I don't even remember now whose idea it was. Was it a phone call or an e-mail message? At first, the notion didn't feel real. Nepal was out there somewhere, with Everest and Sherpas and K2 and Annapurna and living legends. And suddenly, I was in the travel agency, looking at a booklet of tickets in my hand. A rather thick booklet. The one in the very middle ends with the three letters KTM. Kathmandu. What language do they speak there? What is the time difference?
A few months passed. Life routine was undisturbed, almost. Except for a booklet of tickets in my bag. Every once in a while I would pull it out and look at it. Thinking, "I really should start preparing for the trip".
Our plan was complex and ambitious. Groups from three countries would meet in Kathmandu and run a few rivers expedition style - no guides, no raft companies, just us and the Himalayas. We made it work, too - or most of it, anyway. We ran five rivers, and we saw the towns and the mountains. Through most of it, I kept a diary. It's neither a "how-to" manual, nor a guidebook. I just wrote down the stuff that caught my eye, or seemed important enough or fun enough to remember.
Whitewater is one of my life passions. Looking at the wild game of streams, trying to solve the river's puzzles. Excitement what you read it right and panic when you didn't. I'll try to stay within the style and traditions of river stories. That is, I'll sprinkle in a reasonable amount of truth - as much as the story needs to stay together by the campfire or at the dinner table. And add plenty of special effects. So, like any good river story goes, no s$%&, there I was!
I'm standing at the Delta ticket counter, talking to the clerk. Two duffel bags - a light one with my gear and a heavy one with food - are there too, just to make a point. Next to the huge food duffel, my paddle looks small. Perhaps talking is not quite the right term. We're taking turns saying all sorts of things, but the actual information exchange is almost nil.
The clerk wants me to pay the ridiculous overweight charge. I want my luggage to get all the way to Kathmandu, the same way I'm going. It seems like the clerk and I don't have much of a common ground. The plane leaves late, so I have time for this. Just barely. At the end, we both yield - the bags get checked in, and I pull out the Visa. The paddle stays home - "paddle fare" is enough to buy a whole new paddle.
Finally, the plane takes off. Within an hour we cross Ohio, and nobody is worried about a speeding ticket!
In Nepal, almost everything is possible. You can stop a boy on the street and ask for a helicopter. He'll charge you an arm and a leg, and the helicopter will be dirty and smelly, but it will be there. The only thing that's impossible is to know ahead that you'll meet the helicopter boy on the street. That's Nepal for you. Plans don't work very well in Himalayas. Must be the altitude. Don't make plans, just get there... And make sure you have a lot of good karma. And some dough, at least for the first time.
We did have a plan. Or I did. I'd get to Kathmandu, meet with the Moscow group (Oleg and Dima), get a car, load our gear and get to Pokhara. By that time the Israel group (Borya, Slava, Lev, and Alka) should be waiting for us. As plans go, it was a not a bad one. With safety margins and fallbacks and daily tasks and emergency communication channels.
Four hours later in Newark I'm looking at the phone in disbelief. I finally managed to get the Moscow group on the phone, and they are coming to Kathmandu ten hours later than I thought. No, they don't know when their plane lands, but it leaves Delhi at 10pm. There goes the plan. Okay - we'll get the night bus to Pokhara. Or we'll get a hotel and drive to Pokhara in the morning. Or something.
I wake up from jet lag induced sleep and peer through the window. We are approaching Singapore, and the sight is magnificent. Right next to us in the sky is a small thunderstorm. Transfixed, I watch as the violet and blue cloud slowly turns, and lightning pierces its thickness time and time again. The engine noise hides the thunder, and the storm seems quiet and majestic.
Singapore airport is clean like a modern hospital, and runs with the same quiet efficiency. I check the e-mail (nothing from Moscow or Israel groups), and munch on some French cheese in the food court. Don't even remember its name, but it was really good. The cheese was good, not the food court. Actually, the food court was not bad either.
Finally, I'm inside the plane that will take me to Kathmandu. The last leg of the journey. My neighbor is wearing a "Montana" tee shirt. We introduce each other - his name is Martin, and he is going to Nepal with his friend Nicholas. I'm amazed - they don't really have a plan! Just get to Kathmandu, spend a few days there... Maybe some trekking... Then onwards to Pokhara, or maybe somewhere South...
My entry visa application is filled up, and I decide to prepare the visa fee. My money belt feels suspiciously soft. Maybe it's in the backpack? When I pour its contents on the floor and start picking through it, Martin asks if I'd forgotten something. "I hope not," I say through clenched teeth. I hope not... But the money isn't in the backpack. Neither it is inside my jeans. Or in other pieces of clothing. Or in the body cavities. Somebody in Singapore airport is $500 richer. And I don't even have enough money for the entry visa. This is bad... The phrase from a guidebook floats in front of my eyes. "There are no cash machines in Kathmandu". Right. That's why I didn't take my bank card. Maybe Nepal customs take credit cards? Fat chance...
In Nepal, there are two kinds of problems. Ones that you can solve - no reason to worry about those. And ones that you can't solve - no sense to worry about those, either. I forgot everything about my sorry financial state of affairs when the white clouds in the window turned out to consist of rocks, snow, and ice.
If you are lucky, there are two phases in your life. The first one lasts until you first see the Mt. Everest. The second one begins immediately after. As I watch, I can feel the residue of the first phase draining out of me. Our plane waits politely, circling in a holding pattern. In about twenty minutes I am ready. The new phase has begun. The pilot must have felt it, too: Without me saying anything, the plane tilts its wings and starts to descend.
Martin, Nicholas, and I carefully separate our noses and camera lenses from the window glass. Instead of the black and white giants, the window is filled with green-terraces covered hills, and finally the 747 is rolling down the runway.
As far as amenities go, the Kathmandu International Airport is not quite on the cutting edge. Takeoffs and landings it can handle just fine. Customs, passport control, money exchange, and a bulky X-ray machine just about sum it up. For food and shelter you have to go downtown.
At the moment, being penniless and $20 short of an entry visa, shelter is not my number one priority. While I'm contemplating manual labor and selling body parts, Martin takes pity on me and loans me the money. A good thing, too - manual labor is not very lucrative in Nepal.
As I fumble with passport photos and applications, Martin and Nicholas disappear into the doorway. I wave them goodbye. Soon, I'm a proud owner of Nepal entry visa. Next thing to negotiate is customs. What will they say about six gallons of freeze-dried meat and forty rolls of Kodak 400 film? What if there's a duty or an entry tax? It took me two hours to pack that duffel! A sign on the wall clearly says "the limit is 15 rolls of film and 1 camera." Miraculously, my US passport lets me through the green corridor, duffel bags and all.
Meanwhile, an emergency Plan B is starting to form (or is it C or D?). I'll just wait here for the Moscow team to arrive. Find out when their plane lands, pick out the most interesting wall, sit down on my duffel bag facing it, and wait. Maybe I'll curl into a fetal position for an hour or so, just for a change of pace.
True to its nature, Nepal disposes of my new plan as quickly as I can come up with it. There's nowhere to wait and nothing to eat. Now that I successfully infiltrated the country, food is starting to climb the list of the priorities. Shelter is right up there too, preferably with a shower. After all, thanks to Nicholas's generosity I still have ten US dollars - that can go a long way here. I also need to know when the flights from Delhi arrive: One of them is supposed to be carrying Oleg and Dima. A travel agency clerk hints that flight schedules may be in the Departures Hall. So I gather my resolve and take a peek outside.
The sight that opens up through the glass doors is not for the faint of heart. There's a crowd out there, intent on getting to the new arrivals. A line of policemen is holding them down, just barely. I make a guard swear that he'll let me back in, slip through the doors and start walking towards the unknown.
In about two seconds I realize that I'm not walking alone anymore. From nowhere, a man appears. His name is Khem, he has a hotel. And he would like me to stay there. Of course he can show me where the Departures Hall is, but he knows the arriving schedule by heart. And he would like me to stay in his hotel. And he sympathizes with the lost cash. But he is certain it's not a problem. And here is a pamphlet of his hotel. And transportation is not a problem. And he will take me to the bank that can get money from anything. And he would really like me to stay in his hotel... In a few minutes of this I give up.
Instantly, another man appears, looking like a low-ranking operative of a local crime ring. No gun holster bulge though. A trainee? Off duty? "It's our driver", Khem explains. Okay. The most I'm risking is ten dollars and the freeze-dried meat, right?
As a whole platoon of eight-year-olds, again from nowhere, struggles to load my luggage into the taxi, I survey the vehicle. It have seen better days - maybe before the safety belt got cut off... I see no bullet holes or blood stains though. Khem makes sure that I don’t overpay the kids, the engine coughs to life, and the airport disappears into the exhaust cloud.
As we navigate through the busy streets, I notice a movement on the side of the road. What seemed a dog on the first glance, turns out to be a monkey. Gibbon, I think. I'm definitely not in Kansas anymore... Who am I kidding, I've never been to Kansas.
Instead of a bank, we stop at a travel agency. But my request to take money from a credit card seems quite ordinary to the clerk. Soon, I'm eleven thousand rupees richer. Things are looking up, plans or no plans!
Within another half an hour, I'm taking a shower. I have a room on the fourth floor, with a view of Kathmandu. Come evening, Khem will go to the airport with me. Yes, things are definitely looking up!
In a few minutes, hunger drags me out of the shower and into the streets of Thamel. Thamel is where the tourists are. And I do my best being a tourist as well. I drink in the noises and the lights and the smells, thread through the crowds, snap pictures of this and that. The city is full of life and energy. Asia is intoxicating, and I can't get enough.
At night, as promised, Khem takes me to the airport. The crowd is still there, but now I'm on the other side of the police barricade. Nothing feels threatening anymore. There's no need for PA announcement - he runs behind a fence, and in a few minutes comes back with the news: The flight from Delphi is delayed for an hour. Suddenly, I notice a familiar shadow by the arrivals doors. Yes, it's Oleg. Their tickets got changed, and they landed this morning, half an hour after I left the airport. Been waiting here the whole day. So much for plans...
In the morning, Khem arranges for us a van to Pokhara.
Soon, we are on the road. We stop once on a dusty sun-baked gas station, then keep going. Finally, after five hours, we are in the Lakeside. It's a small suburb of Pokhara. Tourist shops, hotels and pubs surround the narrow streets. We catch glimpses of the lake and the peaks beyond.
The van is circling up and down the Lakeside, trying to find the Moondance restaurant. That's our meeting place, and that's where somebody called Charlie rents out kayaks. Finally, everything is in order. We get a room in the Paradise hotel, unload the van, and go to the Moondance for dinner. Charlie turns out to be a middle-aged tall Frenchmen with good English. Oh sure he says. He has heard from the group that we are meeting. They should be coming here shortly. By the way, they broke the cataraft...
Suddenly, the sky is not as bright anymore. And I mean literally - the storm clouds are quickly gathering over the valley. As we are waiting for our food, the atmosphere grows more and more intense. Whenever a bus with rafters comes in front of the restaurant, I run out to check for the cataraft frame on the roof and familiar faces in the windows.
Simultaneously, three things arrive. The food, the bus with the cataraft on top, and the rain. Nice noisy tropical shower. My first impulse is to run out and meet the bus, but I quickly evaluate the situation and do what the priorities of the moment dictate: Return to my chicken fried rice. It's a bit dry, but good nonetheless.
Finally, all is sorted out. The cataraft has a hole in the right tube, but it can be fixed overnight. The gear is in the hotel, and we are in the restaurant, making plans and exchanging river stories. Lev, Alka, Borya, and Slava survived the Kali Gandaki river. We decide on our next destination - Madi Khola.
When we wake up, the weather is nothing like the day before. The air is clean and clear, and the valley is surrounded with snow-white peaks. We eat breakfast on the roof of the hotel. Time to pack our gear for the trip. I open the big duffel bag - we'll leave part of the food in the Charlie's shop.
The inside of the bag smells good. Too good, in fact. It smells of chocolate butter. True, there was a jar of the stuff in the bag. But now the jar is no more, and the content of the bag is mostly chocolate butter. The hotel owner's wife takes pity on me and helps me with the washing...
After three grueling hours, our gear is on top of a van again. Last five minutes to extract everybody from the shops, and we are on the road. We smell of chocolate butter, sweat, dust, and gasoline for the stove. And my newly rented kayak, Wavesport Stubby, is riding on the roof!
The Madi Khola put-in is not reachable by car. After the three-hour ride, the van drops us off in front of a small tea house. From hear on, we have to hire porters and continue on foot. We spend another two hours negotiating, waiting for porters to come, and splitting the gear into bundles. Finally, we are on our way. Madi Khola is behind a mountain range, so we have to cross it to get to the water. As we walk, the sun is pretty hot, but the air gets thinner and cooler.
I'm trying to stay behind the last porter, to make sure that nobody gets lost. At some point I wander ahead of him. I'm covered in sweat and dust, and feeling happier than I had for quite some time! Suddenly, I see a blue and white ribbon of water down below. That must be our river. The view is breathtaking. I decide to take a break and wait for the porter. Suddenly, a Nepalese girl approaches me. She is dressed in traditional bright flowing fabrics. Her English is fluent, and we talk. She is from Pokhara, spending her vacations here. We pose for pictures, and sure enough - my camera is out of film!
The road starts to descend, and the sun is replaced by the afternoon shadows. We walk through a small village, and the local children present their English vocabulary. "Howyudoing? Sweets?" They form an honor guard, so our procession grows in number.
Finally, we reach the river shore. The loads are dropped, and we set up camp. The children are at complete awe of the new spectacle: Three guys running around the disassembled cataraft, with much commotion and swearing. There's a good reason for it, too - the cataraft has a wrong frame. Somehow, two-seater tubes came with a frame from a four-seater. We improvise, and in a few minutes the Moscow-made contraption is assembled and inflated. The fasteners are simple, just a loop of webbing and an aluminum stick. You wrap the loop around the frame, thread the stick through the loop ends, then rotate it to tighten the loop, and lock it in place with another ring of webbing. It's ingenious but takes a lot of body anguish. The locals retreat, forfeiting a fine chance to expand their Russian vocabulary.
As the night comes, everything grows dark and mysterious. The locals come back offering to share a drink, we decline. The first can of the dried meat goes pop. Slava is an artist - what used to be a load of cardboard-like dry chunks, now emits heavenly flavors. I discover that if I pull my head back far enough, I can see the entire horizon line of the gorge. As I watch, the moonrise slowly dims out she Milky Way. The smell of food brings me back to reality, but not for long.
Mornings in Nepal are not soft or sleepy or tranquil. First thing you know, you were under a bottomless starry sky. Then, all of the sudden, Wham! It's bright daylight and time to get up! Now!
So we get up at 6:00 and break camp. We are high in the mountains, and the air is chilly. We pack, we tie the packed stuff on top of the catarafts. Then we pack some more. Then somebody comes up with a great idea - carry the empty cataraft towards the water, and then tie on the cargo! I'm not sure what prompted the idea - maybe the weight of a fully loaded cataraft. So, we untie and unpack and carry and repack and retie. Finally, the moment is there - my paddle slices through the melted ice of Annapurna range!
Yes! I'm in the water! I check the temperature - it's sixteen degrees Centigrade. Good thing too, because my wetsuit is on another continent. Now a couple of stern-squirts to get a feeling for the current, and I'm ready to go! (A stern squirt is a move when the back of the kayak slices under the current, so that the front of the boat pops up). The squirts feel a bit sluggish - must be the altitude. One by one, we push away from the shore and into the embrace of the Madi Khola.
Very quickly, the river shows us who is boss. First, the cataraft with Oleg and Dima broaches on the rock. After some struggle, we set them free and keep going. I'm trying to avoid a small hole, but it catches my boat, flips me end over end, and generally deliveres a through spanking. Then I flush out - only to repeat the process in the next hole. Wake up!
Slowly, I realize that there's water in my boat. A lot of water. I get to the shore, untie the drain plug and set the boat on the stern. The water pours out, both from the drain plug and from the crack next to it. Now, for those of you who aren't familiar with the design of whitewater kayaks, let me assure you. There aren't supposed to be any cracks! I use a space-age treatment - a half-roll of duck tape, and get into the water. The first boulder scrapes it off, and I'm back on the shore, minus the patch. Time to get smarter - I cut the duct tape into small pieces and stuff them into the crack one by one. This actually works.
The slalom continues - the river has a lot of gradient, and a lot of boulders. I run sweep, straggling to avoid all holes and trying not to think what to do if the cataraft needs help. According to the description, there should be a Class V rapid after the tributary. Soon, we see it - a boulder garden decorating two drops, with a nasty-looking hole on the far right. We set up safety and cameras and run it one by one. As I'm waiting with a throw-rope and Alka with a camera, Slava runs the rapid. He comes to the first drop, goes down the slide, picks up some speed and punches the small hole that guards the second drop. In no time, he is in the eddy below. Now it's Boris'es turn. It's his first Class V drop in a kayak, so he is pretty keyed up. He hits the line perfectly - with about ten times speed that it required. Then the cataraft with Oleg and Dima goes through. They run a good line - for a rock climber, that is. Takes them some time to separate the rock, the paddles, the cataraft, and the river. One of the paddles goes for a swim, but Dima fishes it out. Then Lev and Boris get into the second cataraft, and run the drop; Finally, I get into the boat. I go down the slide, catch an eddy behind a boulder, glide across a tongue into the next eddy - and I'm through.
Again, the slalom resumes - jumping this way and that, avoiding the holes. We come to an interesting drop on the river left. Two nasty looking holes and a pillow between. We stop to take a look, then run it. The Catarafts plow right through, the kayaks go in front of the first hole, turn on the pillow and behind the second hole.
The evening is coming, and we need to look for a place to camp. At some point Oleg fells off the cataraft, and Dima gives chase - alone in a two-man cataraft. When we catch up with them, Oleg is cold, the sky is starting to darken, and we really need to get out of the water. Besides, the river character didn't change - the next drop is right in front of us, decorated by a couple of huge boulders, and seems nasty. So we climb the right bank and set up camp.
For those of you who are considering camping on a rice field, let me offer a bit of advice: Don't! They say, you need a lot of water to grow rice. On close inspection, we found that to be inaccurate. In fact we found only a little water, flowing on top of generous amount of mud. Let me assure you - for setting up tents and cooking food, this environment is less than ideal.
Well, it isn't all that bad. We use the ropes to pull the bags up from the catarafts. A local girl let us use her sickle to dig a drainage ditch, to divert some of the water away from the tents. We repay with granola bars. When I climb down to fill up a water bottle, I discover that the river shore is undercut - I can push the bottle straight under the rock. Soon the sky is completely dark, save for the stars and the light bugs. We go to sleep, lulled by the noise of a hole less than ten feet below.
Part 1