Nepal Trek Part I - Meeting My Hero's

Grand arrival. What a way to enter Nepal - by riding on the roof of the overcrowded and bumpy local bus (said to be a tourist bus, ha!). I met some travellers from Japan and another from Switzerland who lives in New Zealand. His name is Tony (picture below). Tony and I trekked together for the first two weeks before he continued the trek, and I stayed behind in a small village called Marpha.I met my hero's on the first few days of the trek. While we were hiking, we sat under a tree to have a rest get some shade. Apparently, this tree is a common rest place, and after just a few minutes of relaxing and letting our sweat subside, four women approached for a rest, too. I call them women, even though three were young girls - maybe aged 6, 8, and 10, and the eldest was their mother. After five minutes, their grandmother came along as well. In the picture below, you can see these women carrying heavy tree logs and baskets over their backs. With a small rope, the women hoist their load upon their backs and leash the rope over their foreheads. I attempted to lift loads like this over my forehead and nearly broke my neck. I don't know how they do it, but from an early age they hike up steep mountains probably everyday with them. My Hero's!So many waterfalls, and each one so so beautiful. This picture was taken from the hotel room we stayed at. Waking up at 6 am only to peer out the window and see clouds hovering above is a great start to any day.Plenty of waterfalls to be juxtaposed in front of one for a classic tourist "I saw a waterfall in Nepal" shot.Each time I crossed a bridge, I would always stop in the middle to gather the fresh air the roaring river never ceases to grace one with. There is an everlasting energy flowing through the rivers and standing atop a bridge over the river is a sure way to feel it.This picture is taken on the path in the middle of the mountain with views below and above that would make anyone tremble with frieght. It made me realize just how small we as humans really are in this crazy world we live in. These mountains simply laugh at us. Silly humans they think - so silly!But the mountains are anything but silly. They are a beauty of a thing to view, but a monster of a thing to trek through. This is Tony in the next two shots, and this is the nearly unpathed mountain trail we had to traverse in order to get to the highest lake in the world. This skree, or loose gravel, was unpaved, and fortunately Tony found a walking stick earlier to scratch out a quasi way, which enabled us to keep on moving.And that's just what we did. We just kept on moving. We are simply passerbys, but these mountains or at least Mother Nature will remain forever.