Pokhara

An uncomfortable bus ride, spanning only the distance from Denali to Fairbanks, but taking a tiring eight hours, brought us to the lakeside town o Pokhara. For the next few months this town will be our vacation spot, our weekend escape to hot showers and a soft bed, and the company of fellow volunteers flocking to town for the same things. The weather has been foggy and cold the past week, blocking the heard about views from town of the Annapurna Himalayas, multiple 8,000 meter peaks being visible from the city center. An afternoon yoga class took me up a seldom used trail to a lookout of the city and the neighboring lake, where the guru and I sat in a small room with a large window until it grew too dark inside to continue, then talked outside, his Nepali accent and my simple as can be so he could understand English, until again it grew close to dark and I worried about walking back down the trail without light. Yesterday we spent all afternoon walking the streets, shopping and haggling prices, trying on all sorts of strange colored but traditional Nepali pants and shirts. Today it is off to our village, which I am still unsure the exact name or what our schedule will be like once there, but am so excited to have a room and call it home for the next two months.