Pune Hill

During the course of this year we were given two 10 day vacations.  For my second vacation I had the amazing experience of having my closest and oldest friend come visit me here. When we were younger Katie and I did all of our traveling together including going a trip cross country, Atlantis, the Canarie Islands, Ireland, and Scotland. However we have not traveled together in quite awhile, despite our attempts over the last few years.

While I’ve been living in Nepal for nearly 7 months I have yet to see anything outside of Kathmandu valley and the district of Ramachamp. With Katie coming this would be the perfect opportunity to take advantage of the tourist attractions Nepal has to offer. Nepal contains 7 of the tallest mountains in the world, including Mt.Everest. 4 of these mountains can be seen from one look out point, Pune Hill.  After going through all our options and weighing the pros and cons, we decided that we would spend the vacation trekking to this look out point!

Our itinerary would look like this:

Day 1: Katie arrives J

Day 2: Take Bus to Pokhera and enjoy the afternoon there

Day 3: Begin Trek

Day 4: Trek

Day 5: Trek

Day 6: Return from trek

Day 7: White Water Raft and return to Kathmandu

Day 8: Spend the day in Kathmandu

Day 9: Katie Leaves L

Pokhera is a cute lake town that attracts a lot of tourists. It is where many of the outdoor recreation activities in addition to a lot of view points of the Himalayan Mountains.  We enjoyed our afternoon shopping, eating, and catching up on the past 7 months. 

We began our trek early the next morning with our guide Bikash. Bikash turned out to be awesome! He was easy to get along with, very helpful, and had a good sense of humor. He also was very confident in our abilities, so when we finished our first day of trekking early on in the day, he suggested that we continue on and combined the first two days of trekking, this way we could have a full day in Pokhera at the end to just relax. Motivated by Bikash’s excitement we agreed to continue on.  While the next section was extremely difficult we made it to the next days guest house just as dark was coming. Completely exhausted from the days hiking we both immediately passed out and hoped our bodies would recover for the next day.

Our second day was absolutely amazing. We were hiking through the forests and were able to see the Himalayan mountains along the trail. On the trail it was awesome to see the other trekkers and hear all the languages being spoken. It’s truly amazing how big the world is yet there are places that have the ability to draw people from every corner of the earth.

On our third and final day we headed down the mountain with the image of our bed pushing us to the finish line. While we had done the trek much faster then expected and felt really good about our abilities, our bodies were beaten down and we were in desperate need of a day of rest.

Over the next few days we enjoyed spa treatments, restaurants, and exploring the sites that Kathmandu has to offer. It is rare to have the opportunity to get to share an experience like this with your friends from home. Having Katie here was like having a little piece of home here with me. I know that this will be only one of the many adventures we will have together in this lifetime, but I know that this one will always remain particularly special and have a special place in my heart.