We met a small group of Japanese girls on the last day of our treck they were staying at the same accommodation in Puthana. They started from Pedi (our final destination) and went to Puthana then back to Pedi. They flew from Kathmandu a couple of days ago; changing their travel mode from bus to plane because they said there was a major landslide. Leigh and I decided not to risk the bus trip, so on our return to Pokhara we bought our flight with Jet Lite to Kathm...

There was a bit of preparation we needed to do for this 9 day treck. We had to arrange the two trecking permits, ACAP - Annapurna Conservation and the Tourist Management Permit Therefore we had to go to the relevant Nepalese authorities, some 10 minute cab ride away. We arranged these permits and caught the cab back to our hotel. Apart from the gear we bought with us from home we needed additional items for the wet wheather, we bought those and we were set to ...

At 7.00PM in the rain a sea of touts and taxis waited for our bus to pull up. The conductor, jumped out pulling the tarp off the roof of the bus exposing our luggage to the warm Monsoon rain. Taxi, hotel; we were offered. Peace Plaza hotel we requested. We didn't actually have a reservation but we didn't want to let the tauts know that. This hotel was recommended by a couple we met one morning at breakfast in Kolkata. The staff were at the door, do you want a roo...

Time to leave Kolkata, we decided to check out the Howrah train station where we will depart the following morning to Raxaul (the Indian/Nepal border town). The only difference was that we decided to take the passenger ferry along the river Hoogly. On the ferry boat journey to the railway station I snapped photos of the view along the river including the Howrah bridge; a similar size to the Sydney Harbour bridge and was told by other commuters that it was il...