Planning to trek through the Himalayas - Page 2

On August 03 2009 08:07 igotmyown wrote:
Equipment: Unless you specifically sign up for a mountain climbing expedition, you're not going to need ice picks..

On August 03 2009 08:24 Kennelie wrote:
that ravenpro is a sick ass walking stick. I really need to get back into my camping/outdoorsy roots.

On August 03 2009 08:07 igotmyown wrote:
You should consider the Anna Purna circuit.

You're a wimp for relying on sherpas. But seriously, if you're taking an organized trip and you're not horribly out of shape, it's not a big deal. Organizers have dealt with older people and people in average shape, they know you're a foreigner, so it's not like they're going to be pushing you hard. In fact if you're with other people you're only going to go as fast as the slowest person.

And as for the altitude, unless you do some low oxygen training there's nothing you can do about it. Like everyone else, just wait a few days to a week to adapt, then go about your business. Conditioning is fine for hiking but it won't do anything about the altitude. Running at 90% at 100% oxygen doesn't help much running at 50% oxygen.
You're not going to be running in the himalayas, so you might start doing some weekend 10 hour or overnight backpacking trips.

Equipment: Unless you specifically sign up for a mountain climbing expedition, you're not going to need ice picks. Sleeping bags, tents (although they'll probably bring the tents and may hire cooks), just have stuff rated to low temperatures and you'll be fine, and much better off than what the native sherpas use (flip flops).

If you're trying to prepare for food, start eating dahl baht takari, rice lentils and vegetables so your stomach won't have to adjust.

And finally, if the problem is that you're bored of tours and hotels and standard holidays, but are think an organized tour or an african safari are adventures, you should realize there are far less scripted ways of traveling. The whole point of tours is to make them less difficult and more accessible. Stop going on tours, don't stay in hotels catered to big spending tourists, stop being such a foreigner and just try to mingle with the locals. Live in their world, don't bring your vacation to them. Part of the fun is getting lost, not knowing where you're going next, and playing charades with the locals with broken bits of speaking on both sides. That last paragraph is my opinion of course.