Hunter's Royal Trek Day 1

Within the program I am doing with GVI, there was a mountain trek paid for as an incentive. The trek I did here is called, "The Royal Trek," which gets its name because the English Prince Charles was one of the first to explore this route. I was expecting to be trekking through one of the Himayla's but didn't realize how long these treks lasted(at least 10 days) so I only had time for a 4 day trek. It was the perfect beginner's trek, it wasn't too difficult, yet it wasn't easy by any means, and while I wasn't walking through Everest or Annapurna or some incredible mountain like that, I still had one of the greatest experiences of my life. The Royal Trek is a 4 day 3 night trek through the hills and mountains that wrap around two beautiful local lakes, Rupa lake, and Bagnas Lake. Our guide's name was Homme a local Nepali guide that works for "Himalayan Encounters" who books all of the trips and extracurricular for us. Homme was an amazing guide, Sarah (a girl from Minnesota who Trekked with me) and I really lucked out. He was super outgoing and friendly, always made sure we were fed and had plenty of water, all in all he was everything you could ask of a guide. Day 1: On the first day we started out at Bagnas lake, working our way up from the foothills of a mountain to an area called "Lipani" after about 4 or so hours of hiking, we finally reached the top of a beautiful hill in Lipani over looking the Bagnas lake, where there was a field about 100 square yards, and a small little guest house. On the field were about 7 local kids playing soccer along with an adorable baby girl maybe a year and a half old. We arrived at the guesthouse at about 2 pm, and while my guide and Sarah took a nap during the afternoon, I was filled with energy and adrenaline from the trek, so I stayed and played with all the kids all afternoon. They absolutely wore me out, especially when I picked a kid up into the air, naturally all of them wanted to be thrown into the air over and over. I had an absolute blast with these kids, and their crappy little soccer ball which had a whole in it and had to be blown up every ten minutes. I plan to hike back to this guest house again and bring these kids a new ball and some treats. That night we had the typical traditional Nepali meal "Dal Baat" which is rice, lental, and pickle. We sat around with the family, eating and drinking local homemade wine. At first I was a bit reluctant to drink homemade wine from a little village in the middle of no where, but while it wasn't very tasty, it was fun having a drink with the family up there and didn't give you a headache or full stomach at all!

From Hunter (4wk explorer volunteer) 

Hunter's Royal Trek Day 1