When I travel I tend to just launch into whatever lies ahead . Over the years I have come to realise that my trekking adventures are based on two philosophies. The first  is ‘slow steps, small steps and you will get there’ I learnt this when I   was doing my first ever trek, to Everest Base Camp. This trek in itself is a case in point and supports my opening premise….why do a few gentle days on the Bibbulmun for example when you can trek to the base camp of the highest mountain the world?  Just throw yourself into and see if you can do this trekking thing.

When I started Everest Base Camp trek, every morning I would watch my fellow trekkers disappear  into the distance,chattering happily, while I struggled on with which ever guide was assigned to cajole me to the next stopping point. One of them, a gentle soul, would say to me every day “Slow steps, small steps madame and you will get there” Each morning I would look up into mountains at my day’s trek and think “I’ll never get there”. And then at some stage I realised I had stopped thinking that,  I moved  to thinking “I wonder how long it will take me to get there”.

I have taken that with me on all my subsequent treks. Slow steps, small steps and  I’ll get there.  Not to finish is not an option for me. I may be tired, sore, pissed off or just totally over it, but I never consider giving up. When it was 3 o’clock in the afternoon and I was standing at the bottom of mountain track in the Himalayas  that wound endlessly to my lodge for the night; when I sat  by the side of a motorway in Spain crying because the blisters on my feet were so big and angry  I could barely walk ; when I lay in bed in Astorga in Spain one night, wondering how I was going to keep going, it never occurred to me to stop. I had a day off, went to the medical centre and had my feet checked, took a bus ride for one section and just kept going.

For this trek in Nepal I undoubtedly could have trained more, bought my boots earlier and worn them in more, lost some weight, any number of ‘should haves or could haves’ But I will go and catch up with my  trekking friend and her family , experience the hustle and bustle, the sights and sounds of Kathmandu, enjoy peace and majesty of the Himalayas, relive the experience of Nepalese toilets which I have pushed to the back of  my mind,  and no doubt be sore, tired and pissed off at some point!! But  I will do it and  will love it because it makes me feel better about myself

Because my second philosophy, s0 eloquently phrased by Sonny in one my favourite movies ever, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, pretty much sums up all my trekking experiences.

“Everything will be all right in the end… if it’s not all right then it’s not yet the end.”