In 2013, I flew to Kathmandu with the intention to do a multi-day trek that ends at the Annapurna Base Camp. On arrival to Kathmandu, I discovered that my luggage has not arrived. After a couple of days roaming the noisy and polluted town, with frequent calls and some visit to the airport with no positive results, I decided that my plans were not going to be ruined by this unfortunate incident. I visited the Nepali offices to obtain the needed permissions, went to a mountain equipment shop and bought and rent what I needed for the trek. After a slow ride on a bus, I arrived to Pokhara, ready to start the trek the following day. It was low season, so I walked for days seeing no one for hours. First 2-3 days were the most demanding, gaining altitude through tropical forest, with humid heat and plenty of leeches. At the base camp, an incomparable view of several eight-thousanders was awaiting, and I was also surprised to find a plaque in memory of Anatoli Boukreev, whose book ‘The Climb’ I had read in the late 1990s.
