Jo Herrings Adventures

I don't plan what I write about on this blog but one thing I have tried not to involve you all in is my constant struggle with my lady bits. Not because they bounce around on Asian bus journeys if untamed by a fierce sports bra, nor the nuisance of fitting these curves into any clothes in the beautiful high street stores, but the actual innards of my lady bits where on a monthly basis I turn green, lose feeling in my legs and have to swiftly crawl to the bathroom to vomit in pain. Always a little awkward if out in public obviously. For the benefit of my male readers be warned I'm likely to start mentioning words you'll recognise from Health lessons at school when you would blush and be baffled by the intriguing boobs and bits girls were starting to develop across the classroom (some of which you learnt you never wanted to know about). You may also squirm when I write "period" and don't mean full stop. I'll forgive you for laying off the blog for a bit w...

This is not the conventional altitude sickness. I haven't lost my appetite, got a thumping headache, disintry or suffer from shortness of breath after 10 steps. This is a feeling of missing all of these symptoms, just to be in the great heights of the Himalayas again. That feeling that none of my pictures from my time in the Kumbu or indeed Sikhm really can medicate me. The thing about travel is it gets under your skin so much it really can leave you with a permanent impediment. The wanderlust of being in the valley of the great mountains 60 years on since the first summit by my heroes Sir Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing Norgay is consuming me at the moment. Today is my first anniversary since I made it to Everest Base Cam p, and if today is anything to go by I will be making a return! I will never forget the difficulty of the Kumbu. With nothing more than 5 months travelling South East Asia as training and the first night providing me with a bout of the runs, I was not best...

I have always wanted to go to Everest Base Camp to see what the closest to the top of the world must be like. My big sister Fiona made it there some 14 years ago on her way to London. She had run into Ants (her old school friend and now my brother-in-law) in the streets of Kathmandu and later met Simon (her husband) after her trek in Chitwan National Park. She had also bought a painting of the beautiful Ama Dablam  (mother mountain for Mum) with Tengboche Monastery in the foreground and it sits pride of place in our family lounge. As a result Nepal and the Everest region screams family adventure to me.     After a couple of days in Kathmandu during a strike (the country is in massive flux as it does not have a constitution or a governing majority) I met Dustin and Elan near my hostel telling them I was keen to do the Everest Base Camp trek. I had been recommended the Anapurna circuit time and time again but with recent deaths due to slips and the coming m...