As I write this, I am sitting in a little art studio I put together in the spare bedroom of my house in North Kingsville, Ohio, United States of America. That's right, we're back home. The Excellent Adventure is over. For now. I'm sure another adventure will start soon enough.
Now the story of how we ended up back home so soon instead of, say, exploring Oman or India or perhaps Abu Dhabi, begins in the city of Kathmandu, Nepal...
Nepal had long been planned as the pinnacle of our trip; the Himalayas had been beckoning us for quite some time. In fact, before this full-on Excellent Adventure was put into play, Kevin and I, along with our older brother Brian, were making rough plans to trek the Annapurna Circuit, a famous 3 week long trail in central Nepal. Instead, we ended up surprising our dad with a week-long fishing trip in Ontario. But that's another story...
Needless to say, we were looking forward to this part of our journey. We arrived in Kathmandu after nearly missing our flight out of Bangkok and, against our better judgment, allowed our taxi driver to talk us into taking a look at the hotel he "represented." And that right there I'd say was one of the biggest turning points in this trip. Now don't get me wrong, this place was great. In fact, if you ever find yourself on vacation in Kathmandu I would certainly recommend Hotel Encounter Nepal. Since we knew this was near the end of our trip, we decided to splurge a bit on our room and spent a whopping $20 (gasp!) for a rooftop suite with real flushing toilets, a bathtub, and a TV. Shoot, there was even a coat rack! But I'll tell you what, the view from our rooftop patio was worth every cent and more.
Obviously, pictures don't do it justice, but this
is our view looking out over the city of Kathmandu
Of every amazing thing I saw on this journey, from the coral reefs of Thailand to the ancient, ruined temples of Cambodia, nothing compared to looking out over the rooftops of Kathmandu. I'm not sure why I was so floored by the sight, but gee whiz, it was something alright.
Me attempting (poorly) to capture the scene on paper
So we lived the high life for a couple days, ordering chicken cordon bleu for dinner every night along with a side order of macaroni and cheese (to be honest, possibly the most delicious meal I have ever consumed). Now, when I said coming to this hotel was a turning point, that was because instead of going off and tackling one of these treks on our own, we decided to check out the trekking company run by the hotel. To cut a long story short, we ended up with a 21 day trekking package to the Mount Everest Base Camp by way of the beautiful Gokyo Valley, followed by an ascent to the top of Island Peak, a 20,000 foot tall mountain in the shadow of Everest itself. Being the generous brother I am, I ended up loaning Kevin the $1,500 to cover his half of the trip. It may sound like a lot, but $1,500 covered food, lodging, mountain climbing gear rental, the flight to and from the start of the trek, and a personal guide for the entire 21 days. And considering the original price of all that was around $2,500, I'd say we got a good deal. Even so, it pretty much wiped out the end of our budget.
Everything I had stuffed into my pack at this point of the trip
Now, I suppose I should say it
would've been a good deal if we had lasted the full 21 days. For you see, about a week into the trek, we started to run into problems. At around 12,000 feet I started to feel the effects of high altitude. Altitude sickness was something I had never even thought of before, but once you're in the mountains, it's something that's on your mind every day. We kept hearing stories of two Dutch guys who ignored the warning signs and climbed too high too fast and ended having to be life-flighted back to Kathmandu; the helicopter ride alone cost them $9,000. Needless to say, I started taking altitude sickness seriously. So when I started getting the early symptoms, such as tiredness, poor appetite, and headaches, I had a tough decision to make.
Namche Bazaar, the last town on the trek.
We stayed here several days acclimatizing to the altitude.
On one hand, I had paid a significant amount of money for this potentially once-in-a-lifetime experience to visit Mount Everest and then climb a 20,000 ft Himalayan mountain, but on the other hand, I had my very life to consider. If I had continued, the symptoms would have progressed from headaches to coughing to vomiting. And from there, potential loss of consciousness followed by a coma and even death. Combine that with Kevin's problem of a nasty knee infection that was spreading and I believe the other hand made a better case.
Kevin's infection. Nasty...
So, sadly, we made the tough descision to cut our losses and return home. Losing out on a thousand dollars is much better than spending $9,000 for a helicopter ride to a hospital.
But you know what? The days we did have out on the trail with our faithful guide Birus were some of the best days of all. There's just simply no way to convey the immenseness of the Himalayas, and the feeling of freedom that comes from trekking into the wild with all your wordly possesions on your back; you just can't put a price on that.
With good friends at your side and a keen sense of adventure, you can go anywhere, do anything, and be anyone you want to be. So what are you waiting for?
