Arrival

11.01.10 – 5.15pm (11.35am UK)

Well, we’ve arrived! What a surreal journey that was… I think the only thing missing from the outbound flight was a line of elephants coming down the aisle! There were 2 intercom requests for medical assistance from ‘any doctors on board’ during the flight from Heathrow to Delhi plus a woman who screamed & wailed through most of the night – we were convinced she was in labour, but apparently not. She just doesn’t travel well…!

I won the competition for having the heaviest suitcase at 28kgs, I also won the heaviest (& largest) hand luggage. Looking at the various bags as we collected them off the conveyor belt at Kathmandu, I think it’s fair to say that I have also won the competition for being the most over packed! Nevermind.

Temperature here in Kathmandu is a balmy 20c, so it’s very pleasant. However, the air quality is pretty poor & as you look to the mountains that surround the town on all sides, there’s a yukky smog all around. Trying to take a photo of the sunset was a bit of a wet squib – hopefully it’ll be better once we leave the town.

The journey from Kathmandu Airport to The Royal Singi Hotel was an experience. Sooo many people, sooo many shacks, sooo many little shops… & the streams of spaghetti like power cables & telephone cables stretching from building to building – it’s amazing that anything works! In fact I’m told it doesn’t – they have regular power failures & the insides of all the ‘shops’ are in darkness. I wonder why?!

The plan for the rest of today is eat at 6.30pm (the Exodus guide is going to take us to somewhere ‘safe’ in Thamel, 10 minutes from the hotel). Then I think we’ll just come back to the hotel for a quick ‘snifter’ before crashing out. I don’t know about everyone else, but I’ve got serious eye sting & my initial hopes of us all doing a children’s song from the church repertoire as a sort of ice breaker for new faces among us are fading fast! I guess I’ll just have to save that for Base Camp…

Tomorrow is an early start for breakfast before meeting for our full briefing at 9am. The rest of the day, from what I can gather, is ’free’ – but I’ll get another post up then with more details.

If you could spare a prayer for my back please I’d be grateful. I managed to put my back out before we left – probably the weight of the suitcase that did it! The journey hasn’t helped & I’m dosed up on Nurofen, but hopefully it’ll come round before we head off in earnest.

Tim, for SLS, signing off. GB.

4 Comments

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  1. Hi All,
    Glad to hear you got there OK. Trust the shopping has gone well, if the hawkers get too much Dad (Mike) will show you how to do his best Arab impression that scares them off, espec if you have been mountain walking and have a beard (sorry Ruth and Judith – for now anyway!!)

    Big hugs for my dad
    Ju xx

  2. Tim, please get a photo of said impression! 🙂

  3. Praying for you all…hope your back gets better soon tim x

  4. Hi Judith and the rest of the intrepid St Luke’s Six

    Congratulations on getting there!! Sounds eventful.

    Hope you have a great trek and just for those moments when it gets a bit hard your friends at CLASP have a joke for you…

    A distraught farmer finds all his cows frozen in the snow and prays to God for help.

    A woman appears and puts her arms around the icy cows and they immediately defrost.

    The farmer says to the woman “Are you an angel from God”?

    “No” says the woman, “I’m Thora Herd”!!!!!

    Enjoy yourselves
    Lots of love and Best Wishes
    Everyone at CLASP

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