Diving in Chuuk

So here we are, on a 7 sq. mile island, where it's not real safe to walk around at night, and yet, they have one of the biggest diving treasures in the world, over 30 WW2 wrecks that are actually divable in recreation depths (< 150 ft. or so). We've gone from 6000m to -37m in just over 10 days time! The wrecks are great, and we are going through a really good dive shop here (it's a good thing that it's good, because it's the only one!!!). I've been on 7 dives so far, Gump 5 (his head is giving him a little trouble, could be dehydration), and the wrecks are really well preserved and very interesting. We've seen cargo ships, a battlship, destroyer, and a bomber. We've seen zero's broken up in the holds, china, gas masks, 18-in. artillery shells, torpedo's, and even a couple human skulls, yikes! We've got about 4 more days of diving, I leave Thursday, Gump Wednesday, so we'll take advantage while we can!

The diving is interesting here as well, it's about as easy as it gets, since "Chuuk" contains several islands surrounded by 1 huge lagoon, it's basically like diving in a cup of water, no thermocline, no currents, really, all you have to do is go down and come back up!

I'll get pics up from here, but probably not till Oz, this is the only computer in town we can use and rumor has it that it's not very safe....

Business class in Manila

Well, we aren't flying business class, but we do have a couple hours to wait, so we are up in the business class lounge waiting with a full bar and buffet and free internet for $15, yeah, that was worth it.

Bangkok was pretty good, very humid there! Our hotel wasn't bad, not quite as amazing as advertised, but still not bad. We ended up seeing several Wat's (buddhist temples), including a couple that were only open on that day since we happened to be there on a buddhist worshipping day, the weekend market which was huge and you could buy anything for cheap (and we might have picked up a few things), and Khoa San, the backpackers street where you can get pad thai for < $1, and it's good! We definitely did eat some good food there, but the best may have been coming out of Bangkok at the airport we hit Burger King, yummy!!! We've been going for almost a month now so it was a nice change from rice.

Now I'm super excited that we are on our way to Truk, I couldn't sleep last night. I'm really excited to dive all the wrecks and see what the story really is out there. We've got plenty of days, though I'm pretty sure the first one will be to sleep. Hope all is well in the world where you are!

PICS!!!! PICS!!!! PICS!!!!!

We are back in Kathmandu, and happy to be here, trekking time is over for now :) We are having a bit of a trekking blowout tonight, and then it's on to Bangkok for Jason and I tomorrow, we got the flights changed for free and a Jacuzzi suit for 3 nights for $200 US!!! Wahoo!! But that's not the point of this post.....


Island Peak, with Lhotse Shar on the left and Peak 38 on the right:

Sunrise over Nuptse:

Holy crap that's high!

The crew on top of Pumori:

Yup, that's Everest and Nupste:

Me on top of Kala Patar (5550 m) with Pumori in the background:

Pumori, Lingtern, and Khungchung on the way up the glacial moraine coming from Everest on the way to Lobuche:

You'll have to trust me on this one: Jason, Emma, and I in front of Ama Dablam!

Ed and the mountains:

First views of Everest (l-r): can't remember :), Everest, Lhotse, Ama Dablam from just above Namche Bazar

The trek nears the end....

We are back in Lukla, my feet hurt, I'm tired of carrying a backpack, but we are happy and the party is tonight for the end of the journey! I wish this place had a usb port and I'd upload photos, but I'll have to do that from Bangkok. It looks like there is room on the flights and NO change fee, screw the U.S. airline change fees!!! We are hopefully getting in on the 24th, and with any luck, we have booked a jacuzzi suite for about $50 U.S. a night, gotta love exchange rates :) So we fly back tomorrow, and though we have the official goodbye with guides and porters tonight, we have the trekkers goodbye tomorrow night at a place called Rum Doodle, where if you summit Everest you eat free for life! Yeah...I'll be paying :)

Back to Namche!

Hey everyone, we are back from Kalaa Patar, Everest base camp, and Island peak. We had great weather for the duration of it, and the pics are amazing, if the guy here will finish burning my pics to cd so I have a solid copy of them, I'll try and get some up soon.

As it goes, we had great weather for Kalaa Patar and the pics of Everest and the surrounding mountains are incredible. I didn't end up going to basecamp, in order to save energy for Island peak, but there was nothing there anyway, just a bunch of rocks and a sign. The climbing season is in the spring, so no one is there right now, and it's just a bunch of rocks. Unfortunately, the tradeoff didn't work so well, I ended up having a bad stomach on summit day, and by the time I got to 5800 m (350 m short of the peak) I was hurting, out of energy, dehydrated, and possibly hypothermic, so the summit was a no go. Still, 5800 m is nothing to sniff at, and it turned out to be my summit for the day. Just happened to have a bad day at the wrong time, oh well.

We are back in Kathmandu in 3 days, hopefully we will be changing our flight to Bangkok up a couple days so that we have more time in a nice city vs. a polluted one, I don't need the sore throat I got from there again...

Dingboche!!!

Well, it's been awhile since I've been in touch, and it's been an amazing few days. We have gone from Namche Bazar north toward Everest, summited Kala Patar @ 5550 m, seen nothing but blue sky and mountains for the most part, it's been amazing!!

I was trying to upload some pics, but it's not happening here in Dingboche, so I'll have to do it from Namche Bazar in a few days. Itinerary for the next 4 days: Summit Island Peak! Jason and I actually decided to skip Base camp today in favor of an easy walk and a rest day before the next 3 days of trying to get up a 20,000 ft. mountain! Base camp is actually deserted right now anyway, the climbing season is in the spring and we have crazy everest views as it is, so good enough. Alan did go to base camp, but he also doesn't have to summit the mountain. It's an additional 5 hours of trekking, but it's mostly to see rocks....

Be back in 4 days, hopefully with summit pics from Island Peak!!!

1st trekking pics!

The crew getting all set up with gear for the climb! Turns out you can buy really cheap gear in Nepal, it's either 2nd use or knock off, but it's still good enough, I've probably saved $500 here! Could have saved a lot more!



Nice scenery, but cloudy...



Can you believe it??!!


The Lukla airstrip, what we flew in to. This was built by Sir Edmond Hilary and his Himalaya foundation. Quite the ride...


The mountains outside of Lukla, so far our only spot of them!

Kathmandu pics!

The trekking group in Lukla!



The largest stuppa (Buddhist temple) in Asia is in Kathmandu!



Buddha at the Monkey Palace

Ahh yes, obligitory pic with the dressed up guy...


Porters....man those guys must have the strongest neck muscles in the world....

Namche Bazar!

Hello everyone from 3450 m! We made the trek up here with no problems, it's a steep climb but we had a slow pace so it was no problem to get here. We have spent the day here aclimitizing, and it's gone well, I think the group is getting on very nicely. The weather hasn't cooperated yet, but supposedly tomorrow it turns and we will get our first views of Everest! Send your good karma our way...

The people here in Nepal are extremely friendly and great to converse worth. Our sherpa has quite the sense of humor, he tied our shoelaces together on our boots at one point and when it's time to go it's "zoom zoom!" time :) We played Uno here last night with some Aussies and a sherpa guide and added a couple new rules which made it very fun and entertaining.

I'm trying for pics tonight, stay tuned....

Namaste from Kathmandu!

we have spent a very interesting time here in Kathmandu. Yesterday jason allen and i went to the monkey palace, a large monastery, which, surprisingly, monkeys all over! so we did that and then wandered for lunch, had momo, which is basically nepalese potstickers and are frickin' awesome. we came back and met our tour group, there are 7 of us going to base camp, then 4 of us up to island peak to climb. seems like a laid back and good group, plus our guides name is karma, so how can it be bad, right?? Today we had a guided tour around the largest stuppa (buddhist temple) in asia, and another hindi temple. nepal is the place where the mongols, chinese, and indians all meshed, so there are lots of both hindi and buddhists here. the locals are great and everyone is very positive, i love it!

Tomorrow the trek starts. I bought some trekking pants today that would have been $125 in the states, and they were about $10 here...ridiculous. They may be knockoffs, but for $10, who cares? Our flight to lukla leaves at 7 am tomorrow, so tonight will be an early night. We'll see everyone in 3 weeks after we climb a mountain!

Kathmandu

Well, we are here in Kathmandu:myself, Jason and my brother. Jason and myself got in about noon yesterday after a 10 hour layover in bangkok (not fun) and all our bags made it no problem. Mountain Monarchs found us and got us to our hotel in good shape. Kathmandu was not quite what I expected, much more third world, small crazy streets, no lanes for cars, and much more dirty. After the initial culture shock we got out and wandered, the locals are actually really nice. We had some beers at a rooftop bar and talked with the staff for an hour or so, they gave us nicknames: Nokesh and Mukesh (no hair and much hair you can figure out for yourself who is who) and then we got dinner, part of it was a chopped up whole chicken in a spicy chili stew, Jason at the brain! Found my brother wandering the streets last night and then a good sleep last night. Today we are out for a wander around Kathmandu to the monkey palace!

And we're off!!

Jason and I head for Nepal today! Hopefully by the time we head down toward Chuuk the cyclones and earthquakes have died down a little bit. Also hopefully my brother Alan has found a flight to Kathmandu, he was on Air India but they are in the middle of a strike, whoops! It's all part of the fun of travelling.....see everyone in 2 months!