Author name: tom

Because a number of us wanted to ride unicycles instead of jeep seats, the tour leaders gave us the option to start off a bit early. We’d get to ride until the jeeps caught us; they’d give us about a 90 minute head start. Our view was that a kilometer ridden on unicycle was equivalent […]

The plan for today was to ride down to Tal, a town further down the valley than Bagarchhap, where we’d started the tour. This meant that we got to ride down past the spectacular waterfalls we’d seen on our first riding day, and through the sub-tropical forest where we saw the pitcher plants. The day

Our way up had been mostly climbing, so our way back was mostly descending. That made long distances much more manageable. We decided to do two days in one, about 30km from Manang to Chame. We’d lose about 900 meters of altitude, but also have about 500 meters of climbing to do. Nepali flat. Total

After acclimating in Manang, our plan was to prep for the push over the pass in two short days; today, just 11km and 500 meters of elevation gain. Most of that gain came in the first 5km; after that it was Nepali Flat. Because of the short day we had a relaxing start, with unicycle lessons

Having reached 3500 meters, we paused in our ascent to acclimatize to altitude. We’d gotten used to the feel of the mountain air, but not to the feeling of fatigue accompanying every exertion. Who knew walking up the stairs could be so hard? In the morning we had the Small World encounter for the day; our

Chris and I were up before sunrise on another crisp, clear morning. We walked up to a beautiful Buddha statue overlooking the town. This site serves as the funeral pyre for the town (Nepalis, both Buddhist and Hindu, cremate their dead), and the hillside above the statue was completely covered with prayer flags. I hung one for a

My body clock was pretty funky after all the travel; I woke up well before sunrise. This turned out to be fortunate, as peeking out of the window revealed the moon setting over an amazing scene that had been covered by clouds yesterday. The snow line had come down pretty far, maybe 200 meters above town, so

After three long days of travel, we were anxious to start riding. We had a good, hearty breakfast at the tea house (traditionally, travelers eat breakfast and dinner at the tea house where they’re sleeping), had a briefing about the day’s ride, and put the unis together. Our Nepali porters and guides were mostly Sherpas

Oakland to Dubai The first part of the epic was travel. Nepal is more or less exactly on the other side of the Northern Hemisphere relative to Oakland, so it’s a long flight however you choose to take it, and all the connections are weird. You can go either east or west; Chris and I