Celebration of an expedition - Nepal

The celebration at the end of our expedition lasted a while, as it should. It began with a big party in Lukla, where after being teetotallers for a month we skulled beer and tried Nepali whisky with the porters, the guides, and the liason officer. The liason officer has a strange role. In essence, the Nepali government requires us to have a special permit and be accompanied by a liason officer on the expedition, as we were going to climb a Himalayan peak above 7000 metres. The problem is, most liason officers have only ever seen the inside of an office, and have no idea about the mountains or mountaineering, let alone climbing a 7000 metre peak. So, it would be dangerous and even stupid to have them “accompany” the team. So it seems to be an unspoken rule that the liason officer sees us off, and then suddenly reappears to join us on the way back, often on the last day of the expedition to walk back to Lukla. Anyway, we had a lot of laughs making fun of the poor man who made a small contribution to our expedition, but partied in a big way at our big party to celebrate our big effort. Without that small contribution though, and so without a permit and his approval we could have been fined thousands of dollars. Once an American team was fined over US $100,000 for climbing without approval.

The night of the party Robin, our cook made the most amazing meal with different curried meats and veges, papadams, and a big cake for dessert. We drank and ate far too much, and then thanked the porters and the guides quite formally for all their hard work, which sometimes involved carrying up to 70 kg loads with barely sandals for footwear through ice and snow. It amazes me how famous some western mountaineers are – particularly those who have climbed Everest, and how little recognition their Nepali guides and porters get. They climb the same peaks, fixing ropes and often enduring twice as much weight as the members of the team, and I never heard any of them complaining. We made donations of our expedition gear, and money to them which they graciously thanked each of us individually for. The night continued with lots of back slapping, some truly bad dancing to Bollywood music, and more making fun of the liason officer and his really truly bad dancing, till we could laugh and stand no longer.

After enduring the flight back from Lukla, (the flight is specatular but the take off and the landing is terrifying, and there is at least one plane accident a month - on a sad note, Edmund Hilary watched his wife and children die on a flight arriving in Lukla), and arriving back in the Du, Nic, Boydo and I decided to get out of the city as soon as possible, and booked a short trip to Pokara to continue our celebration. We took a bus from the Du which was meant to take 6 hours but ended up taking 13..!!. The road was full of landslides which meant that the two lanes of quite a busy road became one , and we had to wait in the bus for hours dripping with sweat until the bus could move a few metres and a breeze would come through the window. After our horendous trip from Dunche (see the article Dunche to the Du) we had decided to take the “tourist bus” so we didn’t have to put up with so many animals and people on top of people as , but even on the tourist bus, 13 hours is a long long ride without air conditioning in over 30 degrees and stifling humidity.

Our celebration continued in Pokhara. We indulged at the “German bakeries” which did a pretty good chocolate croissant, and apple pie; especially after a rice diet for 2 months; and explored the Indian restaurants which the Nepalis do extraordinarily well. We spent our days drinking beers in canoes on the lake, drinking wine on the rooftop of our hotel with a view of the Annapurnas, and just drinking generally, so that we saw things that perhaps weren't there. I like celebrating.