Top Of The World!

So, I've been in Nepal for just over a week now - what do I think of it? It's the best place on earth that I have ever visited! From the moment that I saw the highest mountain range in the world, at eye level while on my approach to Kathmandu, I knew I had done the right thing sticking with the journey - and quite simply I feel that once I have 'done' Nepal (and Tibet) there is nothing more that the adventurer within needs to see. I know its a bold, blinkered statement and there are many places I haven't seen in this colourful, eventful, fantastic world, but, I have finally realised that it is this kind of adventure that I crave.

In my first week I have met some fantastic people. I made the effort to brave the streets on my first day so as not to become a prisoner in my room - Thamel - where I am staying is a very nice, safe place with plenty, but not too many, tourists. The sounds, sights and smells sent me into a sensory overload - how can anywhere be like this - the 3rd poorest country on earth and yet so rich in culture - begs the question, money or happiness?

When I had wandered around the city, getting lost like in Bali so as to experience more that this wonderful place has to offer, I returned back to the hotel so see the travel rep that they had to discuss what options they had for me joining group activities. The options and activities out here are just up my street and are endless in Nepal.

I immediately signed up to the 4 day kayaking clinic and expresses my interest in doing the 10 day rafting trip and the Everest Base Camp trek. The rep said he had a couple of guys going on the 3rd of March - tomorrow, going on the Everest trek! Raj, the rep, introduced me to the other guys, A Dutch guys called Hans and a Finish girl called Liisa. The are both really nice people and they said they'd love me to join them on the trip - so there and then we signed up to the Everest Base Camp trek! We wasted no time in getting to know each other and headed our for the day in Kathmandu, to go bowling - yes bowling in Nepal - Hans and I couldn't believe how surreal it was. Later we headed out for a meal and a few drinks to christen the latest European team to scale to Everest Base Camp (5500m ish). We had a good evening and the following day I just relaxed and did some shopping to buy some gear for the trip. I was supposed to be going out for a meal with Liisa but the river guide was operating on Nepali time and was 30mins late for our meeting - I agreed that I'd see him at 6.30am the following day for my Kayaking clinic.

I took to Kayaking like a duck to water - rolled over and stuck my head under the water! This was a shock to me in the cold water and the time under the water seemed like minutes rather than the 5 seconds that it most likely was. I spent the next 2 days getting my balance and practicing the very difficult eskimo roll. While on the trip I managed to grab a 2.5 hour trip with a group down the river I was on - this good was fun. We had lost glasses and a busted up nose, the works - the river classification here is real and not bigged up like back home - grade 3 here is like what back home we are led to believe is grade 4.

Mt first night at the clinic I was cooked for by a local family - the entire family was there - grandparents, parents, aunties, uncles... you get the picture. The children loved me and I adored their dirty little faces as I helped them with their English home work - I was humbled by the entire experience deep in central Nepal - and I bet the children couldn't wait to go to school the following day to tell everyone that they'd had an English guy help them with their english home work - it made me realise how rewarding it must be to teach English to children like this.

I then spent the night on a little wooden shelf in the equipment shed - it was fantastic and possibly the best evening of my life - I was in a dusty little shed on a shelf feeling a glow of pleasure inside me. The following afternoon, after a very cold day in - sorry under the water, the guide leader told me about a trip he had going down the Bhote Kosi river. The Lonely Plannet guide book say the following about it. 'The Bhote Kosi is the steepest river rafted in Nepal - technical and TOTALLY committing, The Bhoti Kosi is one of the best short rafting trips to be found ANYWHERE in the world.' How was I not going - rafting is my real passion and I could do kayaking, sorry drowning in the warmer weather.

So that was it - I was off down one of the worlds most technically demanding rivers.

I met the team at the rafting HQ in Kathmandu, they were a great bunch of guys. An Australian brother and sister, Danny and Nicki, a Canadian, Kev and a Danish couple Maria and Peter. All of us but Peter and Maria has some good river time under our belts and it was needed for this trip. Day one we ran the top section of the upper Bhote Kosi and the commands were coming thick and fast as we as a team tackled well the relentless rapids. There was no time to think about anything else other than focus on Ahmed's commands to ensure that we got into the correct position for the next rapid. Like I said it was relentless - one rapid followed another and it was important that we hit each rapid right so we didn't get hung up or worse still flip into the glacia fed grade 4/5 river! The guide book was right, the Bhote Kosi was totally committing.

We all worked well as a team and it was good to raft with experienced rafters as we cleared the first section with only one mishap with Danny getting spun out on one of the bigger rapids as we used a rock to turn us down one of the many grade 4 rapids. He was front right (the front have it worst with no foot grip) and I was front left. We both lurched to the side and Danny disappeared over the rock and under the raft! We worked well to keep the raft on course while we pulled Danny back aboard.

After the upper section we headed back to setup our camp and got some beers and camped on a ledge above the river - we all had a good chat and an early night for the full upper section of the Bhote Kosi the following day.

The next day a few of the team switched around on the raft but I hung on to the front left - I love that position being able to read the rapids.

It was a totally different river even though we had rafted the top section already - the dam had been opened and the water flow was different - we all had to react a lot faster and got hung up a few more times. We lost Kev in a similar scenario to how Danny was lost the previous day and we struggled to get him back into the raft - he was a big guy -6ft 4" and we didn't line up correctly for the next rapid and got hung up quite badly - we all had to get out of the raft and precariously balance on a tiny rock.

The rapids got bigger in the lower section and there were a couple of grade 5's that we had to portage around as the week before our support kayaker got caught in a hole under one of the drops!

As you can probably tell this was another highlight for me - rafting on one of he worlds best rivers in a country well known for world class rafting throughout the white water world!

After the rafting, we headed back to Kathmandu and I was again glowing inside satisfied that I had had an amazing time and had met some fantastic people! That night we went out to celebrate - the guys were such nice people, and we ended up staying out until 3.30am getting destroyed on cocktails then hitting the only open club in Thamel - when we left the club the whole town was derelict and silent. We got back to the hotel and had to knock up the security and night porter to let us in. The following few days I relaxed in preparation for Everest Base Camp.

I've had a chat to Liisa and Hans and they both said it would be nice if I'd travel down through Malaysia and Thailand with them before I come back up to Nepal to meet Dan, one of he guys from my Foundation Degree course, for 7 weeks in adventure heaven!

Bring it all on - this place rocks - I hope your all well and loving the blogs. Keep it real, I'll be home soon enough to catch up with you all - the thoughts of that is keeping me going - you all uniquely give me inspiration to keep going and you should take something from that - your amazing people!

Wish me luck for Everest!