This is the second post of a three-week series. Please visit the “Adventure Journal” page and start with “Why Nepal?” to read in order!

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Day 1: Kathmandu (1,400m) - Soti Khola (700m)

May 29, 2019

After a long night of packing our trekking duffels, we crashed for an early wake up the next morning. We left Kathmandu at 7:30am and began the 6-hour car ride to the Manaslu Circuit trailhead. We were in a caravan of two Jeep SUVs and a supply truck, holding the five of us and seven Nepali staff (guide, cook, and help staff/porters). We were to pick up 5-7 mules to join our team, at our first stop in Soti Khola.

Prior to this trek, Kenza was extremely nervous about the whole idea. For weeks she debated whether she wanted to end the trip early because of her anxiety. Her concern centered around the amount of walking, or rather, the sheer number of consecutive days of walking. She would comment that Patagonia was only a few days, but this was nearly three weeks…and she just wasn’t sure about it.

About three weeks earlier, at a dinner in South Africa, Kenza announced to the family that she was ready to commit to the Nepal trek, but only if she could sleep in “Daddy’s tent the whole time” so she would feel more comfortable (emotionally). Naturally, we agreed to her terms.

Today, Kenza, Zayan, and Kapil shared one SUV with a load of supplies, while four Nepali staff, Kaysee, and I shared the other. About an hour into the journey, our driver answered a cellular call from the other driver saying we needed to pull over. Kenza and Zayan had started a game of chess in the back seat (amidst crazy turns, bumps, and generally erratic driving) and now Kenza was vomiting! Ugh.

We got her a few plastic bags and pulled over at the one of the few, but highly visited, rest stops. This was the first (of many) “hole in the ground” toilet the kids experienced! The rest of the 6.5 hour-journey was pretty “boring” for the kids as they could only sleep or look straight ahead…welcome to the first moments of discomfort, kids. Brace yourselves!

This is a shot of the packing craziness the night before we started our trek.

This was my three week trekking gear. I could’ve gotten away with 1-2 less pants, but it was really nice to put on clean clothes as often as I could.

Our journey to Soti Khola included truck traffic jams…at least they were colorful!

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Excerpt from Kenza’s Journal:

Day 1: Soti Khola

Today was a 7-hour drive. I threw up twice and felt very bored. Although my stomach was killing me, I could not help but notice how much pollution there was. It made me sad to see what people are doing to the Earth.

Once we got to our destination, it was like we were in someone’s backyard. We took a small walk down to a waterfall and then a river. It was fun to throw really big rocks in the water. Tomorrow is yet to come!

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Excerpt from Kaysan’s Journal:

Day 1: Soti Khola

Today we were driving to our destonation at the bigining of the trek. It was aproxamily 6 hours. We have seven Nepalese people with us and we will have two mules.

When we arived, we pased the tenniss ball while the Nepalese staff set up the tent. Then we had some tea and biscuits. Afterwords, we walked to a water fall nere by. We all skipped some rocks. I skipped 15. Our guide skipped 9 at once. Daddy was teeching me and Kenza how to skipp a rock.

When we were doing the light hiking, I was trying out my new backpack.