That impending moment of descending in a jet through the rust red smog of the city. That was my first memory of Kathmandu.

It’s a bizarre notion, landing in a city on the opposite side of the planet. My heart swooped with a thousand fluttering wings.

From the plane window, I saw haze and square buildings made of crumbling stucco. The vastness of it captivated me. I barely remember disembarking the plane, completing visa forms, or passing through customs.

I remember the taxi ride to the hotel: lengths of bamboo scaffolding at Tribuvan Airport, mountains of garbage on the streets, lanky white cows grazing atop those garbage pinnacles. Grey monkeys with curling, come-hither tails, dancing along telephone wires like circus performers. A man, like some city dog walker, escorting six roped-together goats to market, much to their bleating protest. And all the while traffic: maddening, jostling traffic. Shoulder-to-shoulder, bumper-to-bumper, one hundred blaring horn tones of traffic. 

Kathmandu shifted my senses. It interrogated me, then bullied my mind and body into submission. It insisted on taking control, and I surrendered. Sometimes I miss that wildness. That permeating aroma of incense, rotting garbage, and dust. The omnipresent, peaceful practice of religions. Bartering without restraint, and the kindness of strangers.

Relive it, here.

XOXO,

It’s been awhile since my last Wednesday Wandering, mostly because I’ve been busy wandering!  I am “living” in Wales until May, which is the natural course for a young lady with a British fiancé. We do a lot of back-and-forth. 

Life has been busy-busy, full of long work hours and steadily warming days. “The Crud” is going around, so instead of guzzling DayQuil, I’m sipping Lemsip, the UK’s lemony-menthol equivalent.

It’s nearly spring here: a season of new opportunity, frolicking lambs, and Six Nations rugby.

It’s a happy time.

Last weekend, we ventured up to Blackpool, my fiancé’s hometown. On the way, we scooped up one of my dear Duluthian friends from Liverpool. She was over visiting friends and attending a wedding.

We introduced her to some of the finer points of British life, including thatched pubs, cheesey chips (with three e’s), and the Lake District. Below you’ll find a few captures from the latter of those three. Somehow cheesey chips are much better consumed than photographed.

These were snapped atop Kirkstone Pass at the third highest pub in the UK, the Kirkstone Pass Inn. Oftentimes during the winter months, the pass is closed due to snow. It’s a cozy inn with a beautiful vista. (I’ve included a half pint to counterbalance the lack of cheesey chips.) 

XOXO,

I adore all things kitsch: oversized fish monuments, festivals dedicated to seasonal crops, antique junk shops. They all speak to my inner tourist, which only seems to emerge in my home state of Minnesota.

Fall is the best season to enjoy all the kitschy goodness of the north woods, as well as the colorful chorus of changing leaves. In late September, tourists have started dying off, and the yokels can finally have a real hootenanny. I recently ventured up the shore to Grand Marais, the kitschiest of the kitschiest. It’s the North Shore’s answer to Wisconsin’s Bayfield: a Currier and Ives storybook town set against the massive blue life-force of Lake Superior.

There are organic co-ops, canoe outfitters and bait shops. Obscure art galleries, lawn decor exhibitions, and giant murals of fancy-free black bears dancing. There’s a wonderful restaurant called the Gunflint Tavern, where you can sit with a pint and ponder the meaning of life or what to order for lunch (I prescribe the walleye sandwich, by the way).

After wandering the streets and skipping rocks, you might get in your automobile and meander south on Highway 61. If it’s not too late in the day, you’ll stop at Temperance River State Park for an hourlong inland hike on the Superior Hiking Trail. You will swoon over the scenery.

I think Sven and Ole would approve.

XOXO,

Some days when I open my front door and breathe in the morning air, some scent triggers the nostalgic region of my brain, and I swoon a little.

It’s something sweet and pungent, like the smoke from juniper branches burnt every morning in Himalayan households.

Outside their front doors, branches burn in large urns, an offering to God. 

Of all the wildness I’ve witnessed this past year, nothing has stirred such a frenzy of drums in my heart as Namche Bazaar, Nepal.

Every morning, I’d watch the sun crest over the ridge from my 12,000-foot vantage point, inhaling crisp, pure juniper air.

My vision of heaven was transformed. It now includes swaths of shape-shifting clouds and low-tone drum beats. There are yak bells clinking, Sanskrit chants, and a warm welcoming committee in the tightly knit streets.

I left a piece of my heart – the back burner of my mind – in Namche Bazaar.

Yak bells. Usually adorning their bovine necks, these ones are for sale to tourists.

A baby calf (not a yak), but still insanely adorable.

The Everest View Hotel. Behind me, the world’s most stunning view. See the valley fading into the far left? That’s where we trekked from.

 My trusty, glorious Keens.

 Trekker Survival Kit. Tiger Balm, Snickers ($1-5, depending on the altitude), leather journal, philosophical travel book, SPF 50+ sunscreen. Oh, and one battered deck of playing cards.

My goal is to return to this place and trek with as many friends and family as I can humanly persuade.

Let’s go.

XOXO,