Can you guess where this is?

This is Praha or Prague if you like from a place called the Petra tower. I am terrible at putting these photos in here in a proper order so just bear with me.

These pictures are the cathedral in Praha, the holocaust memorial in Berlin, Holly in Praha, and I forget the name of the tower statue dealy in Berlin.

These photos are of Amsterdam and downtown Lynden, the windmill kind of gives it away. The one with Holly in it is the TV tower in Berlin. It's kinda big.

Part 2 of the "Anna'poo'na race circuit trek"

Having left off writing about the travels through the windy canyon and somewhat touching on the great people you meet along the way I will resume telling the story at the part I like to think of as the "stair steppers dreamland". If you are in serious need of a workout I know the perfect place for you to go. If you were to do the trek in a clockwise fashion and you like to punish yourself for being a bad person then start your trek in Bherathani, go to Ghorepani, and end in Tatopani. In Ghorepani, there is a little side trek to a place called Poon hill that is merely a warm up for going down literally several thousand steps in either direction. The problem, as you may have deduced is that you must climb up several thousand steps to even begin the little climb to Poon hill. From Tatopani it is a decent climb that has most people hitting the hay early and wishing that they had a personal masseuse to help them forget the day. From Bherathani it is something else entirely. Everyone we passed going in that direction was either resting or breathing very hard and cursing in their own language. I made sure to give them reassurances that there were only about 1000 steps left and then it got a little easier for a little bit and then a few more steps after that. They didn't seem very happy about my motivational speeches so I just started lying and saying "you're almost there!" I think the latter is actually a little bit more evil but I wasn't really sorry about it as I chuckled inside. The stairs themselves should be considered one of the wonders of the world. Some of the rocks they use are huge and it is hard to imagine how they were put into position, especially in such professional way. The guys from Context Design and Build would probably comment that the risers were of various elevations ranging from 4 in. to 17 in. and that an inspector would likely fail the builders without even blinking. I give them a passing grade though considering the difficulty level must have been somewhere in the millions on a 1 to 10 scale. From one point you can see a town directly beneath you and it almost looks like you could jump off the stairs and land in one of the cafes that tempt you from such a long distance, but the smart way is right in front of you in a descending zig zag that dissappears from sight and you know it keeps going for a long time after you can't see it anymore. I was very happy we were going down on this side. Oh yes, I must tell you that both of the hikes are in the jungle and it is a little bit hot and humid. We survived the descent and did a marathon hike to catch a taxi to the promised land that is Pokhara. Ahhhh, Pokhara! Every hike should have a town like it waiting at the end of it. Beautiful climate, nice lake, restaurants, shopping (for the ladies of course) and bars and live music. Even though the town itself kind of shuts down around eleven, they will let you stay in the back and drink and laugh away. Most everyone we met on the trek was there at some point and we all had a great time laughing about everything that happened along the way. The only problem though is when you leave the bar the lights in the town are shut off and if you don't have a torch, or "headlamp", then the walk can be a little disconcerting, to say the least. I don't think I was ever so happy to have a stray mangy mutt following me along a dark road. Then you get to the hotel and you have to do a little gate climbing, some creakier than others, and hope you aren't caught at the top by the guy you just woke up from all the noise. Usually he isn't very happy if you do wake him up, but you just smile say "sorry" and "thanks" and run for your bed. I have to say that I became very good at gate climbing in all phases of sobriety and consider myself somewhat of a master, if there is such a thing. I only woke up the guy once or twice that I can remember and that was because they had the front door locked. After a few days relaxing in Pohkara we went on a three day rafting adventure down the Khali Ghandaki river. It was a hands on experience in the way that they made us do a lot of work setting up and breaking down camp, cutting vegetables, and other little tasks like getting water from the source 100 yards away. Overall it was a great time and the work was actually fun and the river was spectacular. We had great food and good rapids and fun people. They filmed us doing the big rapids and setting up camp and other little things and gave us a DVD as well, which was nice. Tried kayaking as well and found out it isn't as easy as it looks to go straight down the river. I also tried the eskimo roll a couple times and failed after swallowing a bit of water. It was funny watching some of the less experienced people try kayaking as we left them behind while they kept trying to go straight and failed miserably. We went back to Pokhara afterwards and stayed for a night and caught a plane to Kathmandu where we stayed for a couple of nights in the town of Bhaktapur and met up with Yuagen and Dharma by complete accident, who so graciously led us around the town. Yuagen invited us into his home to experience one of the festival nights and the blessing of the brother by the sister. It was great and Holly blessed me, as much as she didn't want to. We then went to Kathmandu and spent a couple days there before we bid farewell to our mother. Again I have to say thanks for everything Mom, and that I love you and will miss you in a couple more weeks! A bit of a joke there Mom. Anyway, Holly and I flew out the next day, myself having flown into outerspace the night before with a string of "European ciggarettes" and beer. We made it to Delhi in one piece and with all of our stuff and I will leave it at that. Until next time, Namaste!

How come nobody is writing my blog for me?

Well, I'm back from the trek and have been for some time and I am extremely dissappointed that nobody has composed my blog for me. It is hard work to come into and internet cafe and type, especially when youhave to pay for it! To tell you the truth I have writers block and it is embarrassing to put things out there without inspiration. "How can you not be inspired? ", you may ask, and I would reply that a beautiful 16 day trek will sap all inspiration from you. I could write for three straight days about all the wondrous sights and kind people, friends we made, pains we endured and I still wouldn't be able to encompass it all. It is like putting off a term paper till the last minute (which I always did) and then just panicing about it and not doing anything and then delivering a sub par work that is no fun for anyone. So what I'm going to do is just write in a sort of outline form and I'll tell you in person how it really went. Well, day one started off with 5 hour ride to a one hour off-roader's wet dream drive to our first hotel, which was found by crossing a raging river on a suspension bridge in the dark, being led by two Nepali trekkers (Yugen and Dharma) who we ended up running into several times along the journey and even after by total accident in their hometown. Our room was about a 3 star rating as we were soon to find that most rooms were 1 star, but little did we know or care (some caring more than others, mom), and it being the start of our journey. Well the food was good and we later found out that it was the same menu, almost exactly, all along the trek. This isn't so bad considering when you get done hiking for the day, anything and lots of it is the best thing. For the first few days we stayed in the marysandi river valley with jungle and rice paddies and waterfalls at every turn. It rained the first day only but it was refreshing and welcome considering my shirt and shorts were already drenched with sweat. The towns along the way all have guest houses and the charm is lacking in some, while incredible in others. Of course, the hundreds of trekkers that are on the trail the same time as you do not make it easy to find the charming towns having a available room. We later found out though that most of the places the majority of trekkers stay in are actually not the best as far as views and personalities are concerned so we tried to stay off the beaten path as much as we could. Oh yes, the Annapurna circuit should really be called the Anna"poo"rna circuit "race". Many people mean many donkey trains hauling supplies which means many poo bombs all along the trail. Luckily it doesn't really smell that bad, or maybe I just got used to it and avoiding stepping in it is pretty easy so it really wasn't that bad. Then there was the "race" part. Trying to stay ahead of these large packs of people is exhausting because you speed up to beat them and then you just run right into the ass end of another group of them. All these groups had porters as well who were carrying two peoples' stuff and they were beating the groups mostly. Speaking of porters, these guys are beyond belief. Some of the loads they carry must be seen to be appreciated. My mom now has a porter fetish, and probably took about 100 photos of various loads, including 7 ft. tall bags of rice stalks wrapped in plastic that I couldn't even imagine lifting let alone carrying up a damn steep hill, or down, to the oft seen knick knack porter that had a veritable mini-mart on his back. I guess I can't be too weirded out by my mom's new favorite obsession, because it would be downright sadistic for anyone who wasn't a Nepalese to do the same. They are mini (and some not so mini) supermen. Anyways, after we left the jungle we entered the pine forests which were like going home, except there were 25,000 ft. mountains in the background that appear to rise in a vertical rush. Describing these mountains, even the ones that didn't have any snow on them is useless, and until I put pictures of them onto the blog you'll just have to google pictures of them yourself. Well, after the pine forest region, which unfortunately only lasts for a couple days, you get near the tree line and it becomes drier and more desert like on one side of the valley. Then you know you are getting close to the big climb, which my mom was really excited about. We acclimated in a small town named Ghyaru, that is as beautiful as any on the trek. (Oh yes, I must note that on the way to Ghyaru, Mom was separated from Holly and I while she was taking some pictures of a woman porter carrying a bundle of wheat. It was several hours, the discovery of some very fine naturally growing cannabis, asking everybody in town if they had seen her, seeing signs scribbled in the dirt pointing in the right direction, and one hell of a switchback trail before we were rejoined by our delighted mother, who you know loves you very much when she is actually going back down the trail of doom to come find you). In Ghyaru it was a really peaceful and wonderful time....for Holly and I. My mom at this point got a flu bug or something and didn't feel very well. I thought it was altitude sickness but she refused to believe me. Luckily we planned on staying in Ghyaru for two days so it gave here a chance to recuperate. Well we set off on the trek again and two days later mom gets poisoned by a bad "potato rosty" prepared and served by some of the more drunk Nepali men I'd seen on the trek. I won't describe her illness to you in detail as it may be very emabarrassing for her story to be put onto the world wide web, but I will say that we laughed very hard and long after she got over it, which was before we had to go over the pass. Poor, tough ass mom, endured two days of no sustenance and the hardest part of the climb and decline (which in some ways was worse), and didn't complain a bit, except about the cleanliness of the rooms, which was nothing new to us. (I was and am very proud of you mom and I hope that we weren't too much of a pain in the ass for you, even when you weren't sick). After the pass, you enter the desert phase of the trek, including the Khali Ghandaki River canyon which boasts sustained winds of somewhere near 1000 mph with constant dust in your face. Seriously though it is more likely around 50 mph, but that is enough when you have to walk into it on one of the longest days of the hike. After that it was more towns, meeting the same people over and over, and being very happy to see them each time, which is a wonderful thing to have happen on a long trek with your family. The people on the trek are all great and you find great friends who you know you will keep in contact with for life and possibly meet in Thailand or something in a few more weeks. Well, my hour is up so I'm going to call this one quits for now. Bye!

Kolkata to Raxual: Big stink to little stink.

Wow, it seems like its been two months since I last sat down and did some typing. I'm a little drunk at the Hyatt in Kathmandu right now and finding it difficult to relate what has happened just to get to this point. I guess I must start at the train ride from Kolkata. First of all, never go to a train station in India without help, unless you are in tourist happy zone, which Kolkata is not. It was wild. We saw train cars packed with people beyond sardine can. Our ride was scheduled to last for 10 hours or so and when we saw the people on that train nightmares began. Of course, it was a sleeper train we tourists got on, and it wasn't too bad. I had the middle bunk of a three tier system where sheets, a pillow, and a blanket were provided. We have it so easy. The train ride was a decent and cheap hotel for the night so we ignored the man who puked all over the floor and the rollicking bathroom conditions and had ourselves a good nap. When we woke and arrrived in Patna, we realized quickly that things were going to be different. Patna is not where you want to have a layover. We got off the train and were instantly met by a man who started guiding us somewhere. I was just happy to be walking so I obliged. He led us through a train station from the apocalypse, and to a toursim agent that loves the business he gets from scared newbies. We were happy to give the man our money for a way to get out of town as soon as possible. We then found out we had 12 hours in this place to waste away. I must say that you should never judge a city by its train station, or the bustling crowd that greets you when you get out of it, but Patna is one of those towns. Don't go to Patna. We didn't have any information on the city and it was sweaty and people were all over us so I told Holly we were going for a walk to look for a cafe, internet bar, or any dark place to hide for a while. Well, we walked. And walked, and walked and walked and walked. It was terrible. I think we were the first outsiders to visit some sections of town in several generations. The people themselves were friendly in thier own, stare at you for a literal minute, kind of way, and it was really exciting to watch a man pee into a giant pool mixture of trash and god knows what else as we dry heaved walking by. We finally found an internet cafe and spent a couple hours in there. I didn't blog because I really wanted to get outside of the mindframe I was in before writing anything the public could read about it. After that we went to the "Oasis restaurant and bar" and it was amazing. Forget that the guys in there were wanting to know if we wanted to use the "backroom?" or that Holly could have been the inaugural female. This place was a godsend and we spent three hours there. Then we walked some more. Well, we got lost as usual and had to hire a took-took to get us somewhere. These guys were really nice and took us to places that were interesting and beautiful in there little ways. One was the Ganga river. It was wide and glistening, and if you ignored the trash along the banks, very pretty. Then they took us to the oldest grain silo in the world, which may not be true, because I just made it up, but it was old being first filled in 1786. The view from the top was great and probably the best part about the time we spent in Patna, except fort the leaving part. Well, it came to be that the reason these guys were so nice was because they wanted holly. They were pulling little touch maneuvers where ever they could get away with it. Perverted little puppies that they were, they gave us the cheapest, longest ride we had had so far. So really, it was a pretty good trade off. After getting back to the train station and a still having several hours to waste away, we found an internet cafe that was right under our noses. I hung outside and had a cigarette and was immediately claimed as family by two Indian guys. They were very nice and all, but there is something weird about desperately wanting to get photos, numbers, e-mail addresses, and how soon it will be before you stay at their house. Oh yeah, one rule when traveling abroad with your sister is that you should just claim she is your girlfriend in some countries. People salivate for a picture or want to talk your ear off about your sister. Much easier to claim incest than to deal with the onslaught. After the fifth level of hell, we proceeded directly to the seventh: the bus station. If we didn't have our tourist bookie we would still be in Patna selling our bodies for food. It was dark, exhaust filled, and full of people and horns and christmas lights and smells and whatever nasty things you can think of. It was a maze from hell. Eventually, we got on our sweaty ass bus and praised the lord that we were free. Well, the lord laughed a little bit then, sending us on the busride from hell. Luckily Holly had some ambien. It made part of the 10 hour bus ride over the worst potholed roads and shitty traffic somewhat tolerable. We arrived early in the morning in the border town of Raxual. Here we found that the art of cheating tourists is also not lost. I don't even have the patience to type what all went on in that little blurb of our trip, I'll just say that we avoided costs of around 700 rupees. We're learning that you really just have to tell people "No, I won't pay for this", even if what they are telling you to pay is the real cost. Ignorance of language can be a blessing sometimes, just a very few sometimes. We finally escaped India (thats what it felt like) and then ahead of us was beautiful Nepal, (except the border town is just like India). Fortunately we had another 5 hour car ride ahead of us, and it was only the craziest road I've ever been on.

Road to Kathmandu: Just fly.

If you have any feelings of vertigo or you are scared of heights, don't go on the road to Kathmandu. If you like that kind of thing, along with an ass that requires some second skin, by all means take an SUV. Don't get me wrong though. It was an absolutely amazing car ride. Something I will remember vividly for the rest of my days. Vertical drops on one side and a passing truck on the other, all of this on a one lane road, with the random walker, motorcyclist, or cow to also create obstacles that require swerving. The views of the towering jungle covered mountains with the terraced farms placed in spots most people would find unaccessable was awe inspiring. The people you see lugging bags that weigh more than they do up hills I wouldn't want to walk up naked are humbling to say the least. Yet they do it with a smile and a "Namaste" (hello). We bounced into Kathmandu, got our hotel situated, and were instatnly trasported from Patna hell to Nepal nice. Nepal and its people are truly kind and speak english on a whole very well. The english speaking is not so important but it is hard to have a conversation with locals when all you can do is wave and smile and repeat that same phrase over and over. We relaxed for a bit, wandered around a touristy neighborhood named Thamel, which is a great place to hang out, touristy or not. We alos hung out in a hiking permit office for four hours which was not fun. Very busy time of the year here in Kathmandu, as we can attest to. We went to a buddhist temple called the monkey temple, real name escapes me at the moment, and saw a lot of monkeys, a beautiful temple and an amazing view of Kathmandu valley. We also went to a park outside of the city and did a guided mountain bike tour. A lot of fun and not too much uphill. We stopped at one of the oldest hindu temples, Changu Nayar, in the valley along the way and got our first glimpse of what a rural Nepalese town might look like. The farmers were drying their rice in the square, chickens and goats everywhere, corn hanging from the eaves drying. It was a picture of peace. We stopped and had an amazing lunch as a thunder storm bringing rains blew in. Luckily it didn't rain too hard or for very long, so the rest of our bike journey was very comfortable. The food here is incredible and cheap. I have taken to a dish somewhat similar to Pho named Thukpa. Holly eats mo-mos like they are going to be banned soon, and we both like the beer (myself much more than Holly). Our mom just got in today and we did a little waiting and a such, but we had a great dinner and are getting ready to start the big hike tomorrow (10/7). I heard they have internet along the way, so you may hear from me before the three week schedule is up but if you don't, I'll be sure to remember everything exciting and relate it to you later.