2011 - Stockholm Stay

Year 2011 started of a bit slowly in Melbourne with not very clear idea of when we can start our travel, as Paddy managed to break his foot. Also, the New york assignment for January did not happen as we hoped... The result was a few stints at Stockholm to experience all 4 seasons :)

January 26 - to Early April Stockholm - Leaving it till late January, did give the foot a chance to heal, so Paddy could actually wear proper shoes and  not the open toed CAM boots, to get exposed to the peak winter of Stockholm with temperatures never crossing the -20

Street scape of Stockholm in Feb

Finally arrived in a very white Stockholm on January 26 , Luckily, it was sunny :) we were prepared for very very short days, but it turned out better, and the snow actually made everything look beautiful The only problem was that we had to really be covered head to toe, and still feel cold. It was a mild -20C , but got used to the layers very soon. The apartment complex was lovely with some nice views of the harbour. The other good news was the food... In 1994 when we first visited Stockholm, vegetarian food implied that the meat actually came with a side serve of vegetables.  However, on very first day, we just wandered into a sandwich place for a quick lunch called 'Sandy' and found about 4 or 5 vegetarian options of wraps, sandwiches and such.

View from our apartment Window

The same night found a quick and cheap all you can eat vegetarian place with a OK option of vegetarian food that was a bit bland but quite good.  The views from our apartment was also really gorgeous and we had a lovely time. Another lovely thing abut Stockholm we found was the language... Yep you had to just hesitate for  micro second and immediately the English came out. All TV was also in English with Swedish sub titles, made it a lot easier in a way, though made learning even a little of Swedish very difficult. Result is after spending almost 5 months in total here our Swedish is limited to hey hey, hey Do, and tak tak :)

The first real effect of a winter storm was felt on our wedding anniversary, February 11th  It was strange watching the snow swirl around in the balcony when we were inside. It was so bad, that the buses could not run that morning. Also, could not get any taxis etc. So were forced stay at home for Paddy, with the main entertainment was to watch the snow clearing vehicles clear the bus depot to get the buses out :) This meant Paddy could  get to work around 1pm.
Only trouble was he had to walk with his dodgy foot from the station that evening :) 

BUT we were not going to let the weather spoil it for us, in fact the snow made the place almost magical and loved the Gamla Stan with its narrow paved lane-ways, and snow covered roofs and the lovely warm cafes,  and another wonderful vegetarian place called hermitage. Our first attempt on the Archipelago tour got abandoned as the ice breaker could not cut through the ice enough to leave the harbour, and only made the ferry move sideways..  We also enjoyed the first ice hockey game and it was good fun. Loved the way the players were introduced with music and the general vibes in the hall.  

The ice Bar

The other memorable trip was to the Vasa museum which was amazing. Saying that the two of us, who usually last about 30 mins in a good museum spent an hour and half here tells you a lot about the way the ship is preserved and the amount of info about it.  Another visit that was a bit tacky nevertheless an experience I will not forget was visiting the ice bar in Stockholm. This is a bar made entirely of ice, right down to the bar tables, and glasses, and yes they lend you these stylish ponchos and gloves :) 

Winter highlights of Stockholm 

• The days are much longer than I expected, and it was nice to have daily sunlight hours increase by about 15 mins each day.
• Watching the little pre-schoolers that were made to walk in their cute little snow bunny outfits to the park, where they used little frisby like disks to Toboggan down the tiny slopes Made you understand , why most swedes we saw were looking fit and non flabby.
• The absolutely white landscape that could not distinguish where the land ended and the water started

As the weather began to thaw in March, walking in the park had a different feel, now instead of slipping and sliding on the snow/ice, there was slush everywhere with the snow melt. The paths started to look very wide :) 

We visited the Skansen but it was still a bit too cold for the animals to come out of hibernation. Did manage to see a few rein deers, and bears that were a bit lazy and sleepy...   Managed to do the Archipelago tour and noticed that there was still a lot of ice floating in the Baltic sea. 

Also visited Sigtuna ,  a cute little town which is claimed to be one of the oldest twos in Sweden and has been a town for more than 1000 years. It was snowed in, and we could not wander through the ruins of the 1000 + years churches we would have loved to. 

View of Sodermalm in spring

The highlights of spring in Stockholm?

• The emergence of large masses of blue showing off the fact that Stockholm is actually made up of many many islands and the reason why people talk in terms of number of bridges when they talk of how far from the city they live in
• The number of cycles that are in use and the fact that people cycle in normal work clothes/shoes, including girls in mini skirts :)
• The parks are almost marshy and messy with all that snow melt. 
• It is finally above 0, and girls are out in mini skirts, but to me its still colder than Melbourne winter on most days :)

The next trip back to Stockholm was at end of summer, its end of July and as the flight comes in to land, can see this absolutely gorgeous sight of green carpets and blue oceans everywhere. Its picture perfect. Suddenly we find all this day light time to make full use off. The archipelago tour of thousand islands for the whole day and it was ... well how do you describe paradise. NOW I understand why the Stockholm people put up with all those miserable days in winter, to have this absolutely gorgeous place for about three to four months. Looks like weather is never bad here in July/August. 

Thousand island Cruise

enjoying the 100 island cruise

Made full use of the long days and visited the many natural spots in the vicinity and had many hikes with packed picnic even on work days... Even managed to go on our cruise to Helsinki and that three hours through the entire archipelago on Friday evening was nothing short of Magic. The archipelago in Helsinki felt very tame after the one at this end :( 

Enjoying a picnic dinner in Brunnsviken

Summer Highlights

• The park usage by all the sun worshippers - and swedes are not bash people and like to tan all of their bodies :)
• The gorgeous views of blue and green where ever you go , now you could see the thousands of islands you keep hearing about
• The long days and lovely weather to enjoy it

Our final trip back to Stockholm was not until Mid November, start of winter. This is my least favourite season in Stockholm. The days are absolutely damp and is getting shorter each day by about 15 mins :(  We seem to get about 1 or maximum 2 hours of sunshine if that, and the sun seems to be really lazy and  stays low down.  Did visit the Christmas market in Gamla Stan which is OK. The only plus I can see is the Christmas lights. You do get to enjoy their beauty for longer time frames, and the lighting is very discrete and lovely.

Highlights of Stockholm in early winter 

• Damp and not great weather
• Short days , shortening even more rapidly 
• Fantastic  Christmas lighting that is discrete and lovely
• Christmas shop windows that are unique and not like every other city in the world. 

2011 - germany and rest

2011 was a true nomadic life with most of our time in Stockholm and Frankfurt, with a few weeks interspersed in London and Paris.  So those of you interested here is a report of the non Stockholm part ... 

April - London 

As the closer friends and family and friends of us know there was a chance that we would go to the big apple in the first quarter of 2011, and Stockholm was going to be a place until then. However, with US economy being what it is the US project never happened in end of March, so it was decided that we will spend the next few months back in Frankfurt. However, the visa had expired and it took a while to get it done, so London was home for next three weeks. 

Here I had my first Pick Pocket experience.  The ज्ञान ( knowledge in sanskrit ) 

I got from this experience  was that if you report the incident to the police and you have lost everything ( as in your ticket cash etc) the police will help you get home using London transport. The police where extremely sympathetic and nice and realistic, (told me to forget any hope of getting the wallet/cards back... I had fond hopes that the thief might take the cash and return the wallet, so I will get my licence and such back...)  Well this meant calling all the banks in three countries to cancel the cards etc. However, luckily but for my ego nothing else was majorly affected, and some one got richer by about 200 british pounds. Did enjoy the brief ( 3 weeks) break, and appreciated being back in a place where you understood what was going on around you rather than it being just some background noise :) Also gave us a chance to catch up with some friends and family etc,  as well as get our Indian spice fix in East ham (Saravana Bhava)  and Southall ( Roxy's) 

May-July Frankfurt - 

This time qround we had couple of friends in Frankfurt. The young couple whom Paddy ad befriended end of his stay last year, where good fun, and we went out quite a bit. Discovered Cacoon, one of the classiest night spot, ( though not quite sure of techno music...)  Had loads of fun with a few friends, but could not last the distance with the music :)

Also, with weather warming up did a lot of hiking. First long weekend was in early june and checked out Vulcan Ring , and fell in love with the place.  The next fantastic trip as down the Lahn river. This was sensational to canoe 15 kms down the Lahn river. 

Again got Purnima and Geeth, with us, so the strong lad could lend us some muscle :) The walking and hiking continued every weekend in Taunus and the red wine consumption increased. 

The last long weekend in June we took of to Garmisch Parkirchen. Hired a medium car rather than the compact, and got upgrade to benz E class. result was for the first time in autobahn we were the ones that were one of the fast lane user :0 Touched 260 KMs but were driving around 200 for quite a while. Was a great experience. the web site http://www.gapa.de/Garmisch-Partenkirchen_GaPa_Multimedia_tour_planner/ was of fantastic value as it helped us find the perfect hikes.  We did the Mt Wank hike, The prartnachklam gorge walk ( along the tunnel and inside the tunnel that runs right next to the gorge. This was absolutely sensational and a not to be missed walk.  We also went to Alspspitz, kruezeck circuit using the cable cars rather than he zugspitz as that was a lot more crowded.  The trip also gave us an opportunity to meet and become friends with cousin of  a good friend who lives in Munich... Also meant that we got to have some yummy lemon rice in the banks of Eibsee with some fun company :)

One other unique experience we did have was visiting a german sauna/spa. This was on a roof top and open air, but the catch is that in these places in germany you are expected to go in your birthday suit ( as the receptionist warned us -  no swim wear allowed ) ! Dedcide that here I did not know anybody and hence should be OK to get in, and actually found that poeple are so comfortable and no one looks at another person. It was a lovely salted pool, steam and sauna etc with the pool/spa in the open air. Felt marvelous and am glad we did it and that I overcame my inhibition :) 

That ended the first part of the german stay. In July I went to Aus/Singapore while Paddy continued funding my holiday. 

Germany Sep/Oct

The late summer autumn in germany was even better with more company for hikes, this time with Fred a fellow CPTer being very interested. So did even more hiking by exploring Taunus, Rhine valley and heidelberg. Thanks to Fred's german also found this awesome website for hiking in and around Frankfurt http://www.regioausflug.de/odenwald/odenwald_wandern_rund.php 

All in all a very enjoyable routine of running during the week, hiking on at least one day in the weekend and partying as well.  End of october , using Pooja as an excuse I also visited Berlin, and that was good. Found that Berlin has definitely changed from our last visit in 1992 , though the bad news of this was that the museums are lot more crowded.  Enjoyed the city anyway. 

One of my favourite monument in paris The cathedral of Notre Dame

First week of November was in Paris and this was ... well what can you say about Paris. This city has to be the most beautiful one in the world with so many lovely architecturally unique and wonderful places in such small area. Staying in St Germain area was excellent and from where we stayed ( close to St Sulpice) the area is full of character at any time of the day.  Also had the good fortune get our dosa fix at the newly opened saravan bhava in paris :) The weather god was on our side and had an excellent stay before heading back to Stockholm.

The end of the year is close and its going to be London for a couple of days and back to base in Melbourne. Until next year and more travels  Auf Wiedersehen, Au Revoir, HeyDoe , Caio etc etc.

Nepal Trek - Annapurna Circuit - Part 1- Basisahar to Manang

After a few attempted trips ( 1994, 2006) we finally made it. The idea of doing the indian trek before attacking the longer and more strenuous Annapurna circuit worked beautifully. So here is a long overdue account of that trip.  Since it is a 20 day long hike, I am doing it in two parts... This section includes the organising and the trip up to Manang at 3500 Mts. Part 2 , will detail the Torungla Pass and beyond.

The entire plan had been made and tickets booked before I realised that our date of landing in kathmandu is tech start of their Dashian and that everything will be shut over the next three to four days. Yep Dashian in 2010 was from October 15 to 17, with almost all travel agents and govt offices shut most days. fortunately, the permit office was open on 16th for the morning.
The organising of the trek was a bit more of an adventure than we had expected thanks to dashian. As planned we arrived on Oct 15th and Gina was expected to join us on 17th, to start the trek on 18th. However, when we tried meeting the two guys whom I had emailed before they turned out to be a bit of a disiater. One of them tried putting on too much airs, and the other had already gone home and was not interested.  So walked around Thamel and met a couple of agencies. One was http://www.adventureasiatrek.com/ , run by Dilip Lama and was new agency and hence very keen to help. The other was one of the bigger group, who said they can organise porters but only starting on Oct 19th.

Dilip promised that he would get us to meet the porter(s) on the following day. So accepted to see him at 11am, on Oct16th and wandered around. Then found out that the permit office is only open on Oct 16th till 1PM, and only re-opened on Oct19th.  So decided that we would get the permits done regardless of the group we go with, even though the agencies wanted t do it themselves. So on oct 16th walked all the way to the permit office and found out you need cash! Had to go ATM hunting ( there are heaps but only very few take international cards) got the necessary money and headed back to the office. The permits could only be got for yourselves and any family member who was not with you. So we became an international family with Gina being our sister In law :) This done went to meet Dilip and his porter/guide was not there, but he did manage to get him after lunch. So met him at about 2 pm. The bloke ..... claimed he had done this trip many times and spoke a few sentences in english, later we found that he could say a few words in english, but doubted if he could understand any. As regardless of what you asked you got the same answer :)At that stage he seemed OK, and after Dilip promised to get us to meet the young guy who would be our second ported on 17th, and set things up for the drive to Besisahar and a airport pickup for Gina for the next day went off to our hotel. The taxi diid not arrive as promised but Dilip found us another and it was very comfortable ride back from airport. On 17th met up with our guide number 2, ..... . On Oct 18th, we found the first impact for Dashian. We had both our porters turn up at the promised 6:30, however we had no vehicle, After a few frantic calls found out that the driver had drunk too much due to dashain and was not cmng. Dilip managed to get us the same vehicle that took us yesterday, and we were happy.  The ride was OK but he would not go any further than Besisahar. had lunch/ breakfast at a dhaba en route , and it was not too bad. Reached Besisahar around 2 pm.

The buses enroute to besishar 

Since had learnt that the walk up to bhulbule was on road ( or what passed for a road in nepal...read that as dirt track) tried finding out about the bus option. One look at it and we decided to walk the 10 KMs and it took 3hrs Bus apparently takes 2 :)

The bus from Besisahar to Bhulbhule...

Apparently that was the day( the day after vijayadashmi) that people visit their families for dashain hence the crowds.
The walk was actually quite pleasant, except to find that our lead porter had a bit of an attitude. This came out, when we found him trying to use the back pack straps to tie his bag on to the backpack and had no ropes etc , despite us asking him pervious day and him saying yes I will bring them... Should have seen the issue brewing, but that can wait. So on very first day, Gina's brand new rain cover had a tear, as he just plonked it close to a jagged rock, while the young fellow was a lot more careful.  The place in bhulbhule gave as a first glimpse of what to expect, squat toilets with a bucket to dip out water... and the views that make up.










The morning sun ( when we reached it was a bit cloudy so did not see anything) gave us the first view of what we can expect for rest of the trek. Yep the grand view of the magnificent mountains that was coming with us :)

Todays walk was along a few rivers and suspension bridges taking us from Bhulbule to Nardi with break fast at Hilton... the Nardi one

After a hearty break fast the walk continued through rice field and other amazing scenery to Germu our stop for the second night. 

Day three was a longish day, as we sated off from germu and after walking past Jagat to Tal. The walk was lovely with views along Marsyagudi river and the village of Tal was lovely. 

The accommodation (hotel Paradise) was also much better here, as we had hot water and could actually wash some clothes :) The sunrise views at Tal was lovely, and the walk to Darapani on day 4 was as beautiful as expected. The river ( marsayagudi) continued to weave its path and we followed it :) Breakfast stop was at Darapani where we had a lovely breakfast at this London returned entrepreneur... ( This lady went as a maid to London to ensure she made enough money to set up a cafe/tea house out here and educate her kids.) She has done that, and is now running this little tea house in darapani. The brekky was nice and the views are changing as we get further up into the hills as its becoming more Buddhist oriented.  The day was greta nd the walk with lots of steps and first views of the Annapurna range took us to Chame. The main guy Indra was not impressed and kept complaining about it being too long a distance to cover on one day. But it was worth it as the hotel Karma in Chame was very comfortable.

Views on the way to Chame

This one is the views in Chame as the sun was setting.

The next day was a walk to Pisang, and the day
did not start well. Indra our porter decide to  stop to buy some cakes or whatever and did not like it when we siad hurry up.. On top of it he was again showing too much attitude when we asked him to be careful with the bags. The result was we told him, taht we had had enough of him and will want to replace him once we get to the next big town... (which looked like Manang) he said he had had enough as well.... and started causing us a few issues, but we reached Pisang with a bit of drama and he refced to let us use his phone, in which we had put in crit ! Anyway, we managed to get in touch with Dilip to get the point across that we cant continue with this bloke and need a replacement. Were introduced to the commy Nepal, as the porters all tried ganging up on us and saying we had to keep Indra for our entire trip... Dilip had told him to go with us till Manang, where he was confidant of finding a replacement. After a stressful evening, fund that Indra left without saying anything next morning.

 Fortunately Tej stayed back. So, Day 6 of the trek, Paddy, had to be a semi porter :) He carried his bag ( except it was about 3 or so Kgs heavier at about 14Kgs) and the day pack( 3 or so Kgs), while I carried my bag (10 Kg) and decided to do the low route to Manang. Got there by about 1pm. AND gained the respect of the porter/guide group,  as we could do it our selves :) Today, they were all telling us how Indra can get drunk and be a bit rude and what not :)

At Manang we found a lovely hotel and good rooms. Also Dilip kept his word and managed to find Ram the gentlest of the porters for rest of our trip. More about the rest of the trip in next edition... or in tamil தொடரும் (English: Will Continue) 

Five star Camping

Finally managed to organise and do a camping/trekking trip to Kuari Pass. This wasone of the best camping trip I have ever done... Raj style :-) with our very own Raju Guide.

The planning started back in April 2010 and with enough persuasion from couple of the team members the trek was chosen to be one that was not too difficult or high to impact AMS (altitude sickness) but high enough to keep us honest and get some nice views. So the kuari pass was chosen as this was 6 days long and went up to 3600Mts. The team consisted of the nomads, our novice camper friends , Piyu and Pooj the y-gen reps.

Trip started from Delhi on the train to H

aridwar and a jeep ride to start fo the trek. The roads were exciting after the recent floods, at one point it was really bad, with just enough space for our qualis to get through on a very muddy stretch , when I decide to enquire the driver about the toad, and asked 'यह कब टीक होगा? - when will this be fixed? ' His answer was 'पहेले खराब था, मगर अब टीक है, अब गढ़ी चल सकती है - It was not ok before, but its OK now, the car can go through' - implying what are you on about, we are going trough aren't we.... I learnt my lesson no more comments about the road :-)

The brochure/email we had got from Grand Adventures India 'http://grandadventure

sindia.com/index.htm' we expected to have a walk of about 3 hours on day one. Well with the exciting ride that we had, it was almost 3pm ( 9 hours of a bumpy drive) by the time we reached Ghat the starting point.Well it was himalayan 3 hours :-) Priyas comment summed it up, after half hour of walking she goes 'perhaps should have done more steps'.

Day one camp was reached when the sun was just about setting and the guys did not have sleeping bags. We thought hmmmm indian trek company.. However, to give Raju credit he fixed the problem. Got some new and

very heavy doonas for that night. Next day early mrning a guy was sent out to get the missing sleeping bags and they arrived by 5 pm next night

! From then on each night was sensational and the food an absolute hi

ghlight. Here is a picture of our dining tent being set up by our entertainer/helper Debu ji. The food each night was sensational as was the brekky and our packed lunch

The walk was as wonderful as we expected with wonderful views of the nandadevi sanctuary and the mountains there like donagiri, nandadevi, godhagiri etc.

The nights were camp fire and dancing . Cant wait for the next trip.

We had these fantastic people looking after us. The cook and his helpers had left by the time we took this picture.