13 Dec 98

I just finished a very enjoyable few days learning to kayak. On the 9th, Gary and I went out to the Seti River and met Dan and Richard. Along with Min, Suko, and Anil (our guides) we headed down the river. We spent three nights camping alongside the river next to the jungle. We also spent the better part of four days getting thrashed about in the river. I learned quite a bit and would like a chance to practice a bit more sometime.

On the first day we learned a few basics and went through some small rapids. The second day I learned to roll the kayak in flat water and ended up swimming after wrecking in a few rapids. The third day I nearly perfected my kayak rolling technique and survived most of the rapids without an emergency ejection from my upsidedown kayak. On one memorable rapid, I ended up upside down and tried to roll back over. That did not work. Then I felt a big bump. I thought it was my guide coming to rescue me. My guide would bump the side of my boat with his so that I could grab his boat and turn myself over. After a moment I realized that the hard bump I had felt was not on the side of my boat, but was on the back of my head. At this point I decided that I was being pounded by rocks, and not being rescued. At that point I decided I would be better off swimming the rest of the rapid with my head above water, so I got out of the kayak and enjoyed my swim.

On the final day, I amazed my guides and myself by rolling my kayak upright after being overturned in some rapids. On the next rapid, I was again over turned and able to right myself without any help. None of the other people in my class were able to roll very well and apparently very few people learn how to do it in the first few days. I think because I open my eyes underwater I was able to be more comfortable sitting in a kayak and blowing bubbles. All four of us ended up swimming through the next two rapids. I tried to roll back over, but the waves were just too big and I got nowhere. I told my guide that I could roll easily in flat water, but found it much more difficult in rough water. On the next rapid he told to practice rolling again. So, with great trust in his judgment of the depth of the water in the rapid, I rolled my self upside down as we entered the rapid. I rolled back upright and, at his urging, rolled again in the rapid. This went well, so I tried a third roll. After a few unsuccessful attempts to get my head above water again, I ended up pulling out and swimming.

Now Gary and I are in Kathmandu again. Tomorrow we head down to India. Our first stop will be Varanasi. It is a holy city for Hindus and we will spend a few days seeing the sights. Then we will try to find this skiing place he heard about in the Indian Himalayas.

Some more observations from my trek -

Language - On several occasions I was surprised to be addressed in Spanish by Nepalese people. It turns out that the words for 'what' (que) and 'goodbye' (hasta) are the same in both languages. They also have quite a few other words in common, but with different meanings. Both Spanish and Nepali have no 'V' sound and use 'B' instead. Also, they don't have many words that start with an 'S' sound. They both use the 'Es' sound, so Steve becomes Esteve.

Porters - In warm weather they wear no shoes or flip-flops. In cold weather they usually have some tennis shoes. The trail is littered with broken flip-flops.