A Trek For The Future-That the Work of PACH and FIBUSPAM Endures

 When dog sled owners hook their dogs up to their sleds for a run, they actually vibrate with excitement. They love to run and can’t wait to start. That’s us. Because of weather, no planes or helicopters have been able to ferry trekkers to and from the airport in Lukla for two days. There are now many hundreds of trekkers from all over the world stuck in Lukla and, like us, in Manthali. It happens but it’s a first for us. Tomorrow is supposed to be clear so our hopes are up. We are now, however, behind schedule and we will have to work hard to make up that ground. I’ve included some photos of the scene at the tiny airport. 

 This summer, Nepal suffered from devastating monsoon rains, landslides and flooding. Hundreds of people died. Today, we saw ithe damage up close. Our drive to the airport in Manthali followed the BP Highway and took us 8 hours. Like many others in Nepal it links the capitol and other cities with the Himalayas and appears to be an engineering miracle. It crosses many rivers, has hair raising ascents, dangerous switchbacks up and down steep hillsides, and only has two very narrow lanes. The past week was the Nepali “Christmas” holiday when scores of Nepali families leave Kathmandu to visit family. Today was the day they all tried to return home. The highway is so badly damaged it is impossible to imagine how it could ever be rebuilt. Entire families on small motorcycles, crammed into vans and in the backs of trucks took tremendous risks to get home. For miles and miles the highway no longer exists and the immense cement structures that supported it have all crumbled. Homes, cars, vehicl

  Today, Saturday, October 12, we departed JFK at 11:20 AM and arrived in Kathmandu on Sunday at 6:00 PM. While our flights were uneventful, we did pause a bit flying over Israel on our way to Doha, Qatar.  Sunday evening our agent in Nepal, Anish Sharma, hosted a welcome “Bronze Plate” dinner where we enjoyed traditional Nepali music and dance.  Tonight, we will get some sleep and Monday we will travel to Manthali airport for our flight to Lukla and the Everest region. Because of the large volume of trekkers and climbers, flights no longer depart from Kathmandu and require a long drive to Manthali. Because of a very destructive 2024 monsoon season, bridges and parts of the highway were destroyed. Our drive tomorrow will now take 7-10 hours to complete.