Walking Among Giants: My Everest Base Camp Trek with Adventure Consultants - Part 3 - Arrival in Kathmandu, Nepal and First Impressions
First Impressions of Kathmandu
Up to this point, my biggest international trips had been to Germany, Poland, Austria, Tokyo Japan and various cruise ports through the Caribbean. None of those prepared me for the experience of Kathmandu. It was like nothing else. The air was dirty (you could see the haze and dust in the air), the airport was old, but maintained and operational. I absolutely loved it. It was raw. It was life. It was real.
After deplaning the A330 via stairs, we made our way across the tarmac to the terminal building with the other weary-eyed travelers nearing their destination. The border guards and airport personnel divided us into different groups based on whether we had applied for our visa before hand or needed to do so in person. As we had obtained our visas prior to leaving the US, we were guided towards the cashiers window to pay for the visas and after a quick look at our documents and the payment of $50 USD each, we then headed into the immigration line where we had the visas attached to our passport books and stamped with our arrival dates. The whole process took only around 10-15 minutes in total and we made our way to the luggage hall to collect our duffels. When we rounded the corner into the luggage hall it was like a North Face store, with The North Face duffel bags of all colors stacked and sorted on the floors and conveyors. It took a few minutes of searching, but we eventually found our bags having successfully followed us around the world from Florida. As we had booked through on one ticket, there was no need to collect our luggage in Doha, and our luggage had been checked from Florida to Nepal. We collected our duffel bags and loaded them onto our luggage trolleys and followed the signs to arrivals. Adventure Consultants had been sure to let us know what to look for at the airport and what to do.
After an escalator ride with our trollies full of the supplies, we would need in the next few weeks and a quick photo op at the first sign we saw that said something to do with Nepal, we made our way outside. Adventure Consultants gave us a heads up as to the chaos that would ensue once we left the airport with tour guides and taxi drivers trying to lure unsuspecting casual travelers to come with them for a ride to the city and on a tour. Fortunately for us, Adventure Consultants had a local staff member there outside the airport holding a sign waiting for our arrival. We were greeted with a friendly hello and received a garland of marigolds to place around our necks. Our bags were loaded into our van and off we went to the hotel. After being a bit nervous about our arrival into Kathmandu, after this initial experience, I knew there was nothing to worry about. I was relieved. AC had made reservations and arrangements for us at the Radisson Hotel Kathmandu, which was centrally located to all the places we would really want to see in Kathmandu before and after our trek and was clean, spacious and felt safe.
This trip marked the first time that either of us had been to a place “off the beaten track.” Thinking back to my first impressions, I just remember the traffic. No lanes, limited traffic signals, yet everyone seemed to know exactly what to do. It was a bit like a roller coaster ride from the airport to the Radisson Hotel where we were meeting the rest of our team including Suze Kelly, our lead guide and general manager of Adventure Consultants; more about our amazing guide later.
After being deposited safely at the hotel, away from the hustle and bustle of “Oz,” we met Suze in the lobby and discussed some initial particulars. We were to meet up with the rest of the team later for an introduction and expedition kick off meeting with the other leaders of both the trek and expedition and discuss more plans and particulars of the mission ahead, but for now, since our room wasn’t quite ready due to the earliness of our arrival, we set our bags down and headed up to the hotel cafeteria for breakfast. Breakfast was so fancy with china and properly attired and friend hotel service staff waiting by to pour fresh coffee or tea. They had both traditional Nepalese and Indian offerings as well as western options like omelets, pastries, cereals, etc. It was quite a lovely spread…and one I would come to welcome and appreciate even more after 18 days up in the mountains.
After breakfast and a chance to drop our luggage off in the room we met back up with Suze for a quick acclimatization trip to the Thamel region of Kathmandu. Suze helped with the taxi situation, which was an experience in and of itself and helped us understand the process, negotiation, etc needed to catch a ride by ourselves if needed. I guess you could call Thamel the “tourist” area of the city. It catered greater to travelers with local hotels, food vendors, trekking gear and climbing equipment. We were on the hunt for an ATM. Nepal is a very cash reliant country, so as a point of recommendation, please plan to have access to cash upon your arrival in the country either through a bank or a local ATM (our western bank cards were accepted at the ATMs on their networks, so we had access at any ATM we encountered on the trip, making it pretty convenient overall. With Nepalese Rupees in hand, we were ready. We explored some of the shops in the area on our own for a bit, admiring the handicrafts of the local shopkeepers and stopping for a local beer at a fancy “nightclub” that was just getting ready to open for the day. After a bit of window shopping, we made the adventurous decision to walk back to the hotel. There were sidewalks, yes, but signal lights were sparse to cross the busy streets along the way, so it took a bit of a game of “Frogger” to make it back safety…but, we made it.
Not really remembering at this point when the last time I had actually slept for longer than a couple hours, the time had come for our team meeting to discuss logistics of the trek and expeditions and go over last minute details and safety information. We met in the hotel conference room and met the rest of the team. Ang Dorjee Sherpa was selected to be the expedition lead for the summit attempt. This was his first time as expedition leader for AC and his nerves at his new role on the team showed, but with such a vast amount of experience under his belt (at this point he had summitted Everest 24 times as of the writing of this blog), confidence in his ability was high and everyone was confident the team he put together was only the best. We met the assistant guides who would ensure our safety on the trek and the other climbers/trekkers. It was a good group to say the least.
After the team meeting, we piled into a couple of vans and were treated to a fancy dinner at a lovely restaurant in Kathmandu called Le Sherpa that featured a menu of farm to table fresh international offerings…and beer. We all toasted to a successful journey through the Khumbu region. By this point in the evening, I was completely exhausted by what felt like a 36 hour day, (now that I think about it, I think that’s exactly what it more like 48 hours without since sleeping in an actual bed, although Qatar Airways business class is pretty nice and swanky, it’s still not a bed), the whole group headed back to the Radisson for a well-deserved rest, because the next day had some incredible and exciting things planned.
