Annapurna

Dear Blog-follwers,

I sit here in a small travel agents/internet cafe with a cup of milk tea and a chocolate croissant feeling inspired to write to you all. I have in fact forgone my normal breakfast of toast, eggs, spinach, potatoes and tomatoes for a slightly less healthy option, but one that allows me to type. I've even cycled 7.5km (3.5miles) in 20 minutes to get here and write, so, as I sit here sweating, I'm sure you're wondering what could possibly have made me so enthusiastic? The clue is in the title of the entry. This morning was our first sighting of the Annapurna mountains. We woke before 7 and having had a night of no rain and a sunny morning we decided to walk up to the viewpoint just behind where we are camped.

We tried not to make any noise as the campsite was quiet, but Amelie and Til's dog Ole was too excited to see us up and had to have at least a few barks! We took him and their other dog Ford with us and with another stray in tow, the five of us followed the footpath over the bridge, up the side of the hill to see the snow-capped peak of the Annapurna for the first time. We sat in the sunshine and just looked in awe at the vastness of the mountain. I think the Annapurna is around 7,800metres high. It's been covered by the monsoon clouds almost everyday for the last few months and you almost start to doubt that there are any big mountains at all.

My cycle in around the lake this morning was also beautiful. The monsoon, despite being the worst for a long time has produced, along with the hard labour of Nepali women, beautifully deep green paddy-fields. The hillsides are covered in grass and trees and running with water. We're only 800 metres above sea level in Pokhara, but the hills around the lake climb to 1500 metres and the water is continuously running off them. Terraced farming has been the method used to harness the water, the end result being the continual sound of running water as it is chanelled through different terraces, over and under roads and eventually makes its way to the lake. Is this the most magical combination in the world; snow-capped mountains, deep green hills, cool water and hot sunshine?

Anyway, I realise that I should return to the story I left last time. We had just had four weeks in Pame at the campsite and were heading to Kathmandu. We went with Amelie and Til and decided to stop at place called Bandipur, a small town set amid the hill tops 80km from Pokhara. We arrived in the afternoon and found a great place to park where there were two hotels and a huge area of grass at the end of which was a viewpoint of the mountains. The town was a lovely little place and the buildings almost tudor looking. Newari architecture is incredibly similar. The little carved wooden windows and doors, the closeness of the houses, the flagstone streets, all looked like a small village from the middle ages.

We had a really nice couple of days there, but the day Amelie and Til were due to leave was a little more fraught with tension. We had parked next to an old water tank. It was  a big square hole set into the ground, maybe 2 metres deep, and 15 meters across both way. They are still used in many places for people to wash and do their laundry. The sides of the tank are exactly the same as the dry stone walling you get at home. We had both parked next to this tank and the two days we were there it had rained very heavily. Amelie and Til were due to leave at 6 in the morning to get to Kathmandu. We heard their engine start and then had a frantic knock on the door with Amelie asking Mark to help them. We both got up and couldn't believe our eyes. Their truck; a great big 8 tonne green Mercedes 911 beauty was precariously tilted on one side where the wall of the tank had fallen away as they'd tried to reverse out of their parking spot. The combination of the sodden ground and the weight of their truck had made the tank collapse. The frog (it looks like one!) was not looking good. It wouldn't be an exageration to say it was tilted at a 45 degree angle. All 8 tonnes of it.

We knew we couldn't tow it out as we only weigh 4.5 tonnes max, but we instead tried to act like an anchor but attaching our winch at the back and then tying more straps around trees to try and stop it from falling in. I had to go into the local town to try and find some oil for the winch, but instead I found through some other local Nepalis a guy who claimed to have a ten-tonne winch. We all returned to the truck and the guys had to dig a deep hole 3-4 metres in front of the truck and then tied the winch rope wround a tree trunk and burried it at least a metre deep. The truck was then winched forward. At least at this point if felt like it was safe and no longer about to fall.

After lunch however, with the lead guy of the winching team enjoying a few bevvies, they asked Til to just reverse the truck out. It was madness as he would have fallen straight back into the same position. Mark had a brainwave - put some wooden boards underneath the wheels, squirt them with washing-up liquid and then winch the truck sideways, sliding on the boards. It worked, but not after Mark had been smacked accidentally in the face with a wooden plank! It's all healed now, but I'll let him tell that story. It took us 13 hours to get that truck into a position of safety. The next day we all left for Kathmandu. I had manged to get a guava seed jammed into my tooth and needed to get it seen to!

First impressions of Kathmandu - filfthy and polluted! But then we were staying at a car workshop just down the road from a dump! Having had a small glimpse of a few of Kathmandu's sights, having walked among the beautiful architectire of the Durbar Square in Patan, and having been lucky enough to see the Himlayan range that surrounds the city's namesake, the Kathmandu valley, I can really see how people's stories of arriving here in the 1970s when there were no cars and no pollution made this city into the Shangri-La that it once was. It must have been amazing.

I don't wish to do it a disservice today. It's a city that's worth looking at. The temples, the shops, the architecure, the people and the mountains are still a great combination, but it does give you an idea of how unplanned and rapid development can lead to environmental damage. Reports in the papers last week were of urban pollution collecting around mount Everest. We donned face masks to cycle around the city.

Our three week stay at Irwins workshop was under a shelter and we were with friends. Mark had all sorts of jobs to do on the van and we managed to get (after two attempts) our alternator repaired. It may seem like we have done a lot of maintenance on the van, and I suppose we have, but the poor thing does take a battering and has driven 25,000km (approx 13,000miles) in the last year, over some very bumpy terrain! She's an old girl too, having been born in 1993!

So, our stay was longer than expected, and resulted in Mark getting a bad cough from the pollution - it's almost better now. It was the arrival of our friends that precipitated our departure. We all met in Goa last year on the beach: Amelie and Til, me and Mark and Mandy and Steffen. Steffen, some of you may recall, is the mechanic that helped Mark on the van in Goa. They were arriving from Australia and picking up their van before we could all spend 10 days together back in Pame.

Those ten days have gone now, they were great- and it was quicker than we all wanted, but the bain of all travellers lives; visa restrictons, made it so. They're on their way to the border now and heading for India and then home.

When we returned to Pame we had new neighbours. Stefan and Petra with their dog and Patrick and Marion with their two children and dog. Both of them own incredible vehicles; Stefan and Petra's is a 6-wheeler, 19 tonne truck that he took 5 years to build and Partick and Marions houses a whole family; brilliant!

So folks, I guess that's all for now. We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of our cousin Sarah and Ed. It's 9 days til they land in Nepal. Between then and now, I guess it will be more of the same; cycling, walking, swimming, reading, raining, sunshine, mountains, clouds, greenness, lakes, temples and  nice breakfasts. In the words of Jill Scott, I feel like I'm living my life like it's golden!

Love, Jo and Mark xxx