This is it. The final countdown. The last few days before I leave on my next big adventure.

I’ve done a fair bit of travelling in my day – but this is a trip unlike any other I have taken.  I have never before needed vaccinations (thyphoid!) for my trips, or pre-prescribed antibiotics just in case.  I have never needed to bring my own toilet paper and mosquito netting and super power bug spray on a trip.  I have never needed to pretreat my clothes with bug repellent. 

However, in spite of all of this, I am looking forward to this trip.  The two week break from my normal life routines will be a welcome refreshing break – not that I don’t love what I do here at home, but sometimes you just need to unplug and recharge.

I still have a fair bit of preparation to do, like figuring out which clothes and (more importantly) which shoes I am bringing, but I think I have a good start with my trip to REI today and my trip to the camera store last weekend.  My rented wide angle lens will be here on Wednesday and I have all my camera stuff ready to go.  I’m slightly disappointed that I won’t be able to use only my backpacking pack for this trip – but I’m still going to try to travel as lightly as possible.

Now for the information that people have been asking about – where are you going, and how long will you be gone.  Well, without further adieu, here is the rundown of my trip.

Next Sunday, I will fliy to JFK to meet up with the rest of the group – and my mom – before we travel together to Doha, Qatar for the first leg of the trip.  This is a 12 hr flight.  Yay. *cues up lots of music and stuff to watch on electronic devices*

After a 7ish hr layover, we will then travel on a 5 hr flight to Kathmandu. Wahoo!

We will spend 4 days in Kathmandu.  During this stint in Nepal’s capital city, we will visit a number of temples, Patan City, visit a local school and visit to Mt. Everest.  Needless to say, I am quite excited about taking a ridiculously cliche photo with me in front of Mt. Everest – at base camp – likely with a silly grin on my face and probably giving two thumbs up.

After this part of the trip, we will travel to Pokhara, where we will spend 3 days staying at a lakeside hotel at Lake Phewa.  We will also tour more temples, another school, make some Nepalese food. 

After this, we will travel to Chitwa National Park and stay at the Tiger Tops Jungle Lodge for 3 days.  During this time we will go on a safari (!) and I plan on taking some sweet pictures here.  I will also try to avoid being bitten by a tiger.  🙂  We will also visit Naudanda and some local farms during our time here.

After Tiger Tops, we will head back to Kathmandu for 2 more days which will include a visit to another school and an orphanage and Bhaktapur.

For the schools and the orphanage, we will be bringing supplies to share with the kids – my mom the former teacher is taking the lead on gathering stuff for us to bring and share. 

While I am travelling I will be posting updates here and to Facebook and Twitter since the hotels have wifi access.  If you aren’t my friend on Facebook or if you don’t follow me on Twitter head on over to the right side of this page, and there are links to do both.  The updates will likely be a mix of photos, videos, and text, so keep a look out!

I am also looking for suggestions for music to bring along on the trip.  Do you have a favorite artist or song to share?  The perfect travel music?  I’m open to suggestions.

I’m really looking forward to this trip and thankful for the opportunity to travel.  I haven’t been out of the country since December of 2006, so I’m looking forward to this experience.

nepal, travel