UKC

Did anyone watch this series? I really only enjoyed it for the scenery.

In reply to mypyrex:

I agree about the scenery, although would like to have seen more of the big mountains and valleys. I presume he avoided these as the valleys tend to run North-South and contrary to his generally West-East route?

I thought it was all a bit contrived and irritatingly dramatic at times when there really wasn't drama occurring, apart from the rather nasty taxi crash.

In reply to Trangia:

I liked it. I thought he seemed to have a real affection for the places and people. And that was a nasty accident. Not sure I'd have been rushing back after it...

In reply to Trangia:



Spot on. Apart from the distance involved it didn't appear to me that what he did was any more physical than, say, the Annapurna Circuit. He did seem to spend a lot of time road walking.

He also seemed to be doing an impersonation of Bear Grylls: "I'm Levison Wood and I'm...." "...a near vertical slope(of 30 degrees_..."

In reply to no_more_scotch_eggs:

Which I and, no doubt, other trekkers have had.

In reply to mypyrex:

Yes, still got one more episode to go. The scenery is of course great. The guy's style did grate at first, though I got used to it. The crash was very dramatic and stark. Especially as I'd just been laughing at their response to the "beware of elephants" signs and thinking they were generally overplaying the dangers of their trip.

I also enjoyed the interactions with local people and his friend's wife and family did seem to really love him as one of their own...quite a touching and genuine embrace from his friend's wife when they visited.

In reply to mypyrex:

I think walking 1500 miles is pretty physical whichever way you slice it...!

And I don't think its was meant to be about the physical challenge- the bear grylls quotient was pretty low. I thought the insights into the places he was passing through were the highlights- the views of the people in Kashmir about the conflict there, the fuel crisis in Nepal, the various soothsayers he consulted, getting fitted out in Bhutanese national dress, the 'interesting' art in the village last night...

Yes, it's just travelogue, but I warmed to his approach and the obvious regard he holds for the area. It's a long, long way from 'born survivor'....!

In reply to mypyrex:


I'm sure

I'm less certain all documentary makers do though

In reply to no_more_scotch_eggs:

Nobding...Bumthang...phallic art...!

"...a near vertical slope(of 30 degrees_..."

Ha yes that was a good one. Ultimately found it a bit disappointing apart from the crash episode.

In reply to mypyrex:

Did people watch his Walking The Nile documentary last year? Without giving anything away, that one was genuinely dangerous, and seemed way more 'out there' than Himalaya. Definitely worth watching.

It feels like there has been a change in style. This one feels a bit more overhyped (but it is Channel 4 after all, they probably demand some of that), but without too much real danger, the taxi crash being a freak accident. His lack of mountain sense in the first couple of episodes drove me mad, it was clear he was slowing the party down. But this one seems more personal to him. And for me, the biggest draw is the insight into the variety of the cultures and his interactions with people he meets along the way.

In reply to Trevers:

Was the lm doing this and lm doing that when he carried nothing more more than a man bag and had a support crew doing all the manual work that got me.

Very early Victorian style of exploring.

In reply to mypyrex:

Did he really walk it? I mostly saw his rather fetching man bag most of the time!

But I did enjoy the scenery±!

In reply to mypyrex:

I mostly saw him getting motorised lifts to places. So he walked a bit but far from all the way.

In reply to Orgsm:

No you didn't!
Like others, I liked the way he interacted with people he met, and liked hearing (by interpretation) what they were saying. It gives you a feeling for people far removed from your own society.

In reply to mypyrex:

I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I really did warm to his style.

I especially enjoyed the Nepal section. Having lived with a Gurung family in a village near Pokhara (Tangting) for three months. I too have sampled the honey-hunters wares, and yes it really is quite, ahem, intoxicating. I also had to endure the local hooch - Raksi, made from millet - but learned to quite like it in the absence of anything else. I still maintain contact with folks from the village, as Levison says, everyone has a phone... therefore I am FB friends with lots of people I made contact with.

I also enjoyed the Bhutan experience, I was saddened that Binod never made it to the final summit.

Yes, all-in-all great Sunday night viewing

In reply to lucas95:



Definitely no support crew. Watch it and you'll see.

In reply to digby:

Really then how did he break his arm, return to the UK for a few weeks before restarting then?

In reply to Trevers:

Sorry, my bad. Can see how he fitted everything in stupid man bag now.

In reply to lucas95:


You do know man bag is another term for scrotum?

In reply to lucas95:


Watch it and I promise you'll eat your words

In reply to Trevers:

In one of the early episodes, you got a glimpse of a van, which was a baggage transfer vehicle... it had signage on to that effect.

In the last episode on the trail, prior to them hiring the porters, an unnamed guy was seen momentarily in shot with them carrying a rather large rucksack - a porter perhaps.

In reply to Bellie:



He mentioned several times they were using porters, and had support crews for various stages, I didn't get any sense of duplicity.

But I was talking about the previous Nile series anyway...

In reply to Trevers: I quite enjoyed the series but it was quite obvious that he only did the walking, someone else did the carrying. I never saw either him or Binod carry a rucksack other than ones big enough to hold a water bottle and a small amount of food which made it seem a bit fake when they pitched a tent and crawled into a sleeping bag each night ?

In reply to GravitySucks:


But the premise was never that he was doing it unsupported in one unbroken push. He's not channelling Bear Grylls and pretending to be all alone in some brutal wilderness.

In reply to Orgsm:


"the taxi taking them back to their overnight accommodation crashed off the road"

No one claimed the walk was absolutely continuous in time, or totally unsupported. But you most certainly did not 'mostly see him getting motorised lifts to places' unless you only watched that one bit out of the whole series.