Thank you everyone (and goodbye Vietnam)

We are sitting in Kuala Lumpur airport waiting for our flight to Kathmandu and it is starting to dawn on us that we are actually going to have to walk 280km at altitude up and down some pretty massive mountains. Thankfully though our legs have been strengthened by all our walks along the beach and even more so by the support we have received. So we would like to thank everyone that has contributed towards our fundraising, everyone who has wished us luck and everyone who has said we are mad. Thank you all.

We will be doing our best to try and keep you all updated on how the trek is going but understandably our access to the internet may be slightly limited. We will try and get some photos up each time we stop in Namche Bazaar and if we can we will try and keep a running blog or something wherever else we are.

It’s all becoming very real and we have one day to sort all of our kit out. This is not the sort of shopping trip that anybody looks forward to but I have been assured that everything we need can be found in Kathmandu. The kit list is long but we do have one whole day so everything should be fine!

We have now left behind all the souvenir shops of Vietnam and South East Asia and will instead be searching through great swathes of knock-off outdoor gear to try and find some stuff that will keep us warm when we’re up high and also not cause us to faint from overheating in the lower regions. It’s mid-twenties at the moment in Kathmandu apparently.

Our last week in Vietnam was very relaxing so we are feeling relatively refreshed but perhaps a little well fed for what we are about to do. We had five nights in Nha Trang which as far as we could tell is the Costa Del Sol for Russians. Beautiful beach, lovely mountains, great weather and some fantastically ugly hotel tower blocks built with all the care and attention you would expect over here. So we contented ourselves with walking along the beach and eating some pretty good food.

Not in shot: high rises and large Russian people

After three months of eating in South East Asia we were more than ready to destroy some Western food and that is just what we did. BBQ ribs, spaghetti carbonara, English breakfasts, Italian pizzas, New Zealand wines and more all fell before us like sacrificial lambs. It was excellent but yes we may have overdone it a little.

Goodbye Larue, you treated us well

We certainly overdid the New Zealand wine one night at the Sailing Club. It was Saturday night, the wine was excellent and there was a live DJ blaring tunes on the beach for us to dance to so it wasn’t all our fault!

A great spot for breakfast and also drinking late into the night

Luckily we had a day to recover before getting on another insufferable train journey. There is one place you really don’t want to be when you are very aware of not wanting to catch a cough or a cold – a Vietnamese train. They cough, they sneeze and they burp at you. Actually AT you. Then again the worst behaved person on the train was a fat, middle aged Australian bloke who was insufferably rude to everyone including his Vietnamese wife/escort/thing.

We then had one final night in Saigon and ventured out to the 27th floor of the AB tower to Chill Saigon where we had first gone with Sally and Dan. It was just as we had remembered it; the steaks were fantastic, the wine was splendid – a Napa Valley Pinot Noir, the views immense and the side dishes out of this world. We left once again feeling a little overfed but that will all be corrected once we are on the tsampa and lentils and rice in Nepal.

Charcuterie plate you say? Sign me up

So it is goodbye from us for a while but we will do what we can to keep people up to date with our progress.

Thank you once again for all the wonderful contributions and support we have received.

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