Travel To: Nepal

To say I have been given a fortunate lot in life is, by my standards, a bit of an understatement. There have been several moments in my life where I have been stunned and speechless at how lucky life can be. There have been events both big and small that have forced reflection and elicited a reaction of "heck yes"- and as I'm sure you can guess, that's pretty much how I felt the entire time I was in Nepal playing chaperone to a group of 9 great students.

Nepal has been on my radar since I was in high school myself, and was officially added to my (very informal) life list several years ago. I never even occurred to me that someone would one day pay me to go, but here I was officially getting paid to spend a week in a bucket-list destination.  Go figure.

Our 6 day journey was split into two parts - community service in the small village of Tripureshwor, and site seeing in Kathmandu. Both portions had a big impact on the success of the trip, and I wouldn't have given up either. We moved from guesthouse to campsite and back again. We bathed in a river, took a perilous bus journey through the mountains, we went white water rafting down the famous Trishuli river, and we learned more riddles than I'll ever know what to do with. We laughed and joked in a context outside the classroom, and we conquered fears and broke down barriers. From a teachers perspective, the trip could not have gone better. Of course, it helps that unprovoked student feedback consisted of "awwweeesommme" and "best trip ever". I guess they got something out of it too!

I'm going to let the photos do the talking for this one as Nepal has some pretty epic vistas to share. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the view!

Note: some of these photos are from one of my bonkers awesome students who will remain anonymous for as long as they choose.