"A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step" Lao Tzu
This journey began while flicking aimlessly through TV channels on an evening 2 years ago. By chance, or karma, I paused, then was captivated by a National Geographic program "The Lost Caves of Shangri-La" -- a documentary about a team's exploration of new discovered, ancient and practically inaccessible Buddhist caves in the remote kingdom of Mustang. By the end of the program there was a "Note to self" filed away in the "Places to See Before I Die" list.
Earlier this year, in the Spring, my 28 year old son called "Hey Mom, how would you like to hike the Himalayas with me?" "I'd love to!" was out of my mouth as spontaneously as it had been a couple of years earlier when he called and asked "Hey Mom, how'd you like to hike the West Coast Trail with me?" (which, up to this point in my life, was the most physically and mentally challenging thing I have done)
Now one might wonder about motives by him asking his mid 50's mother off to share such challenges -- what those that know the two us understand is we share the same sense of adventure and curiousity, along with a friendly sense of competition between us.
The idea was for us to travel with 2 others, fly to Nepal and do some hiking in the Himalayas. Plans and timing changed and the trip was cancelled but the images I had associated with it were now in the forefront of my mind and starting to meld with the National Geographic images of Mustang.
By July the thoughts and images had joined and research on how to see the restricted kingdom of Mustang, in a moment of "Just Do It", I committed to a time frame and flights -- with details to be filled in later.
Two nights later, a gal pal of mine for almost 35 years, was visiting. I excitedly dragged her to my computer to show her pictures of the isolated country I was going to trek, and explained the sparse details of how that would happen.
"I'd love to do that." she said. "Well, you should come along." I said jokingly. "Really?" she replied, hopefully. "Really???!!!" I said incredulously, as I would never have imagined this as something that would appeal to her -- her only overseas travel had been to the British Isles, mostly to visit extended family.
And so it came to be. The first challenge was to match up flights which we managed to mostly do -- we are on different flights from Seoul to Vancouver on our way home.
Next was deciding on a trekking company. To enter Mustang you must have:
- a special permit which costs $70 US per day
- a licenced government guide
- (my rule) a leave of your senses.
We decided on Mission Eco Trek and structured the trek to our time frames -- the 2 of us, (Sherri M and Sheri R), a guide and 2 porters.
From August through to the week of departure there were weekly planning sessions, note books filled with packing lists, "to do's", flight details, day by day trekking info, costs, "must sees" in Kathmandu and Seoul (where we overnight going and returning). There were moments where we would just look at each oather and burst out laughing at the sheer absurdity of what we were planning.
There were some very serious moments, as we upped our activity level to be physically able to trek up to 6 hours a day altitudes reaching 14,000 feet. One day I had an email from Sheri Rwith links to a site that showed people trekking with horses -- "What do you think?" her email read.
When we met for our weekly planning session that evening, we researched as much as we could and sent a note to our guide company host, Ram, to inquire if they were available.
They were, and were booked -- 2 horses, with wooden saddles and horsemen -- can carry us or our daypacks!
In mid August I was reading a Globe and Mail article by a 'more mature' and not-so-spry Canadian traveller who had visited Kathmandu and the Himalayas. Towards the end of his article, he mentioned one of the highlights, visiting Chitwan National Park. I looked it up and then couldn't wait to show Sheri R.
She felt the same as I did, "How could we pass up the opportunity to visit this park on the border of Indian and Nepal with the chance to go trekking in the jungle on elephant back to look for rhinos, Siberian tigers, and sloth bears along with dugout canoe rides looking for Gangetic dolphins and Mugger crocodiles.
That was the first step of our journey.