Undress The Planet

Travelling to find out what people are looking for, what I am looking for, and to find truth, answers, happiness, alternative ways of living, and overall experience, learn, and grow.

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Thai Elephants 

We booked a half-day visit with the elephants at one of the ‘ethical and reputable’ elephant sanctuaries near Chiang Mai. We got free promotional water and traditional complementary ‘Karen’ clothing (the same shirts you can see us wearing around the elephants). The day of I was a bit nervous to be honest. I know elephants have a solid reputation of being gentle giants but still ..they are big! However, when we arrived at the sanctuary ..all I felt was excitement. And then there they were! 5 of them. 1 little one (3 years old). 

We got changed into the traditional shirts - so that we appeared ‘familiar’ to the elephants which had been cared for by the Karen Hill Tribe in the past. Then we each got to grab a bunch of bananas and some pieces of sugar cane and head over to the elephants to feed them. The caretakers told us that if we stood next to the elephant and loudly said ‘bon’ they would open their mouths and we could feed them a banana. Otherwise they would go after the food with their trunks. 

They really are playful beings and they would try to sneak the bananas and sugar cane from you. I also noticed that each of them had a bit of a personality. The little one seemed to get overwhelmed when too many people were focused on her (or him) and would retreat. One time I saw the little one leave the crowd and amble over to one of the caretakers. The caretaker was crouched on the ground and even though he was about as big as one of the little elephants legs, the little elephant seemed to take refuge and comfort in the caretaker’s presence. That was really cute to see. 

Then we lead them to the mud bath and got down and dirty with the elephants. Only 2 of the elephants went in and not all of the people went in either. It was a bit of a colder, drizzly day and thus not so much of a ‘let’s jump in the cold water’ kind of day. But Dawid and I went right in. I mean gee who knows when we will get to play with elephants again! It really was fun(ny). Then we washed off in the river. All the elephants seemed to enjoy this bit as they all rolled around in the river. 

There’s something wondrous about these beautiful, gentle giants. They look ancient and wise with their huge heads and bodies and big, brown kind eyes. Their toes are cute half-circles, they have long bristly hairs sticking out all over their body, and they get so playful with their trunks. Another highlight of our trip for sure. :D 

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Playing With Elephant Poo

One of the attractions/activities near Chiang Mai was the Poopoopaper Park - a park where you can make coloured paper out of elephant poo. We scootered there one day and got to touch the elephant poo and participate in the various stages of paper making. And so it just so happens that.. sometimes it’s okay to have fun with poo. ;)

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Chiang Mai

Dawid and I agree that we would both travel to Chiang Mai again. It was easy to live there. Partly, because we had a place we could ‘live’ in, partly because Chiang Mai is a relatively modern & wealthy city/catered to foreign visitors. You can feel the Thai culture there but it also feels familiar. 

The city-centre is square and surrounded by a moat and bits of the ancient wall. The gates are historic sites, especially the Tha Phae Gate which is where the Sunday night market starts (or ends depending on how you look at it), where the New Years celebrations were most concentrated, and where tons of tourists take pictures. However, the city reaches far beyond this ‘square’. 

I’d say that one of the things that make Chiang Mai unique are the night markets. There are various markets around the city most (if not all) evenings of the week. My personal favourite was the Sunday night market, and my second favourite was the market infront of Maya - the big-modern shopping mall Maya 20mins from our place - Tuesday to Friday. You could almost find anything at these markets. Artisans displayed their goods and there were only some stands selling cheap knick-knacks. I always found clusters of street food stands and we certainly indulged in some interesting treats. Dawid and I even split a roasted silk-worm ..but that not so much enjoyable as it was a test.

We also ate the best food here. So fresh, plenty, and affordable. 

Being there at the same time as the elephant parade was also pretty cool. Elephants parade is an open-air exhibition dedicated to saving the Asian elephant from extinction. Each elephant is designed by an artist and can be bought. The parade moves from city to city, staying just for a couple months in each place. 

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Our Chiang Mai Home

Our Airb’n’b host was so kind that he picked us up at the train station in Chiang Mai and brought us to our condo. We drove for what seemed like forever through the city but already we liked what we saw. Little shops and cafes ..many with Christmas decorations and generally no high buildings. 

The condo was quite a bit out of the city and the place was pretty modern. We had our thumbs scanned for the entry system. We had access to a pool and a small gym and sauna (which was broken while we were there :( ). Our condo was on the second floor and consisted of one main space shared by the kitchenette, dining table, and living room. Then there were the separate bathroom and bedroom. The bedroom was separated by a glass sliding door. Our window overlooked the pool. All in all it was small, modern, cozy, and just right for us. 

We had to get a little crafty with our ‘drying rack’ ..version 1 can be seen in the picture above ^. Version two came to be in the bedroom ..where I tied the rope around the curtain rod and the closet rod. Also since we didn’t have a burner plate ..we ended up boiling our milk in the water boiler. What can I say, we made it work ;). 

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Chiang Mai Bound In A Sleeper Train

In departing from Bangkok and heading to Chiang Mai we were gathering a new experience: travelling by sleeper train. I had read that taking the sleeper train was both comfortable and affordable. In one blog I even read how the trains were super modern, the food really good and relatively fresh, the facilities clean and proper and the beds compfy. It was pretty exciting to be spending around 14h on a sleeper train. I envisioned that it would kind of be like staying in a hostel on wheels. Well it didn’t turn out exactly like that but it was still a highlight as far as our travel experiences go. 

The train was delayed by almost 1 hour. Then when we were able to board, the train was not one of the ‘new’ ones. It was clean but we were stuck in the small top-bunk space for around 12-13 hours of the trip. I wasn’t a big fan of the windowless space. The food wasn’t ‘tasty’ and we had to eat it on our bed. It was only when we were just a couple of hours from Chiang Mai that some people on the bottom bunks moved their things and let the train attendants convert the bed into seats. So I got to see some of the landscape and scenery outside Chiang Mai. Overall, it wasn’t what we expected but we still had some fun and got some sleep. 

As for the cookies ^ ..those were black sesame (popular ingredient in Thai food) short bread cookies with some sort of sweet glaze and cashew halves. That was the snack we bought for the train ride and as odd as they tasted - kind of like burnt butter - ..by the time we arrived in Chiang Mai there were none left O_O.

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Sawadi Ka (Hello), Bangkok

Our next destination was Bangkok. When we arrived we thought about taking a Taxi but decided to try to save the money and bus instead. It was a bit tricky figuring out where to go to catch the first bus as the Thai folk that we asked spoke and understood almost no English. All I had, were some screenshots of the bus route from Google maps. In the end we managed to take a combination of buses and the LRT that did get us to the right part of town. Then after walking around for 30mins like a lost couple on the Amazing Race, asking people and showing them the address, we eventually arrived at the Hostel drenched in sweat. Bangkok was Hot. The hostel was nice and for the first time we experienced the cultural custom of removing your footwear upon entering a building - something we ended up doing around 20% of the time - for sanitary, good health practice, and historical-cultural reasons. Subsequently we showered up, slept, and then ventured out into the city. We ate our first Thai meals - pineapple fried rice and some version of ‘Tom Yum’ - and then went downtown.

Once we got to the city center with the LRT we were passing one giant mall building after the other. I was pretty excited to see Christmas and New Years decorations in the open squares between the mall buildings - Christmas not something typically celebrated in Thai primarily-Buddhist culture. The first mall we entered was not much different to a large mall in Canada. We saw all the same stores and brands and actually it reminded us of Square One Shopping Centre in Mississauga. Funny thing is, this mall was also called Siam ‘Square One’. And all in all, besides the population speaking a different language the city looked a lot like a combination of the major Canadian cities + temples and shrines to commemorate the recently-passed beloved King Bhumibol Adulyadej.

At the mall we indulged in a very expensive, yet very delicious dessert: a two-toned Kakigori as you can see in one of the pictures ^. A small mountain of shaved ice, topped with a sweet, light dressing, filled with an assortment of chocolatey and chewy bits and served with a little pitcher of molten chocolate sauce. Man that was good.

The next day we went to the train station to buy our Chiang Mai tickets, drop our baggage and make the most of our time to explore more of what Bangkok has to offer. In a nutshell we checked out the Chao Phraya River, Chinatown (Pic #5), The Flower Market (Pic #6), Wat Arun (Temple of Dawn), The Grand Palace, and Asiatique (Pic #7). We enjoyed seeing these tourist attractions but also felt like we had spent enough time in Bangkok after hitting up all these places. I’m not a big fan of big cities, and well Bangkok is a huge city.

There is a bit of a funny story though that I want to quickly share. It also reflects some of the things we had learned to date from our experience in Nepal. So: when we first arrived at the bank of the river that flows through Bangkok, we were looking for a water taxi of sorts that could bring us to the attractions along the riverbank. We arrived at a port and sure enough they offered some boat services. However, they were asking for around $80CAD for a ~1.5h boat tour to a variety of attractions. Woah. That was a lot of money for us at this point. Right away they went on to offer us a ‘special price’ and dropped the price to ~$65CAD. Still wayy too much for us. We asked just to cross the river but this didn’t seem possible. The guy lowered the price a bit more and offered a ‘shorter’ tour. Then as we started to pull away the typical question came: ‘Okay, tell me how much are you willing to pay?’. Well quite frankly our limit was $20. The guy started to get pissed at our low offer and even walked away. For those of you that have seen The Office - you may remember that one of the negotiation tactics that Michael Scott tried with Darryl was ‘walking away’/leaving the negotiation space (an idea he had found on Wikipedia). Well we experienced this in real life right there at that port. But we ignored this whole act and calmly thought about the price, proposed how much we were willing to pay and then left when they didn’t meet us at our limit. They were rude when we asked if there were other boat services - pretty much denying that we had any chance any where else and so we didn’t bother to argue further. We had learned that this is all a show and if we didn’t get a reasonable offer at the first place we just had to try again. Sure enough we just walked a bit along the riverbank before arriving at a proper water taxi terminal. There we paid ~$1.50/person to get from one stop to any other attraction along the river. We had a good laugh at how we so easily avoided such a money-suck at the other port and kept our cool, not even slightly affected by the pressure they tried to impose on us. And over time we only got better at negotiating. I’m sure will still overpaid occasionally but not with huge profit margins on the part of the vendors. (:

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Moving On

A few more days in Pokhara and then a couple more in Kathmandu and our time in Nepal came to an end.

We took a mini van from Pokhara with our good friends Sam and Julia who returned to base, while we continued on to our last stop - good ol’ Kathmandu.

There we met up with a family friend for dinner and shopped around a little. We had made our peace with Nepal and were ready to move on.

I would say Nepal felt like a good starting point in Southeast Asia and it ended up being the place we stayed for the longest period of time. I have mixed feelings about our experience here ..it was both pleasantly different in some ways and unpleasantly different in other ways. I wouldn’t go as far as to say I have a love-hate relationship with Nepal ..but perhaps some mild form of that. Also in other words ..if I never return I’m okay with that ..and if I do return, it’s for the mountains.

Namaste, Nepal. On to the next chapter ✌

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Nepal - The Last Adventure …Brought To You By The ‘Steelbirds’ ;)

We were surprised when our good friends (that we had met volunteering) showed up in Pokhara along with another girl (from volunteering) and her boyfriend. They had some time to spend in Pokhara and it was lovely for us to get to spend some more time with them. They also had the idea to rent some scooters and drive down to Lumbini (Buddha’s birthplace). At first the idea seemed a bit stressful to me ..driving ~230km through Nepal in one day, and then back the same way the following day. But we were in ..especially after having been in Pokhara for 2 weeks straight without much adventure.

So we went to rent some scooters. This goes down very differently than if you were renting scooters in Europe or Canada ..or even in Thailand. One of us left their passport as a sort of security deposit, we paid, we confirmed that we were all good scooter drivers, and that was it. No paper work, no verification of our licenses, and we just barely remembered to exchange phone numbers. Easy. However, only a couple of us knew how to drive a scooter. So we had to quickly learn the night before.

The next morning we all had breakfast together and then started on our adventure. The road was windy and the views beautiful. It was cold from the wind but nice when we were driving through a sunny patch. We took several breaks. I found it exhausting but exciting. At one point in the afternoon we left the hilly, green landscape behind us and entered into chaos. The windy road turned into a 6 lane Nepali highway going 20+ km through a smoggy city. Then another 30+ km down another highway to get to Lumbini. Ough. We arrived just after a stunning sunset and found ourselves amongst a streetful of hotels and guesthouses. We settled for one but had neither hot showers nor warm rooms. After dinner we were all pooched and went to bed with a 5:30am start in mind.

The next morning we headed to Buddha’s birthplace. We arrived at 6am when it was due to open. The sun hadn’t even risen. We walked around the foggy, quiet grounds. We saw some temples and baboons. In the distance you could hear music with a steady base. It sounded like rave music and we joked that the monks were having a dance party. We walked by some international temples but didn’t see nearly the whole place - spanning over km upon km of ground. Around 8am we headed back to the hotels to grab some doughnuts and bananas for breakfast before heading back. My hands were bruised from gripping the handle bars while going over bumpy dirt bits and again it was very cold. However, we all drove at a much faster speed and were back in the hills sooner than I expected. It was a bit of a wild day. We were tired, yet we drove fast. I was happy when we made it back, returned the scooters and enjoyed a proper hot bucket shower and dinner.

Still it was fun and I’d say the ride was more interesting than Lumbini. We even got stopped by the police who checked our licenses but didn’t seem to know what a proper license looked like - and just accepted what we presented them with. One of our group only showed his citizen card and another showed an expired license. Still we got the green light.

Looking back I will say that sharing this experience with these ⬆ folks was great but it was a stressful highlight for me. And so - as with nearly every other experience along these travels - this one has taught me a little bit more about myself. (:

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Food, Food, & More Food

It was interesting for me to note that food had become an even bigger part of my life whilst travelling. I would explain this with 2 reasons: 1. Food is a big part of culture. It can tell you something about the people that prepare and consume it. Also eating often provides you with the opportunity to interact with locals. 2. Travelling doesn’t involve going to work (at least in my definition it doesn’t mean ‘work’ as in ‘job’) and thus you spend your time differently. In my case I like to do a lot ..and thus become quite hungry ..eating allows for a good break, OR I like to do little ..and would like to enjoy this with some food. In other words - eating is both a necessity whilst travelling & travelling is a good excuse to eat/try new dishes.

It is also interesting to note how our budget plays a big part in all this - and why I am writing about this now. We went from eating bread with peanut butter, carrots, and canned beans –> to eating the most delicious curries, salads, pad Thai, veggie burgers, falafels, and drinking the freshest banana, pineapple, & mango smoothies. Also in other words: we moved from Europe to Asia.

In Nepal we ate some amazing food. Local food at a very small cost, and food catered more to tourists at a small cost.

Above are some pictures from our favourite places in Pokhara - mostly serving non-Nepali food. Metro - a creperie that served delicious loaded banana nutella crepes Himalayan Java Coffee house - which served lavish coffee drinks The Juicery - serving healthy juices, smoothies, amazing cacao porridge, sizzling shashuka, and so much more good stuff Umbrella Cafe - best mushroom burgers in town Flying Spirit - amazing falafel wraps and momos Neptalia - greasy but tasty pizza and freshly squeezed OJ

And this was only the beginning of our food fun ..next comes Thailand and oh my, food became the highlight of most days 🙌

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Pokhara 2.0

After the trek we headed back to the same hotel we had stayed at the one night before the trek. However, that night they were fully booked. So they sent us across the street to another hotel. It was okay, but expensive and not as nice - there really are big differences in accommodations in Nepal. So the next day we went back to the other one and stayed there for 10 nights.

At first we still mostly hung around the ‘left’ side of town, the more touristy part. But slowly we ventured further and further into the 'right’ part as the Movie Garden 🎥🎬 was located there. This place was one of Pokhara’s gems. An outdoor movie theatre, surrounded by big tropical plants, lit by candlelight and fireflies, overlooking Phewa Lake. You’d come, get your tickets and free popcorn (if you checked in on Fb), grab a seat on some pillows, snuggle up under a blanket and enjoy a wonderful movie. You could also order pizza or drinks upon arrival which would be brought to you as the movie began. A brilliant place. Needless to say I spent many evenings there watching movies such as 'Into The Wild’, 'The Hateful Eight’, 'Slumdog Millionaire’, 'Samsara’, 'Life Is Beautiful’, and more. 😃

One day we went for a day trip up to the popular stupa (otherwise known as a temple) as we hadn’t been doing much sightseeing. First we took a little sailboat across the lake. We sailed out onto Phewa Lake and the bustling sounds of Pokhara faded into the shoreline ..allowing a breezy peacefulness to settle over us. Next we hiked up to the stupa. On the way a big family of monkeys crossed our path. We even spotted a baby clinging to its momma’s back! Our first sighting of wild animals on our travels. At the top we had a great view of the city sprawling out over kms, with the Himalayas looming up behind it. Then on our way down we stopped by a cave in which you could see a place of worship and a waterfall. It was a bit tricky to find since the entrance was on a main road and those are filled with so much colour, lights, signs, and everything else that it makes for a challenge to pick out one place or thing. The cave was hot and humid but for $1 it was neat to see. To be honest I thought the entrance - a spiraling staircase down - was more interesting.

Eventually, on one of my exploration walks I found these little bamboo shacks at the very 'right’ end of the city, right at the lake’s shore. We moved and spent our last 2 weeks there. It was a simple place but we had a little porch with a table and chairs and a hammock ..all for $3.5/night! From then we found all our favourite cafes and restaurants and thereby a little 'slice of home’. ☺

We also became familiar with all the cows roaming the streets, holy cow indeed! 🐄

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Annapurna Circuit Trek - The Last Stretch & Some More Pics From The Trek

The last day trekking in the mountains was an easy one. Consistently slightly downhill, warm, and sunny. We were 5 at this point - Dawid, Jenna, & I (the Annapurna Trio), and 2 German guys we had met through Jenna. 

We arrived in Jomsom in the afternoon - a bit of a strange place as we walked through a large but quiet town for 15mins before arriving at the small airport and tourist/trekker guesthouses. Here we spent our last night - all 5 of us sleeping in one big room, one next to the other. 

The next morning the two Germans took a plane back to Pokhara. Turns out this was an extremely lovely way to travel in comparison to the bus - which is how the rest of us got back to Pokhara. The plane had about 20 seats and an airplane attendant who even handed out some cookies to snack on during the short 20min flight. We on the other hand were crammed onto the very back seat of the packed bus with 2 others (total: 5) for about 10 hours. The back is the bumpiest and we arrived in Pokhara with bruises already forming. The drive was also very nerve-wracking as the road was narrow, windy, and dropped steeply down on one side and the drivers tend to be a little too enthusiastic in their driving. There were a lot of tight squeezes. Thus, we were very thankful when we finally got off the bus and headed to our hotel...

This marking the end of our 13 day trek. WHew :D

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Annapurna Circuit Trek - Muktinath

The night after crossing the Pass we stayed in Muktinath in the ‘Hotel Bob Marley’. A huge place with a pool table, patio, fireplace, and proper hot showers. Most of the folks we knew were staying here and so we all enjoyed dinner together ..and Dawid and I treated ourselves to a big piece of apple crumble to celebrate. The next day would be our last trekking day ending with our final night in Jomsom before returning to Pokhara. 

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Annapurna Circuit Trek - The Thorong-La Pass (5416m) 

The day finally arrived; the day we’d be crossing the Thorong-La pass at an altitude of 5416m. We stayed just a bit above Thorang Phedi - one village before High Camp. It was a cozy tea house and there were now 5 of us. We ate breakfast at 5:30am and departed at 6am. The whole climb to High Camp and then to the Pass was tough. That day we had to achieve an altitude gain of 1000m. I felt as though I was moving at a snail’s pace - especially since I was still sick and thus had more trouble breathing. But we kept going and going.

Then we arrived at the Pass. A big moment. Although it didn’t really feel like it ..rather it felt very cold and windy. We spent about a whole 5 minutes up there. Just enough to snap some picture before descending at nearly a run until we found a somewhat isolated spot. Here we had some snacks, baked goods (a treat!), before continuing on. I was quite uncomfortable at this point. I really had to pee but everything was pretty exposed and barren, and I was very cold and felt very exhausted. In light of my struggles, I gotta say I was pretty impressed with everyone’s strength and determination. We were usually the youngest yet slowest ones. Not by much but even some 60 year old hikers and bikers passed us. Then again it’s not really about getting there first. It’s about everyone and their own physical and mental journey along the path and in the end we all made it. A great feeling when we saw our next destination far, far in the distance and knew we had brought the toughest part of the trek behind us.

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Annapurna Circuit Trek - From Tilicho To Yak Kharka To Thorong-La Phedi

Two more days before we’d cross the Pass. It seemed like the days weren’t getting any easier at this point (but then again why should they have been) and getting to Yak Kharka we had to a go a very long stretch in the mid-day heat without a chance to refill our water. However, this was also an especially beautiful trekking day.

We somehow missed the correct path at one point and only noticed once we got to a river with no possibility to cross. This cost us about 15-20mins as we had to throw dozens of rocks into the water in order to build a path over which we could cross. With the help of Jenna’s hiking poles we finally crossed and some girl arrived just as we had finished the job and was very thankful for our work haha.

Then we headed up and passed through another ghost town. On top of a point with some bell clanking and door banging in the wind. Eerie. After that we walked around a large pasture on which grazed dozens of cows (maybe they were yaks) and horses. The beauty of this part of the trek was that each of them cows had a cowbell on and as they moved across the pasture the jingle produced a sort of song carried by the wind. We stopped for a few moments to listen and appreciate the music to this moment.

Then we got to a lookout point (see picture above) from where we could see Manang in the distance and the fork of the trail - one path leading to Tilicho and the other to Thorong-La Pass. From there it was not so far to Yak Kharka. At first a steep descent to a little tea house where we were able to eat and fill our bottles, and then just ~1.5h further.

On the final day before the Pass we just had to hike a short stretch to Thorang Phedi. Not a very interesting day but we were passed by a herd of mules carrying supplies up. We hadn’t seen many of these throughout the trek but rather saw lots of porters - Nepali men hired to carry both trekkers’ belongings and supplies. Sometimes the weight seemed enorm. We heard a story about a girl who had 2 porters for her things and thus brought 5 jars of nutella to snack on throughout the trek. WOW. 

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Annapurna Circuit Trek - Tilicho Lake Detour: Part 2

So the Tilicho trek went like this: we had a long day hiking to the Tilicho basecamp from Manang. At the basecamp we stayed for 2 nights. We had the nicest room yet - a queen bed with an en-suite bathroom (ahem squat toilet). Here we also had a reunion with some trekkers who had caught up with us. 

It was a bummer that I was getting progressively more sick but I really did want to go up to the lake. I drank a lot of ginger-lemon-honey teas and had an early sleep. The next day we had our usual breakfast of porridge (with water - and sometimes onion flavoured apple pieces) and headed up to the lake. One perk was that we could leave most of our stuff down at the basecamp and needed only to take water and snacks with us. 

It was a long ascent - an 800m gain in altitude. But we made it up in about 2.5h and bam there it was: Tilicho Lake ..big and blue. To our surprise and delight our dog friend made it up as well. We had met him when we left Manang and named him ‘Tilicho’ ..I guess you could say he lived up to his name. 

We took lots of pictures, ate our snacks, and then headed back down. It was significantly colder up there and windy. We were back at the basecamp much faster and I was able to enjoy a cold shower while the air was still somewhat warm from the noon sun. That night we stayed at the basecamp while some moved on. 

But ..we did it! We saw Tilicho Lake at an altitude of 4,919m.

Later I looked back at the photos I had taken throughout our trek and I found the one with the sign (see above) stating that Tilicho was the highest lake. I suppose that’s what had given us the idea. If anyone asks - that’s my evidence.

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Annapurna Circuit Trek - Tilicho Lake Detour: Part 1

From Manang we had the option to either continue towards the pass or to do a 2 day detour to Tilicho Lake. We had heard that the trek to the lake and the lake itself were more beautiful than the pass and that it was absolutely worth it. It would be tough - some said more tough than the pass - but it would also be a good way to prepare for the pass. So we decided to go. I do have to be honest here though ..we thought that Tilicho Lake is the highest lake in the world which is the real reason we went in the first place. We thought it would be cool to say we went to the ‘xyz’ something that can’t be topped anywhere else in the world in some way - especially since we both happened to have see many lakes in our lives already. However, at one point we actually started to wonder where we had heard or seen that and why we had gotten the idea that Tilicho was indeed the highest lake in the world - and it turns out that this actually may not be a simple fact. But regardless of whether it is true or not ..it did get us up there and boy was it ever worth it. Who cares if it’s the highest lake. It was beautiful and better yet it didn’t even look real. It looked like it was animated. Photo-shopped. Surreal. And soo, soo blue.

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Annapurna Circuit Trek - Dal Bhat Power, 24 Hour!

Dal Bhat (also referred to as Nepali Thali): Is a dish consisting always of rice (bhat) and lentil (dal) soup. However, it also mostly comes with variations of vegetable curry (I experienced mostly potato curry), curd or yogurt, pickle (pickled root vegetable), cooked greens (something resembling spinach), and some crispy papad (a big piece of a thin, salty chip). This is what many Nepalese ate at every meal. It is what we got at every bus stop break. They say ‘Dal Bhat power, 24 hour!’. I’m not sure about having ‘power for 24 hour’ afterwards but it sure did clear out my system - musta been all that fibre. It was a big hit with trekkers though as you can get unlimited refills with this dish. From my experience this was the case everywhere in Nepal. Sure it cost a bit more but at least you knew you’d be full. I met people who disliked it and people who absolutely loved it. In my case I would eat so much in one sitting I never wanted to eat it again ..but a few days later I was craving it. Speaking of which ..I could go for that delicious Dal Bhat served in Manang right about now ...mmmm.

Unfortunately, I could never wait long enough to take a picture so I had to use someone else’s in my post - photo creds go to: http://www.thelongestwayhome.com/blog/food-around-the-world/nepalese/food-from-nepal-dal-bhat-tourist-version/ ..for a picture of a very lavish Dal Bhat.

Other than Dal Bhat we would usually have the option to eat soup, fried potatoes with veggies, fried noodles with veggies, or fried rice with veggies. In addition, you could order spring rolls, omelettes, or momos. Mostly, the veggies consisted of cabbage - and sometimes carrots. The food options always seemed plentiful but the variations were slim - but generally did taste really good ..maybe also because we were hungry trekkers!