Last Nepal post, I promise

It's getting to the point where these vacation posts are rather orphaned out here in the middle of December. But since this blog is little more than my personal scrapbook, I wanted to post a few pictures from our post-race time in Nepal. All four of us — Beat, me, Steve, and Martina — were more wrecked from the 220-kilometer stage race than I think any of us anticipated. Before the trip, we had discussed the possibility of a fast-trek to Annapurna Base Camp, but decided that two big treks in two weeks may be more than our bodies could handle. Although in some ways I wish we'd just rallied to do it, in truth it would have been a terrible idea. Steve had Achilles problems, Martina had foot pain that made it a struggle to walk around town, I was wasting away, and Beat was just sick of all of us (I kid, I kid.) Ascending to 17,000 feet in the space of three to four days, in our condition, likely would have been a disaster.

Instead, we toured the popular spots around Pokhara, and it admittedly was fun to be a true tourist for a few days. The above photo is the World Peace Pagoda, which was constructed by Japanese Buddhist monks to  promote — surprise — world peace. It is a beautiful structure, built on a ridge above Phewa Tal with fantastic views of the valley. However, increasing cloudiness throughout the week prevented us from ever seeing another real glimpse of the Annapurna Range.

We hiked up to Sarangkot, another point on a ridge about 2,500 feet above Pokhara. The hike felt short and sweet after RTP Nepal, and we stopped for a lunch of momos and soda at the top. True luxury.

Sarangkot is also a popular spot for paragliders. A "suburb" of Pokhara called Lakeside and Phewa Tal are shown below.

There was also the inevitable touristing around Lakeside, where we actually wandered through crowds, went into shops, and purchased souvenirs (I never really got the hang of enjoying this, but I did try.)

After a few days in Pokhara, we climbed into another (slightly less death-defying) taxi for a ride down to Chitwan National Park, located in the subtropical lowlands of southern Nepal.

We stayed at the Chitwan Jungle Lodge, which had the amusing perk of elephant safaris. Because Chitwan is so dense and undeveloped, elephants are actually the only "vehicles" that can navigate the terrain. (People on foot can as well, of course, but park officials —soldiers with guns — don't allow tourists to hike beyond lodge grounds out of fear they'll be stomped by rhinos or eaten by tigers.) The lodge employs domesticated elephants from India to haul the tourists around the jungle and look for wild animals, which sometimes include wild elephants. We saw a rhinoceros, a crocodile, fresh tiger tracks (no tiger), and lots of deer, birds and warthog. Nothing that I was able to capture with a decent photograph. Riding elephants through the jungle was definitely a highlight of the trip, and allowed me to live out my childhood "Indiana Jones" fantasies. Yes, we did feel uneasy about the use of elephants as pack animals. However, the elephants at the tourist lodges appear healthy and well-treated, and the flow of tourism dollars does promote continued protection of the national park and the endangered animals therein from the lucrative poaching industry. It's certainly a double-edged sword.

But perhaps even more than the elephant rides and rhino sighting, the highlight of Chitwan Jungle Lodge was this pair: a 2-year-old cat and her mongoose "kitten." The story of how they came together is simultaneously tragic and touching. When the mongoose was just a few days old, lodge employees found him alone and apparently orphaned. They brought him back to the lodge and fed him scraps of food until he was healthy enough to move around on his own. It was during this time that the cat gave birth to a litter of kittens, which the young mongoose found and killed. The cat, either grieving or confused, began to nurse the mongoose as though he was her own kitten. The two have apparently been inseparable ever since. The cat brings the mongoose snakes and rodents, cleans him, and cuddles with him. We watched them play together numerous times.

And the mongoose, now six months old, has grown up thinking he's a cat. He behaves in very cat-like ways, prowling around the lodge grounds and slurping up the dregs of beer glasses. He especially likes to cozy up on guests' laps and fall asleep. It was all very cute and cuddly until he yawned, revealing a row of razor-sharp, cobra-slaying teeth.

We spent our last day in Nepal back in Kathmandu, where we sprung for a room at the Hyatt because honestly, we were all becoming a little weary of third-world charm (and traffic.) We walked to the Boudhanath Stupa, a large Buddhist temple surrounded by more than fifty Tibetan monasteries. It's become the central location for Tibetan refugees in Nepal, and also the most popular tourism site in Kathmandu.

Nepal certainly was the trip of a lifetime, and I loved being there. I'd go back in a heartbeat even if it included the guarantee that I'd have to fight "The Bug" all over again. Someday I will return to the Himalayas.

Reverse culture shock

I underdressed, again. Say what you will about the lack of winter in coastal California, but when the air temperature is 41 degrees and a brisk 15 mph wind is whipping along a bald ridge, it's cold. But of course the California sun has lulled me into a sense of complacency, so here I am, up on Black Mountain with the Fatback, trying to slap some life back into my rigid fingers, again. If Fatty Fatback had a personality he'd probably be silently laughing at the poetic justice of my discomfort, trapped as he is in a land without snow.

I steamrolled over some rocks and launched down the fall-line, mowing over clumps of grass on a faint deer trail. The cold wind tore through my meager layers and chilled the beads of sweat on my skin. I mashed the pedals as the contour turned upward, and topped out with an even better view of sunset. Wispy clouds, golden haze, and the distant mirror of the Pacific Ocean reflecting fire from the sun. Squinting into the sunlight, I failed to see a herd of grazing deer until they erupted from the grass mere meters away, then raced down the ridge. I scanned the sloping meadow for a good place to drop toward Indian Creek but thought better of it, because it is illegal to be in this park after dark, and this is still highly-regulated coastal California. No more off-roading today; the sunset view would have to do. I touched my frozen feet to the ground and smiled, because it was worth it.

The reverse culture shock I'd been experiencing since I returned from Nepal was finally starting to fade. I think most people who travel through a developing nation experience this to some extent. At first there is relief ("Wow, look how smooth these roads are. So strange not to have motorcycles buzzing around on all sides as diesel trucks bear down on you.") Then there is the sense of novelty. ("Wow, there's so much fresh produce in this one store, and I don't need to haggle with a guy pushing a cart full of tangerines.") Then comes guilt. ("Why do I have so many bicycles? I met a young man in Nepal who walked three hours to work because he couldn't afford any other form of transportation. I should start a charity that raises funds to give sturdy work bicycles to families in Nepal.") Then comes a kind of cultural despair, which can happen when you return from a place where people do so much with so little, to a place where you can't go to Target for cat litter without finding yourself fully submerged in a mad holiday frenzy. ("I watched men building a stone levee with their hands, hoisting huge boulders and hammering them into place, in an effort to divert monsoonal flooding that had killed several people in their village. That was the human spirit. This is insanity.") Then, finally, acceptance. ("I have so many opportunities. I'm free to ride my fat bike any time I want. I really am lucky to live here.")

So I returned to my routine, still grateful for my opportunities back home, still enthralled with the landscape and people of Nepal, still disturbed by holiday excess. Normal life returned to me quickly, but I did spend more time thinking how I could better strike a balance in my own world, and how I could find a way to add a few of my own stones to that life-saving levee. Not because I believe Nepalis — or frenzied holiday shoppers — need saving. People can do a lot with a little if they have to. And people with a lot can do a little if they want to. I can do a little. I can contribute where I can, and on the homefront, I can focus my energy toward the world I want to live in. Be the change I want to see, so to speak.

Bicycling is always a great place to start.

Nepal gear round-up

I wanted to post a wrap-up of some of the gear I used during the 220 kilometers of Racing the Planet Nepal, and my thoughts on why it worked (or didn't work.) It's not comprehensive and, as with all gear "reviews" should be taken for the highly subjective and personal opinions they are.

RaidLight Runner R-Light Backpack; holds 30 liters, weighs 690 grams: Raidlight designed this backpack specifically for adventure and long-distance endurance racing, and Racing the Planet sells it directly from its Web site. So it's become the prominent pack at many RTP events, for good reason. It's light, it's decently robust, it has space for lots of stuff, and it has strategic pockets that allow the wearer to access water bottles, food, drugs, and cameras without having to wrestle with the pack. It definitely passed my "Jill-proof" test, meaning I overstuffed it often and hiked and ran many miles with it in Europe, California and Nepal, and nothing broke (and believe me, I am not gentle nor do I have a good track record with longevity in my gear.) It doesn't have a frame, which I prefer for any sort of running. I also own a similarly sized Osprey Stratos backpack that does have a frame. I have taken the Stratos on a couple of fastpacking trips in which I ran for only a few miles, and still ended up with painful sores on my shoulders and hips. With the Raidlight, I tightened the hip and breast straps and let the pack hang loosely off my shoulders, the way I often do with my packs when cycling. Experienced packers may question this strategy but it worked great for me. Even packed with up to 27 pounds of gear, water and food, the Raidlight remained comfortable and didn't cause any chaffing in an entire week. (I did have to tighten the shoulder straps to prevent bouncing whenever I was running 5 mph or faster.) I would definitely use it again on a multi-night fastpacking trip. I already know I can hold seven days worth of food, clothing, rain gear, sleeping gear, and other supplies with this pack. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to add a nine-ounce bivy or lightweight shelter. (I already know I won't be adding a stove. I'll explain why later in this post.)

Black Diamond Ultra-Distance Z-Poles: length 120 centimeters, weigh 9.5 ounces. I love these poles. Seriously. Beat and I purchased them on a whim while browsing the Anchorage REI mere hours before the 2011 Susitna 100, because we were worried about the slog factor caused by all the new snow the region had received that day. Those poles all but carried me the last 50 miles of the Su100, and continued to provide ample balance and knee support on many good hikes afterward. When they disappeared high on Testa Grigia in Italy, I nearly cried. But then Beat bought me a new pair for ... Halloween (awesome guy that he is, no special occasion needed) ... and I had the privilege of using them in Nepal. These carbon poles are both light and strong, with a simple but robust inner-cord support system that allow them to collapse small enough to fit inside the Raidlight without falling apart. They also feature comfy foam grips, hand straps and all-around awesomeness. I really am a fan. 

Brooks Cascadia shoes: These were another remnant of my early days of running, in that they were my main training shoe for the fall and winter of 2010-2011, and were a close second to the Hokas during spring and summer. Yes, they were the same pair of shoes and yes, they had a ton of miles on them (I don't keep track, but the soles were almost worn clean through.) I realize that using such a worn pair of shoes in a long endurance race was a gamble, but they had been so comfortable and provided such great traction on loose and muddy terrain, that I was willing to take the risk. (I was also aware that a lot of the miles in RTP Nepal would be spent hiking, even if I remained healthy, which I didn't.) Great shoes. I finally tossed them out in Kathmandu but recently purchased a new pair (the latest version is signal green color, which I dislike, but what can you do? They hook you first and then they the foist bad colors on you.)

Ridge Rest So-lite; length 72 inches, weighs 14 ounces: I chose the Ridge Rest over my inflatable Thermarest because of the higher R-Value, or insulation factor, and the fact that closed-cell foam can't burst and leave you really miserable at night. Also, I am usually a stomach sleeper, so the softness of the pad isn't as important to me as long as I have a good pillow for neck and shoulder support (I made one out of coats and a stuff sack.) The main thing I seek in a sleeping pad is insulation from the cold ground, which a full-length Ridge Rest provides in all conditions. The So-lite had an added benefit of an aluminum surface that reflects body heat. Whether or not this makes a difference, I don't know. But I have slept on a Ridge Rest comfortably when temperatures reached 35 below, and it is now and probably will forever be my go-to backpacking pad as long as space allows.

RAB Quantum Endurance 400 sleeping bag; length 6 feet 6 inches, weighs 2 pounds 1 ounce: These 850-fill down bags are rated to 25 degrees, so we remained warm and comfy during those long, sick nights in camp. We also were grateful for the weather-proof exterior. Every night, the cheap Coleman tents collected so much condensation on the poorly ventilated walls and roof that it would literally rain inside the tent during the early hours of the morning. We were able to just shake all the droplets off our bags in the morning, while our poor tentmates had to pack up their own soaked bags and hope they reached the next camp in time to dry them out in the sun. Despite the relatively high humidity and keeping it packed in a water-proof stuff sack, my bag was always dry when I unpacked it in the evening. Which was a good thing, because I only once made it to camp before the sun sank behind the mountains.

DriDucks Duralight Rainsuit; weighs 11 ounces. Cheap, ultralight, waterproof, breathable. To those descriptors, you can also add ugly and easily torn, but my pair held up just fine. They're constructed with triple-layer, porous polypro fabric. Thanks to the perfect weather, we mainly used these rainsuits to stay warm in camp, where temperatures dropped as low as 33 degrees, and also for warmth while hiking in the morning and after dark during the long stage. It's actually one of the most breathable yet warm raincoats I've ever worn. And although we didn't test them in wet conditions, the coat has received mostly good reviews for its waterproof capabilities. At $45 for the pair, that's hard to beat. Basically a reusable disposable rainsuit.

Expedition food; 800 calories, weighs 6.2 ounces. Anyone who read my novel of a race report knows that my food was a huge FAIL for me. I carried several pounds of these expensive meals that I never ate. I still believe this largely had to do with my illness and unintentional cleansing of my already oversensitive digestive system. But I also think it carries an important lesson about finding the foods that specifically work for you, and not just doing what everyone else does. I am not a good eater; under endurance duress, I literally cannot eat high-fat or high-protein foods (unless those fats are accompanied by a large volume of sugar ala peanut butter cups. Go figure.) If I do force them down, I often have to endure digestive discomfort and even outright rejection of the food. I haven't made these types of foods work for me yet. I either need to accept that my body seems unable to process larger percentages of proteins and fats even in slower, longer endurance situations, and carry mainly carbohydrates, or I need to spend a lot more time getting my body used to processing fats on the go. Beyond this, there is the smaller issue that I really do think most backpacking-friendly camp food is gross. I am not a "hot food in camp" kind of a person, and yes I realize this puts me in an extreme minority. On my next fastpacking trip, I will bring bagels. I will make the space. It's better to eat something, anything, than nothing at all. Trust me. 

Recovery run: Coyote Ridge 50K

Racing the Planet Nepal finished two weeks ago Saturday. We spent the following week touristing around Pokhara, Chitwan National Park and Kathmandu (from which I will soon post pictures, along with a post-race gear wrap-up.) It was a fantastic week but not great for recovery. I continued to cope with digestive oversensitivity, dehydration (relying on bottled water makes it more of a chore to acquire and carry enough drinking water) and general fatigue. Just when my stomach was finally becoming accustomed to Nepal-specific bacteria, we returned to the United States, and I had to readjust to American food all over again. Jet lag also hit me hard, and I was unable to sleep at night even when I forced myself to stay awake all day.

Health-wise, November 2011 felt like an incredibly destructive month. I started with the 25-hour mountain bike race. No matter how much you love it, that much biking in a day just isn't healthy. Post-race snarfing, my sister's wedding festivities, travel food and tapering led to me packing on some pounds just before we left for Nepal. I usually weigh in the 133-135 range. I was 139 the day before we left the country. Then there was sickness, the resulting nutrition debacle amid a tough endurance race, and slowness to recover afterward. Several days after returning to California, my weight was still 129 ... meaning I likely lost ten to fifteen pounds during the race. That's a lot of big swings in one month, both gained and lost in the least healthy ways possible. The result left my body feeling more than a bit broken down.

Shortly after Racing the Planet Nepal wrapped up, amid the glow of finishing, Beat and I registered online for a 50-kilometer trail run. The Coyote Ridge 50K was scheduled less than a week after our return from Nepal. It's already mid-December (!!!) and I'm registered for the Susitna 100 in February (I may write a blog post about why I've decided to run the Susitna 100 again, but it basically boils down to a conviction that my life would not be complete without my annual winter slog in Alaska, and no I do not consider that normal or healthy.) But since Susitna is just a short nine weeks away, I decided I needed to kick off my "training." And somehow in my post-race fog, running a 50K seemed like a good idea.

My first days back in California felt like an exercise in futility, in every sense of the phrase. I started with short rides on my road bike, because I was back in the land of bikes so of course I was going to ride my bike. I enjoyed the riding immensely, but my legs felt like they had been soaked in a protein-dissolving acid solution. You know, like mush. The usual efforts suddenly became so much slower and more challenging. My regular route up Montebello Road felt like an Everest climb. I wanted to blame jet lag, but I suspected something deeper.

On Wednesday, I could no longer delay the inevitable. I had to see whether my body still knew how to run. It had been at least six weeks since the last time I attempted a real trail run without a 25-pound pack and trekking poles. But Wednesday's run was not an encouraging experiment. Basically, I spent ninety minutes trying to "run" six miles, pounding my mush legs, gasping for air at a paltry 1,200 feet elevation, and basically having The Fear driven firmly into my heart.

Understand that I was never trying to "train" for the 50K. I just had to prove to myself that my body still worked. I wasn't sure it did. I realize that these efforts didn't exactly aid in recovery, but I needed a mental boost. Any mental boost. I went back out on Thursday afternoon and ran eight miles. That too took ninety minutes, with more climbing, and I felt generally better. Not great, but better.

"I still think I'm broken," I told Beat. "I'm not really sure how I can turn eight tough miles over to 31 in two days. It's going to be like that time I tried to ride a hundred-mile mountain bike race three weeks after the Tour Divide. That was a huge disaster."

"It will be fine," Beat assured me. "Your body will remember how to run."

If I looked tired, it's because I was really tired.

The Coyote Ridge 50K began at 8 a.m. Saturday in Muir Beach. The course circled the Golden Gate National Recreation Area in the Marin Headlands, a beautiful region of open (yes, deforested) rolling hills and seaside cliffs. It's both famous and infamous with Bay-area runners for its stunning scenery, steep terrain, concrete-like trails and almost-never-clear weather in December. When I saw the forecast for a high of 52 degrees and sunshine, I planned for 52 degrees with wind, salty moisture and dense fog. We left Los Altos in the almost-frosty darkness of 6 a.m., just in time to catch a glimpse of the lunar eclipse. I leaned toward the windshield and gaped at the full moon, eerily shrouded by a bronze shadow. "This is a bad omen," I said. "Or maybe it's a good one." Beat just shook his head. He doesn't believe in omens.

Coyote Ridge was not a "soft" 50K by any means, with an elevation gain of 7,130 feet and a course profile that looked like the electrocardiogram of a man about to have a heart attack. The race had a nine-hour cutoff that spanned dawn to dusk, and I planned to use all of those hours. I just wanted to finish, if that was even possible. I followed the paceline up the first steep climb just as the sun rose over the eastern ridges, promising a gorgeous day. Huge waves crashed on the rocks, turkey vultures soared over our heads and the bright blue Pacific stretched into an equally bright sky. I was stoked on the scenery, crisp 40-degree air and sunshine, and started marching faster. After passing a dozen or more people, I thought better of running a 180-bpm heart rate in the first mile of a 31-mile day. So I settled back in with the pack, wondering just how it could be that I felt so good.

I wrote a long preface to this race report to set up yet another grueling tale of hardship, but the truth is, there wasn't any. My training over the last six months means there's not an ounce of speed in my legs, and I was purposely conservative, so I didn't come close to setting a PR. But out of the seven 50K's that I've completed, the Coyote Ridge 50K felt like my strongest, most consistent run yet. I didn't have side-stitches. I didn't get hurty foot. I didn't experience the sensation of my stomach turning inside out and purging its contents all over a rice paddy. I just ... ran. Sometimes the climbs were head-spinningly steep; those I walked. And I shuffled as I usually do on the steep descents, because it's not like I magically figured out how to run downhill overnight. And I did move slowly up a couple of gradual inclines when my right knee was acting up. But then I stopped to pop a couple of Advil, massaged the knee cap for a minute, and felt strong once again.

I did experience disappointment when my small Sony point-and-shoot camera blew up about a half hour into the race. I continued to try to beat it back to life and did manage to extract one more photo — the one at the top of this post. But you'll have to take my word that it was a gorgeous day with stunning scenery throughout. I finished in six hours and 50 minutes, seven minutes after Beat finished. (We decided not to race together but ended up running similar times anyway.) I was the fourth woman, which according to Beat should secure my spot at the top of the 2011 Coastal Trail Run Ultra Blazers awards. Yay. :)

GPS stats here. The statistic I'm pleased with the heart-rate graph, whose consistency helps me believe that my endurance survived whatever nutritional horrors I put my body through in November. (The elevation graph is messed up after my GPS signal cut out several times. I did not fall off any cliffs.)

The pessimistic side of me is suspicious that maybe I only reason I felt so strong during the Coyote Ridge 50K was precisely because I felt so weak and sick in Nepal, and really anything would feel awesome in comparison. But the optimistic side of me likes to believe that my body isn't broken, that maybe it was never broken, and maybe it just knew how to run, all along. 

The long wait to the finish

The end of the Long March carried the cruel illusion that the hardship was finished, when really there were still 36 hours left in the race. Sure, there was only one more short stage — an easy, mostly flat 13 kilometers across Pokhara. But not until Saturday. Friday was technically still part of the Long March. For those of us who finished the 45 miles on Thursday, it was a rest day. For me, it felt like one of the biggest endurance challenges of the race.

I woke up feeling sick to my stomach. This was most likely my fault for running for sixteen and a half hours on minimal nutrition, but I blamed "the bug ... or a new bug." I shuffled miserably around camp and refused to eat. I sorted out the rest of my freeze-dried meals that I hadn't yet given away or thrown away and threw them away (and yes, the only freeze-dried meal of my own that I actually ate in seven days was the demon Thai Chicken before the race even began.) Our camp was located near the shoreline of Bengas Lake, a popular tourism spot, so we were surrounded by small restaurants. Beat coaxed me up to what was a common sight in the cities of Nepal — a single-counter store with various chips, cookies, ramen and soda. We shared a small bag of "American Sour Cream and Onion" potato chips and a Sprite. Very soon afterward, digestive distress ensued. I rushed to the toilets, and then returned to the tent to marinate in my own misery. As the sun rose over the hillside, the temperature inside the nylon oven climbed to what must have been 130 degrees. I lay in my sweat-drenched underwear on top of a Ridge Rest and moaned.

A few times, Beat came to the door of the tent to coax me out. "It's too hot in here. Come outside."

"Errrrrrgh."

And then, twenty minutes later: "You need to get up and eat something."

"Ugggggh."

And then, another twenty minutes later. "Seriously. You have to get out of here."

"Just give me twenty more minutes."

"No, you have to eat something now. You ran for sixteen hours yesterday and you need something to recover. Seriously, this is how kidney failure happens to people."

I crawled out of the tent and was almost surprised to discover that it wasn't 130 degrees outside. I added hot water to a cup of ramen and began working on it at a rate of about a spoonful per minute. Steve approached and began raving about the most amazing grilled fish he just had for lunch, at a little restaurant down by the water. "The guy catches fish in a net, and then he cleans the fish, and then he fills it with all this garlic, chili and spices, and then he throws it on the grill, all right in front of you. It's awesome."

Fish and garlic? It sounded awful to me, but I couldn't go back to the tent to lay down without stewing in my own brain proteins. I had to find some way to kill the daylight hours. Eventually I agreed to head down to the restaurant to sit at a table and drink soda, especially after Beat threatened to make me eat the Kathmandu Curry (he ended up eating it himself for lunch.) The lakeside restaurant was tiny, with a family of four taking orders, chopping potatoes, selling sodas and grilling fish on a barbecue barely large enough to hold two foil-wrapped fish. I ordered a small plate of fries and Sprite, and Beat ordered the fish. I agreed to try it, and then I ended up eating half of it. It was pretty fantastic ... more proof that I just had over-sensitive endurance stomach and not an actual illness. Although I would have benefited more from downing a couple thousand calories in electrolyte and protein recovery drink, the fish did me a world of good.

But mostly, I was looking forward to running again. An ongoing theme throughout my Racing the Planet Nepal experience was that I generally felt okay on the trail, and horrible in camp. There are several factors that contributed to this, but I think in general I just cope better when I stay on the move. By the final night, only three remained in our tent out of the original seven: me, Beat and a retired British investment banker who lives in Hong Kong, Peter Clarke. Patty unfortunately became overwhelmed by her illness and had to drop out during stage five. We didn't see her again. Peter, who is 61 years old, not only managed to remain healthy through the sick-fest, but also finished well ahead of us in every stage but the last one.

This is the contingent from the San Francisco Bay area: Martina Koldewey, Chuck Wilson, Beat, me, Sarah Diaz, Erin Sprague and Steve Ansell.

Stage six was 13 kilometers (8 miles) with 130 meters (426 feet) of climbing. Short and flat. Before we could start running toward Pokhara, we had to get to the other side of Bengas Lake. Racing the Planet set up an elaborate shuttle system using dozens of small paddle boats, each with its own local captain.

Beat and I thought it would have been more fun if racers were each issued a paddle and given the task of paddling the boat as part of the race, cooperation style. Or better yet, have the leaders swim while towing the back-of-packers in boats behind them.

Our particular captain was a bit competitive himself (and probably younger than 18, although child labor is commonplace here; the median age in Nepal is 20 and 40 percent of the population is younger than 14.) Even though our boat started near the back, we passed enough boats to get a good spot on the starting line. For breakfast I ate my last bar, a Nature Valley Peanut Butter Granola Bar, savoring every bite. And that was that. There were no more bars.

The run into the finish was mostly uneventful. We actually did run at about a 10-minute-mile pace until we hit an open swamp, where the footing became dicey and I also experienced a serious bonk. Of course my entire race experience was essentially one big, drawn-out bonk. But this one had a sharper feel, a touch of finality, and I nearly panicked. "Holy cow, I'm going to shut down right here like that woman who collapsed just a few meters shy of the finish line in the Boston Marathon." We were still five kilometers from the Fulbari Resort. I sputtered to such a crawl that Beat asked me what was wrong, and I admitted I was out of gas. Luckily, he had one more energy bar and relented to splitting it with me.

With those final sparks of fuel, my distress subsided. I looked up and for the first time that morning, actually noticed the incredible skyline spread out before us. The many photos in these posts don't even come close to depicting the scale of these mountains, and as a visual it's impossible to describe. Pokhara Valley rests at 3,000 feet. Less than twenty miles in a direct line, the elevation rises sharply to 25,000 feet. The skyline features three eight-thousanders (as in meters): Dhaulagiri, Annapurna and Manaslu. The photogenic pyramid in the middle of the Annapurna range is the 7,000-meter Machhapuchhre ("Fishtail.") I like to believe that someday I will return to Nepal and trek into the heart of these mountains. But even to see them from afar is consistently breathtaking.

After a surprisingly short hour and 45 minutes, we strode across the finish line to a barrage of clapping schoolchildren, Nepali ethnic music and a holy man dabbing blessings on our forehead. We received a medal and shawl as we bee-lined for the pizza — pizza! —which is all I was capable of thinking about in that moment.

As for the race, Beat and I finished 108th and 109th out of 220 starters and 170 finishers with a time of 48 hours and five minutes. I was 16th out of 50 starters and 38 finishers in the women's category. Out of Americans, I was 22nd of 51. And out of American women I was first of ten! (See, I knew I'd get myself on the podium if I whittled the categories down enough.)

But beyond all the small details of the race was the simple yet deep satisfaction of having completed one of the toughest — and yet most culturally and personally enriching — journeys of my life. In time I would reflect on the thresholds I had crossed, but for now it was time to simply celebrate and bask in the warm sunlight. We hugged new friends and toasted glass bottles of soda and beer to a race well run. I hoped in time my body would forgive me for the relentless struggle through weakness in pain. Pizza was a good place to start. 

Thanksgiving march

As the race director rattled through her morning announcements, Matt the ex-Marine pushed through the crowd toward me. He reached out and gave me a hardy handshake. "Happy Thanksgiving," he said.

"Oh wow, you're right," I said. "I totally forgot. It's Thursday. It's Thanksgiving."

"I brought a package of mashed potatoes," he said. "I'm going to eat them at the overnight checkpoint, the one with the hot water."

"That was a great idea," I said. "I didn't bring ... anything."

Matt grinned and turned to spread his holiday greetings to other Americans in the crowd. I sighed heavily as nostalgia pangs churned in my empty stomach. Warm images replaced the ashen faces of the crowd. My aunt shouting at the Dallas Cowboys above the chatter of my cousins. My now-deceased grandfather cracking corny jokes. My grandmother admonishing everyone to rattle off a long list of thanks as the turkey gets cold. My sisters and I sneaking Peanut M&Ms from the candy dish before dinner. My mother's pies. Oh, my mother's pies. Coconut cream. Heaven.

I returned to reality in a jolt of cold obviousness. "What the hell am I doing here?" The day's plan spread out before me like a sentence: "The Long March," 72 kilometers (45 miles) with 3,249 meters (10,659 feet) of climbing, on tough and often steep terrain. This in itself would make for a tough day, but now it followed four solid days of racing to a combined 79 miles and 18,600 feet of climbing, on rugged trails, running what amounted to a starvation diet of about 1,200 calories a day.

I felt nauseated from the morning's granola bar, or maybe it was nervousness. Honestly, I don't know how much of my inability to eat was remnant symptoms of the bug and how much of it was psychological. My body was exhausted and so tired of feeling sick, and my mind both blamed food and obsessed about it. I just wasn't sure how much farther I could go, and yet I had come so far. Of course The Long March was worth a shot.

And then, the race began. I think my expression in this photograph shows how I felt. My eyes were droopy and tired, my posture slumped and my legs were dragging. But there's a spark there, and a genuine smile. I was still enthralled with the landscape and culture, and excited to see what lay ahead.

And the morning was gorgeous. We had been incredibly lucky with the weather. The week before the race, it rained so continuously that the race organizers sent out an e-mail warning of a wet and cold slog with a decent chance of snow. And the week after the race, the mountains were always shrouded in thick clouds. But for that one week the sky was clear, and temperatures held a mild range from 1 to 30 degrees Celsius (yes, it does get quite warm in Nepal in November.) Plus, the mountains were always out. If Hindu karma does exist, the perfect weather was probably a fair exchange for how sick I felt.

After two rolling kilometers the trail shot skyward, gaining 600 meters in two kilometers. That's an average grade of 30 percent or a gain of 1,600 feet per mile. Pretty steep. I actually had to go back and re-read to course notes to get this number because in my memory it was not much of a climb at all. I don't think that's as much a result of poor memory as it is an indicator that our health really was improving. As we recovered, the miles seemed easier, even if they really weren't.

The miles were numerous though, and for much of the stage my mind fell into that Zen place that can often be described as "auto-pilot." Because of this, my memories of this stage are more fragmented than the others, so I have many pictures with fewer stories to tell. We were marching.

Nepalis seem to spend lots of time relaxing on the side of the trails, where I imagine the most entertaining action takes place. I was always impressed with the way they sat, with their knees fully bent or even squatting in a way that made my own knees ache vicariously. Steve and I discussed another seeming anomaly in rural Nepal — an almost complete lack of middle-aged people. We saw many hundreds of children, and strikingly beautiful young adults up to about age 25. Everyone older than that looked to be at least sixty, with wrinkles spread across their faces, sagging postures and tired eyes. We couldn't decide whether there actually is a large generation gap, whether most of the middle-aged adults were  working the fields away from town, or whether the hard lives in rural Nepal just leave people looking much older than they are.

After 15 kilometers, we traversed a mountainside jungle along a disconcertingly slippery trail. It actually felt strange to reduce our pace to a slow walk, as we had been jogging for a while. During our training, Beat was always significantly stronger and faster than me while carrying a pack. It's one of the reasons we decided not to race together, as I feared his pace would burn me out and mine would bore him. Even though I was stronger in stage five than I had been yet, following Beat's pace kept me right at my upper limit. And yet, the sensation of dripping sweat and breathing hard felt really good, because it wasn't sick, and it wasn't weak. It was running, which is what we came to our running race to do.

But I knew my body was significantly broken down and couldn't even begin to recover until I rested, which wasn't going to happen during a 45-mile continuous march. I accepted this willingly, even gratefully, because I knew that life doesn't always hand you the best timing and I believed the journey was worth it.  But I braced myself for hardship.

One interesting aspect of climbing mountains in Nepal is that there is nearly always some kind of religious shrine at the top. This is one of the more elaborate pagodas we passed, but it represents well the strong Buddhist presence in the mountains. Even though Hinduism is the dominant religion in Nepal, Buddhism is growing thanks to a large influx of refugees from Tibet, as well as an explosion in the general population. The purpose of the pagoda is to house sacred relics and writings. I once looked into a small structure that housed a naked Barbie doll among the many candles, flower petals and glass bottles. It seemed more likely that this was just someone's idea of a disrespectful joke, or the work of defiant child ... but then you never really know what holds spiritual meaning to another.

I respect spirituality and believe my own lies in the awe of living, which is why I do the things that I do. When I was in college I read a lot of Joseph Campbell, "follow your bliss" and all that. He has one quote that particularly sticks out in my mind as closely paralleling my own beliefs:

“People say that what we’re all seeking is a meaning for life. I don’t think that’s what we’re really seeking. I think that what we’re seeking is an experience of being alive, so that our life experiences on the purely physical plane will have resonances with our own innermost being and reality, so that we actually feel the rapture of being alive.” ("The Power of Myth")

The rapture of being alive. It would hit me sometimes as we jogged along the rocky trail, even through a mental molasses of fatigue and physical deterioration. "I'm in Nepal. Those are the Himalayas. I'm really here." I do realize that meeting Beat has opened up opportunities for me that I would not have otherwise had, possibly ever. For that I am grateful. But more than that, I'm grateful just to have Beat in my life. He does understand that I'd be happy to spend all of my weeks and months in California with him if that's what it took, but I'm glad he too so zealously values the experience of being alive that he'll go to the other side of the world to find it. There is just so much to discover in the regions and experiences far outside our comfort zones. And I'm grateful that Beat not only values these experiences, but also values me enough to sacrifice some of his own experiences to stick by my side while I stumble through a sick fog. That truly made the difference in my struggle to push on or give up during the first stage. I am grateful. (Beat's probably embarrassed reading this right now, but my grandmother sitting in front of the Thanksgiving spread would be so proud.)

The general route of stage five wrapped around the Pokhara Valley and emerged on the far side of town via a rippling series of mountain passes, three big climbs in all. The second took place in the heat of the day, that 30-degree-Celsius range, and was a real crusher. A few times, I flirted with the notion of just passing out alongside the trail, and then I would eat another few gummies from my last oh-so-precious bag of candy. For all of this post-race blather about the rapture of being alive, if I am honest with myself, it was a 99-cent bag of candy that really got me through.

The sun set over the distant Annapurna range as we climbed the third pass. We reached the top, kilometer 45, just as it was becoming too dark to hike without lights. Racing the Planet set up what it called the overnight checkpoint here, meaning you could either stop and sleep for a few hours or keep on moving into the night. Either way, the clock kept running. I didn't care about the clock, but I was also intrigued by the prospect of moving through this strange land in the dark and quiet of the night. It was less intimidating because Beat was with me.

We pulled two stools to the edge of the ridge, and for the first time I saw the city lights of Pokhara spread out before us. Beat dropped his pack and fished out two packages of ramen noodles that he had purchased that morning in Birenthanti for 40 rupees (about 50 cents.) We cut empty water bottles in half, crushed the noodles into one cup, dropped packets of powdered cappuccino into the other, and then filled them with hot water. As I sipped the foamy beverage and devoured the still-crunchy soup, I felt a rush of well-being and warmth every bit as satisfying as a full turkey dinner served by loved ones. It was, for those fleeting minutes at least, the best Thanksgiving dinner ever.

Instead of collapsing on the couch with full bellies and football on the television after dinner, we chased our 300 calories of ramen and cappuccino with 30 kilometers of running in Nepal in the dark. The final 30K was less hilly and we actually did run some, although not fast, and of course with much silliness. Because it was not all that late, we still had to contend with dodging the lights of oncoming motorcycles and passing groups of local children and spectators who could see and yell at us even though we couldn't see them (Nepalis must have excellent night vision.)

I was amazed I didn't feel worse in the final miles — if fact, except for the struggles during the hot climb, my physical state seemed to remain in a state of equilibrium for the entire day, as though the pace of my continuing recovery from my illness perfectly matched the deterioration of endurance racing. I didn't feel great, but really, I didn't feel bad either. In fact, I felt a lot less bad than I believed I should after 45 miles even under normal circumstances. My knees were still okay. I didn't have any blisters. I didn't even have any chafing from my huge pack. Most importantly, I didn't have any foot pain. I've never traveled that far in one shot without getting "hurty foot," at any speed. For that, too, I was grateful.

But most of all, I was grateful to be done. We finished at 11:47 p.m. for a finishing time of 16 hours and 32 minutes (the race started at 7:15.) It was good enough to come in about 95th or so, which out of 170 who started the stage wasn't an awful position (at least not as awful as tenth from last.) Despite all, we really were improving, and all of the hard parts of the race were over with. Or so I thought.