Day 13 - Pokhara

“How does one become a butterfly? You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.”
–Trina Paulus

Pokhara is a beautiful little town that has many café‘s, shops and restaurants catering to tourist. If the sky is clear you get pretty nice views of the Annapurna mountain range. Some of the popular things to see are, Phewa Lake, World Peace Temple, Tibetan Market, Devi’s Falls and Gupteshwar Mahadev Cave. Paragliding is also very popular and sometimes we would see 25 people in the air. We did not paraglide as it was too expensive ($100 US/person) for us but, the people we talked to that did it, loved it. The Tibetan market is in the same area as the falls and cave. There are many types of food available from local food to western. You can get authentic Nepalese, Tibetan, India, as well as Italian and wood fire pizza. Clothing and souvenirs are plentiful and fairly cheap but, if you are going back to Kathmandu you can get things a little cheaper their. The advise from a lot of people is to buy hiking gear here or in Kathmandu before your trek because it’s cheaper. That’s true but, from my experience the quality is pretty poor and you’ll be lucky to get one trek worth of use out of anything you purchase. I still think it’s better to purchase items in your area and only get things that you forgot or did not bring here.

Our hotel in Pokhara

View from our hotel window

Kids playing in front of our hotel

We spend most of our time in Pokhara relaxing, drinking coffee and eating sweets.  We also did the tourist stuff and shopped a bit.  Overall it’s very relaxing here and well worth staying at least 2 days if you have time in your schedule.

Coffee time

Phewa Lake

Washing cloth in Phewa Lake

  

Down town Pokhara

Current exchange rates

We rented a boat and rowed across the lake stopping at the Hindu Temple Barahi half way.  Once on the other side we hiked up to the World Peace Temple.
 

Barahi Temple

Rowing across Phewa Lake

World Peace Temple

View from the World Peace Temple 

Our guide Govinda

There was a monastery near the Tibetan market that we were able to visit.  The monks were just about to begin their afternoon prayers so we were able to snap a few pictures.

Lunch at a Tibetan Restaurant

Wood fire pizza with our friend Dino

Peace and Love, Donna and Tom

Day 12 - Dhampus to Phedi to Pokhara

“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.” - Dr. Seuss

Today we wake knowing it’s our last day on the trek. We only have a short distance to Phedi where we will get a taxi back to Pokhara. It’s another gorgeous day and I rise before the sun to set up my camera. I’m going to try and capture the sunrise on the mountain range. Unfortunately there are not to many clouds so the sunrise is not spectacular but, it’s still beautiful! 

Today we hiked with a fellow trekker from the Netherlands, Dino. We spend most of the day chatting about how beautiful Nepal is. Also, discussing getting together in the future for another trek in Nepal. I like that idea, coming back and doing another trek.

 

 

This has been a fantastic trek and one Donna and I will cherish for the rest of our life’s. The beauty and degree of difficulty for this trek was surprising. Having done Annapurna Circuit and Everest bass Camp with the three passes, Kongma La, Chugyema La (Cho La), and Renjo La this ranks 2^nd to me. My favorite trek was going over Renjo La and hiking down to Thame.

At the end of our trek, Ram, Tom, Donna & Govinda

Dino, Donna & Tom

Today’s hiking totals were 1 hr,45 min, 3.3 miles (5.3 Km).
Total for our entire trek was 80 miles (129 Km)

Peace and Love Tom & Donna