Let the Nepal Adventure Begin!

I made it!!  Have just woken up from a very welcome 4hr afternoon nap and am tired from the journey, but I wanted to crank out a quick blog to welcome you to Nepal and the start of my Annapurna adventure!

First impressions – Kathmandu is nuts.  It reminds me a lot of India with the INSANE traffic and mopeds – and pedestrians – that somehow manage not to get squashed in the chaos.   It took about an hour to drive through the insanity from the airport to reach our hotel, the Thamel Park, which is where  I am now, chugging hydration fluids, feeling a bit loopy and wondering if I am hungry or not.  (I just read the room service menu and am not really any better informed as to what my dining choices are, so I think I’ll leave it awhile and come back to it later.)

So it took a while to get here, traveling first to Istanbul, then onwards to Nepal – both with Turkish Airlines.  Because of how the journey costed out, I’d made 2 separate bookings, so I’d have to collect my bags after my first flight to Istanbul, and then recheck in for my flight to Nepal – but the savings were worth the slight inconvenience.  I recall it being super easy and efficient the last time I did something similar when I flew to Ercan for Loopy’s birthday last year (at least in Biz Class!).

The Turkish Airlines flight was about an hour late leaving ORD – but I had purposely made sure to give myself a very generous layover allowance in Istanbul, so that there would not even be the possibility of my having to leg it through the airport!  So other than being mildly irritating to stand for ages in the boarding queue (and then again on the jet bridge?), it wasn’t really a big deal.  The flight itself was uneventful – very smooth with virtually no turbulence (thank you, flying gods) and I think I actually managed to get a couple hours of sleep.  The meal service was OK – but I do think the standard of the food has slipped in the last couple of years that I’ve flown with them, IMHO.  I remember being blown away by how tasty the food was on Turkish – now, its perfectly serviceable but also perfectly forgettable.  They did make a BIG deal about serving “The Oldest Bread” – a small dark brown roll that came individually presented in its own little white cloth bag and promo video.  According to the description, its “12,000 years old and still as fresh as the first day” – I’m not sure that’s quite the flex that Turkish Airlines thinks it is, especially as it really didn’t taste all that good.  You know I love me some bread – but this was distinctly underwhelming, a fitting metaphor for the entire meal.  #firstworldproblems, amiright?? (you know I totally nicked that little bag so it wasn’t a complete waste)

I said this last time – but Istanbul airport is SO much nicer when its experienced not at breakneck speed in a panicked state.  I had plenty of time to get through immigration and security (while they may suck at ancient comestibles, Turkish Airlines certainly knows how to get its Biz class passengers through the various airport chores efficiently – top marks there – LISTEN UP, Kathmandu airport!) and mosey my way up to the TA lounge.  I had a solid 6hrs to relax and chill out before my flight to Nepal, so I availed myself of the shower suite in the lounge, enjoyed some freshly made pides (Turkish flatbread) and read more of my book on the 2008 K2 mountaineering disaster (where 11 people lost their lives on K2 in a single night).  And – no – I have no desire to summit K2 or Everest or Annapurna – base camps will do just fine for me, thank you very much.  I also decided to book a week long photography expedition to the Lofoten Islands in Norway in September (instead of going camping and hiking in the Nangma Valley in Pakistan) and I also supported an Indiegogo for an automated Sourdough Sidekick machine.  This is being developed in partnership with King Arthur’s Baking and it promises to automate the whole sourdough starter refresh/feeding process AND tell you when your sourdough is at peak activity for bread making!  If all goes well, it should be shipping to yours truly in Jan 2026 – hurrah!

So all in all, a pretty productive layover.  Eventually, it was time to wander in a complacently leisurely fashion over to B3 for my 6hr flight to Kathmandu – departing IST at 8.30pm and landing at 6am local time.  So my second “night” spent on an airplane for a total journey time of at least 24hrs (I know I should be able to work out exactly how long, but time zones make it more complicated to figure out!).   Again, I think I managed to get a bit of sleep – but I woke up when I smelled coffee being brewed in the galley (ah, Pavlovian conditioning at work).  I assumed that it was for the breakfast service and that we were about 1.5hrs out, so I got up, took my earplugs out, had a pee and basically thoroughly woke up – before I realized that we still had at least 3hrs to go, breakfast was nowhere in sight and the coffee was probably for the pilots.  Dammit.

But it did mean that I was awake to see the sunrise and shape of the mountain ranges below us start to come into view.  Alas, I was sitting on the wrong side of the plane to get a really decent view of the sun over the mountains (top tip – if you are flying in to Kathmandu from Istanbul, make sure you sit on the left hand side of the plane, looking forward) but there should be many MANY great photo ops this trip, so it wasn’t the end of the world.  Looking out of the window, it seemed very hazy (smog?) with very low visibility to the ground below us.  Sure enough – with only 15mins to go before landing, we were thrown into a holding pattern that looped around and around Kathmandu airport because visibility was not sufficient for landing, according to the pilot.  After almost TWO HOURS of this, we finally did manage to land – but not before I’d started to wonder a) how long can we do this for before we run out of fuel and b) what is plan b?  Fortunately, I was saved from my mild internal catastrophizing (wow – that is a tricky word to spell when you are jetlagged) and it is the epitome of a “Nothing I can do about it so no point worrying about it” problem.  Honestly, it didn’t look all that much less hazy at 8am than it did at 6am, but whatever – we finally made it safe and sound and that is all that matters.

Kathmandu airport is a clusterfuck.

Now, not as bad as Bali airport (my longest ever immigration experience) but I’d say its in the top 10 annoyingly Queue-y airports to get through.  To visit Nepal, you need a tourist visa which you can apply for online or simply get at the airport (the recommended option).  The word “simply” is used here in the context of it was not hard or complicated – but it was a right old pain in the ass that took FOREVER.  You first had to go to the self-service visa kiosk,  scan your passport and fill out all your information using keyboards that were definitely having some sort of existential crisis and really didn’t want to live anymore and just hope you’d answered the questions correctly.  You then had to either pay online at the kiosk – or take a photo of your completed visa application (which included the application number) and then join the throng of people massed around the visa payment desk, to pay in cash.  The online option was a non-starter as the screen was entirely in Nepalese (am not yet fluent) so off to the scrum I went.

As a Brit, there is no excuse for a poorly organized queue.  At least with a well structured line you can amuse yourself by trying to calculate how fast its moving and how long it will take you to get to the front.  With a big wodge of people – not so much.  AND then you have the jabronis who just breeze on past the line and walk right up to the front, being VERY sure not to make any eye contact with anyone, to just cut straight on in.  Maybe they had good reason to (douche pass, anyone?) so I was annoyed and envious in equal measure.  In the end, it probably took about 30 mins so it wasn’t terrible – and I was grateful I’d not been at the back of the plane – I could just imagine how long it would take for several hundred people having to painfully tap their way through that visa kiosk system.  Brutal.

As I was waiting in the “line” I could feel this bead of sweat form and then trickle very slowly down the back of my leg.  I had been tracking the weather for the last couple of weeks and it was forecast to be hot in Kathmandu – like 80 degrees hot.  Even in Annapurna, the forecast was in the upper 70s – which is unexpected when all the photos you see of ABC have snow in them.  I did make sure to pack a few t shirts, but my gear was still definitely skewed towards expecting it to be cold and needing to layer up.  I’m sure it will be a bit colder, especially higher up, but I think I will probably need to get something cooler to sleep in as I think I might roast in my 20 degree rated bag and thermal pyjamas!

Anyway, visa in hand, it was another queue to then get through the immigration checkpoint, and then yet ANOTHER line to go through another bag screening (which seemed a bit redundant – we’d all just gotten off a plane and hadn’t been anywhere else, so…??).  After that line, we finally got to the baggage hall to retrieve our luggage – which all turned up!  Yey!!  And then there was one last line after we’d collected our bags for another security check (they really don’t want you bringing those bricks of money or gold bullion into the country, so i’m glad I left mine at home).  All in all, that whole process took a solid hour and a half – at least half of it spent in queues of indeterminate utility.  Anyhoo, all the waiting around did give me the chance to meet and get to know one of my new travel buddies, Racheal, a bit, so that was nice.  There are only 8 of us now on this trip (a couple people canceled at the last moment) which I think is the perfect size of group.  Also on our flight was Forest, a friend of both Racheal and Amanda’s – but she was in economy enjoying the high-definition stereo sound of twin babies crying through the flight, so it took her a while to get through all the arrival shenanigans.  But we found our arrival team easily and were greeted with a warm smile and a wonderfully fragrant garland of bright orange marigolds – very grateful for it masking the day-old travel funk!

I can smell it as I sit here on my bed typing away and its still glorious, if a little wilty by now.  The room here is pretty basic – but there is a kettle so I can make some tea and the beds are firm and comfy.  My plan tonight is to get something from room service (maybe the Frutynuty salad or the Chicken Sizzler), have a shower and then try and get to sleep on local time.  I also need to figure out the toilet sitch as all I can see right now is the loo with a bidet hose next to it.  No obvious flush handle anywhere.  That’s OK for having a pee, but I need to figure this out before the need for number 2 strikes.  I don’t particularly want to be attacking a turd with a shower nozzle if I can help it.

So that’s it for now.  Tomorrow, the rest of the group arrive and we meet with our ABC crew and get ready for our short internal flight to Pokhara, gateway to our trek.  Not sure what I’ll have energy for tomorrow (its a curious 10hr 45 min time difference to Chicago) so I may be all over the place.  But I will keep you posted as best I can, wi-fi and jetlag permitting!

LET THE FUN BEGIN!!!

* Oh bugger.  I just realized I signed up for an Indiegogo for that sourdough machine on April 1st.  I don’t think its an April Fools joke – but I guess I’ll find out next January!!