Long overdue update

It is mid September already and it has been a really long time since my last blog entry. I promised someone to do this more frequently and this is a start. I guess it makes sense to bring you all up to date to what I have been up to these last couple of months.
After my wonderful trek in the Khumbu and the climb of Island Peak unfortunately I had to leave Nepal. The plan was to head to Spiti and Ladakh and do some more trekking there. On the way out of Nepal I stopped at Bardia National Park in Western Nepal to visit the Elephant breeding centre. There were quite a few baby elephants there and I had a great time playing with them. Tourism in Western Nepal is not doing very well which is very obvious in Bardia National Park. I was almost the only tourist there. They are all hoping that this will improve next season.

Cecilia & Baby Elephant.

By the time I got to India monsoon was starting and I had a couple of extremely wet and hot days on the road which I escaped once I had made it to Shimla. But the place was packed with Indian tourists and so I soon moved on. I had decided to drive to Leh from Manali and do the Spiti valley on the way back. The ride between Leh and Manali was great and me and Stybba set some new personal records as far as heights of motorable passes were concerned: we crossed the first one Rohtang La (3'978 m) in pouring rain which did not stop until after the second pass Baralacha (4'892 m). But on the third day the weather improved and Lachulung LA (5'059 m) and Tanglang LA (5'325 m) were mastered as well and brought us safely to sunny Leh.

Stybba on Leh - Manali road

The summer was then spent in Leh where I met a lot of people and did two great treks. On one of these treks I climbed Stock Kangri (6'120 m). I hope to do a blog entry about the treks a little later this week.

Sunset on Stock Ranges

Also during my time in Leh a solution for the long planned trip to Tibet and China finally presented itself. Which meant I had to get back to Kathmandu by mid September. In the end it was very hard leaving Leh and I kept post phoning my departure until that was just no longer possible if I wanted to make it to Kathmandu in time. Which meant a couple of days long riding and leaving out Spiti.
So now I am back in Kathmandu and here I am getting ready for my trip through Tibet. On that leg of the journey I will have some company. Yesterday my friend Rainer showed up here and we are hoping his BMW will make here as well. We will find out in a couple of days. Also along for the ride are Peter and Gilles, two bikers I had met in Leh. I am really looking forward to Tibet not the least because it has been so much work and so much trouble setting up this trip. But that is another story......