Archive for the ‘Himalayan Trek’ Category
Trip Contemplations
I packed my first item! I placed the trekking poles into the duffel bag.
I’ve been thinking lately, about how this trip is really a combination of multiple adventures for me. First off, there is the small detail of flying across the Pacific Ocean and the long number of hours in an airplane that entails. Then, navigating airports, keeping track of my property, finding transportation, facing foreign languages, dealing with Customs regulations and culture differences, all pretty much adding up to more adventure than appeals to me. If you know me well, you may recognize that this is even more daunting because I won’t have my wife along, with her magic abilities providing guidance and protection; I chose this trip on my own. Next, I get to deal with Kathmandu, a city of about a million people and a fair amount of pollution and poverty. I intend to rise to the occasion and focus on the highlights offered by this ‘big city’ part of the adventure. Finally, we get to the Twin Otter flight to Lukla and begin our trekking. I’m hoping I’ll have been able to save some of my reserve for the subsequent challenge offered by the high altitude environs. At least the hiking in mountains part particularly suits my desires.
I am already sensing how the support and encouragement from friends and family combine and magnify, which boosts my intuitions about the invisible power of the collective. Being aware of how excited your friends are for you is energizing, but when it expands to include friends of family and friends, it becomes a sensation that transcends. I’m realizing that for the many times I’ll wish that one of you were with me to share the experience, there are a dramatic number of other people who are gleaning their own vicarious joy out of the adventure. That is empowering! Through the ability to publish my words here, you will all be going on this trek with me. I’m glad, and blessed, to have you along.
We aren’t the first ones to make this trip, but we are the ones doing it in April, 2009. The Nepali people providing services have seen a lot of tourists, but they’ve never met me before. There are many adventures awaiting and I look forward to being ‘in the moment’ for each and every one.
I have learned that an 8th trekker has signed on with our group and she is a doctor, adding a medical presence to our ensemble. That’s a comfort. I wonder how many pharmaceutical resources she carries with her when she travels.
“Doc, it hurts when I do this…”
“Don’t do that.”
Of course, my perennial wise crack is, “It only hurts when I breathe.”
Let it Rain
Finally, we are being blessed by the first enchanting rumbles of thunder as spring rotates into place here in my homeland. I can’t wait to find out if we will enjoy any dramatic weather in Nepal in April. I am preparing for anything and everything. If I can muster the mysterious power of mental influence, I will see what I can bring about by dwelling on nothing too serious or uncomfortable. I’ve really been wondering lately about the power of influence of our minds.
Recently, the thought passed through my mind that I did not suffer a cold this winter. I let that thought slip by unspoken, admittedly due to a superstition that saying something–acknowledging it–would lead to, …well, …you know: getting a cold! Why, then, did I suddenly let the words fly when the thought came to me a second time in the car the other night? I had no conscious reason for these thoughts in the first place, nor any explanation for why I ended up saying it out loud.
I woke up Sunday morning with a sore throat that had me feeling just a bit off and by the evening was struggling with a tickle in my throat and stuffiness in my nose that really hassled my attempts to fall asleep. It continued to progress to an overall feeling of cruddiness with stinging eyes that have me just wanting to snuggle under the covers and sleep for days. So, which came first here, the chicken or the egg?
Is it possible that deep within my essence I sensed what was coming, long before my mind became fully aware? My body knew what was happening before my mind did? That would explain why the thoughts seemed so out of context to me. Or is the onset of illness simply a result of me thinking about it and my body following the path I was paving? If the mind can control the body, I’m sure not displaying the necessary discipline to redirect this now. All day I’ve been floundering back and forth with trying to talk myself, right-quick, back to optimal health and then whimpering that I want to just allow myself to feel all the yuck and stay in bed! My poor body seems to be following both messages equally well and it is no wonder I feel so crazy sometimes.
I’m using this as a reminder to be sure to pack as many little medicine cabinet comforts, the ones I rarely-if-ever turn to normally, in order to be prepared for anything that my mind conjures up while wandering around in the Himalayan wonderland of Nepal.
The duality within me truly believes in the power of the mind to influence the processes and functions of the body, while at the same time, doubts that my little mind is enlightened enough to wield such otherworldly power. Just the kind of thing worthy of pondering in long hours of trudging uphill on unpaved foot paths in the thin air of the world’s highest mountains, don’t you think?
Rain, or shine.
Preparation Update
The weekend plan to “test-pack” didn’t come to fruition, however, there were some steps made …literally. Got a couple walks in over the last two days. The second one, on Sunday, was shorter but it included wearing my day-pack and trying out some trekking poles that friends graciously lent me for the trip. The poles will work perfect. We looked online for videos showing take-offs and landings at the Lukla Airport that my trip-mate, Gary, mentioned he had watched. We also looked on Google Earth for the view of the region my trip will be visiting. A lot of people post pictures they’ve taken to that site. I decided that if I don’t get any good pictures of my own, I could just collect equivalent shots posted by others online. The images all look alike. I wonder if I will come up with anything unique in the way it all appears this April. If nothing else, I can employ ample use of the timer option and insert myself in the views. It was interesting to see some shots posted of the airport in the ’70s and ’80s. That did provide reference for how it has changed over time.
I re-read some of the trip information that the outfitter has provided and was reminded, among several noteworthy things, that I would be wise to have in my possession a spare photo of myself for the visa application. Apparently, they may or may not ask for one. Better safe than sorry. I came across details of the trip insurance I bought that included a sheet that has information cards to be cut out and would be ideal candidates for laminating. Yes, I already did all the laminating I thought I needed. Oops.
The sad truth is, as I uncover little details like this that I had forgotten about, and tend to them, instead of making me feel all the more prepared and dampening my ‘preparation anxiety’, it seems to unravel my confidence and cause me to wonder what else I might be overlooking.
What am I neglecting? …In this case, to break the chain of negative thinking! I’m plenty prepared. Mentally, I’m definitly ready to just get on with it.
Timing
It’s all in the timing. The trick is, each of us measure it differently. Some people become fixated on it and others make a conscious decision to disregard it. My time that remains prior to departure for the Himalayan trek is now inside 2 weeks. I’m hoping to pull together the many little things I’ve been doing to prepare and this weekend maybe even pack as if I were leaving, in order to better sense if there is something I have overlooked. This would give me time to take care of things if I find I don’t have what I need or want. I guess I am also interested to determine whether I have too much. Not too much time, but too much stuff.
I’ve made time to watch some basketball of the NCAA Men’s Tournament. As with almost all sports, time is all-critical. Obviously, there is the shot-clock to be managed, repeatedly throughout the game, and then the final buzzer to be beaten. But most importantly, the timing of each and every decision, as well as the athletic ability to respond in critical time to each decision, reveals outcomes of success and failure. For me it provides the beauty or the banality of the game. There are many times when players are so totally open to receive a pass, yet that moment is so incredibly short, infinitesimally small even, that completing it doesn’t happen. If their timing is off, the game can seem boring as hell. And when it is on, I find it a work of art.
Some athletes speak of slowing the action down in their minds, or of feeling as if that is what happens to them when they get in a ‘zone’. But I think the real secret is in the ability to think ahead. Anticipate what is about to happen and you just might be ready when it does. Maybe that is just another way of describing the same phenomenon, I don’t know. Makes it pretty fascinating with regard to team sports when you think about the nuances of timing and are able to witness a group of individuals mesh in ultimate synchronized anticipation and micro-second reactions, to achieve success. Especially when they are doing it against another team of individuals employing the same skills and effort to thwart them all the while.
I measure the time in two ways: the time remaining is getting short and yet it is still a long time until I leave. It is all relative.
Side Effects
I am one of those people who doesn’t take much in the way of medications. If I get a headache, I figure I should drink more water and maybe rest a bit. It rarely occurs to me to take a pill for it. Symptoms of a cold have to get pretty severe, or interfere with my ability to function at work, before I reach for the throat lozenge or cough syrup or decongestant. But after a required physical to get clearance from my doctor to participate in a high altitude trek, I was informed I needed to treat a partial airway obstruction. Of all things, it involved a twice-daily dose of medication. I figured that since this was directly related to my breathing, and I would be needing all the breath I can muster on my planned adventure, it would be logical to follow through with the prescribed regimen.
It has been 10 weeks now and I have been tolerating it pretty well. Maybe even noticed the improvement, although I was quite unaware before all this that I was experiencing anything less than optimal. The information provided with the drug indicated that some people experience positive results right away, but it is more likely that it will take 2-4 weeks for the medication to begin to work its magic. My experience has been undefined in the timing of ultimate sustained positive result, but it has been gradually becoming apparent to me that I am developing side effects. And, that they are increasing in number and intensity.
I dug up the literature and revisited the details about side effects. I was a bit surprised to see how many applied. Not all of the listed possibilities, so that is good, huh? But, oh my, look at that. Eleven very recognizable issues, all listed under contact your physician immediately. Not the kind of thing that helps me reduce anxiety of preparing for my big trip.
Didn’t get any specific trip-planning tasks accomplished today, but not because I wasn’t working on anything valuable. Filled out the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament bracket. I’m pretty sure I got all the correct teams. Now I just wait for the side-effects of that effort.
Preparing for a trek in the Himalayas
What might be the next best thing to climbing the mountain called Everest? I suggest, for the non-technical climber, it could simply be standing on a nearby summit to enjoy a first-hand view of the highest mountain on Earth. In Nepal the head of the sky is called Sagarmatha. In two weeks, I leave home in Minnesota, U.S.A. to participate in a 7-person, 3-week trek in the Solu Khumbu of Nepal with a goal of reaching Gokyo Ri (17,500 ft.) to view the Earth Mother.
For some perspective, let me point out that Nepal is pretty much on the opposite side of the northern hemisphere from me. I was born and raised in an area of approximate altitude of 700-950 ft. above sea level. I travel very rarely and have never experienced the degree of cultural and economic disparity that I can expect on this trip. This can be called a trek for me in more ways than one. Preparations have been in process for months, but it feels like it is getting down to the wire now and there is an increasing level of anxiety that is showing up.
Today, I picked off some of the little tasks. I laminated some ID and medical information and used a permanent marker to write my name and address on the inside of my bags. Every little step accomplished helps keep the task of preparing from feeling overwhelming. You know, as in, fooling myself. In the mean time, I am becoming increasingly reverent about every visit to a toilet that offers a seat, to a hot shower of unlimited duration, to my bed; well in advance of how much I will grow to appreciate them in the weeks to come.
On Thursday, April 2, I fly to Los Angeles and then on to Bangkok, Thailand, and after a night’s layover there, to Katmandu, Nepal. After two days, we fly to Lukla, either by Twin Otter or helicopter (I’m leaning toward wanting a ride in a helicopter, but either one sounds “exciting”). We’ll tread the same path as those whose goal includes the death zone at the top of the world, visiting places like Namche Bazaar and Tengboche Monastery. There will be prayer wheels and flags and mantras of ‘om mani padme hum’. Our ultimate elevation will be higher (should I be allowed to achieve it) than Base Camp of the climbers of Everest. Cerebral Edema will not hesitate to take a life at lesser heights than this, if one disregards the signals.
I intend to actually write by hand in a journal during the weeks of the trek to capture details of our adventures. I am sincerely looking forward to being beyond the reach, and for me, subsequent lure, of my usual technologies. So, upon my return, I should hope you will find a series of posts on this site describing the wonder of it all and that you will be intrigued enough to return and explore them with me here.
Namaste.
Relative Something 