Day 38 - 9th March. Kathmandu to China

During breakfast we found out from Surita  that Diego had been admitted to the hospital across the road in the early hours of the morning. He's been suffering really bad stomach problems and was trying to put his shoes on to talke himself in when Surita found him in the hallway.

David had been to see him earlier in the morning and we made plans to go and visit with him and Paula. Poor Diego didn't look too sparkling at all. He was hooked up to a drip and looked pale but said he was feeling much, much better and wanted to leave.

Nepali hospital tests are a little hard to fathom but it seems that there's no method of submitting and retrieving tests and results. David had had to take the tests down to the lab in the morning and also had to go and collect them so that the doctors could take a look and decide if Diego was well enough to leave. While David was collecting the tests we discussed what we thought might have caused it. Diego thought it was the 4 slices of pre-s;iced watermelon he'd muched through yesterday but then we remembered the gutter water that had been used to soak him through during Holi.  Eventually te doctors decided that he could leave and gave him a list of medication to buy from the pharmacy. After making sure that he knew what he was doing with it all,  we deposited Diego back at the hostel, collected Forrester, and went in search of coffee and cake.

After stopping at a street stall on the way for the tastiest momos yet, we all followed Matt as he navigated to a coffee shop that he's read up on online. It was much further than we'd thought and had almost given up hope of finding it when we detected the smell of freshly-baked pastries.

The coffee shop was divine and as we sipped our French press and shared our fabulous cakes in amongst the shelves of English books, I had to keep reminding myself where we were. Travelling is awesome but it is so good just to have the feeling of something familiar and decadent every now and again. Given that I was a bit nervous about the move to China where I was anticipating problems with communicating and eating, it was just what I needed.

The rest of the afternoon was spent scouring the shops in Patan for the Kathmandu fridge magnet that I had promised Denise. Since we weren't technically in Kathmandu and it wasn't a tourist area this was harder than I expected. Trying to explain that I wanted a picture of a different part of townm, that stuck via magnetism to a household appliance most people woud never own was quite a challenge. Unsurprisingly I went back to the hotel empty-handed.

We had time for our last communal dinner without everyone before the flight and it was really nice to spend the last hour chatting and enjoying their company. The food was great as usual and it was a little sad to be leaving such a great bunch of people. Paula was heading to Pokhura, David and Forrester were spending a few days elsewhere before joining her, Josh and Naomi were continuing their work with rescued sex traffickers before popping back to Australia to renew their Visas so they could continue running the ashram in Varanasi, and the Scottish girl (why can't I remember her name?!) was finishing her thesis while waiting for her girlfriend, Megan to come back from her hospital placement so they could decide whether they'd move to the US together.

About 9pm we headed to the airport. Surita came with us so she could pick up some people who wanted to stay at the hostel and dropped us off at departures. We were scanned and checked so many times starting from the second we set foot through the door but yet most of the officials didn't wear uniforms. The airport was a bit like a delapidated hotel with wood panelled walls and fancy wooden mirrors but I did manage to find the fridge magnet!

Time at the airport was mostly spent queuing up for continual checks. When we finally got to the gate there was just a big group of people (too many to fit) and a very expensive shop. I asked to go back through to the main bit so that I could grab a few things but when I got there, everything was suddenly shut. It seemed strange that it handled so few people that they only bothered to open things just before a flight left.

The Dragon Airlines flight was pretty unremarkable apart from that they asked me to fill is a customer satisfaction questionnaire, with the chance to win free flights to Hong Kong. This seemed a bit daft considering we were on a flight to Hong Kong but I wouldn't complain at winning. I mostly kept myself entertained by filling it in at each key point: when I used the in-flight entertainment (which was crap and crackly with no function to stop and start),  following the meal (which was pretty tasty), after going to the loo (no complaints there) and when I asked the stewardess to bring some water (efficient and polite but was still thirsty). I did consider asking for all sorts of things to see how hard they tried but thought I might be better trying to rest instead.

Day 37- 8th March - Kathmandu

We slept late after last night's shennanigans but didn't feel as rough as we expected when we woke up.
We gave our sopping and stained clothes to Surita for laundry and immediately felt guilty when I saw her working her way through the piles of stuff we'd all given her.

Nothing else much to report for once. We walked into Patan with Paula and Diego and went to noodle stall for a carb fix and had watermelon. That really is as exciting as the day got.

Later, Matt had sleep and I chatted to Paula about all sorts of disturbing and interesting stuff before we went downstairs to help with dinner. It was so nice to just contribute to making a meal because I've really missed cooking. I had my first experience with soya beans and I'm really not sure they're worth the hassle, or the creepy feeling of squeezing all the moisture out just for them to spring back to their original foamy shape.

After stuffing ourselves senseless as usual, an early night was had by all. Guess we're not the young party things we thought we were last night.

Day 36 - 7th March - Kathmandu

Holi festival was the day we had been looking forward to and dreading for the last month. Since our arrival in India the shops had been full of huge baskets of every coloured powder (including glittery) imagineable as well as ahuge array of water guns, streamers, hats, masks and all sorts of colourful and crazy things. We'd been warned in Varanasi that Matt should not go out before 12pm because he'd returned multi-coloured and without his trousers, and had changed our plans so we could be somewhere in a city on the right day. We'd even nearly missed it because it was held on a different day in Nepal.

We'd asked last night about what people in the hostel were up to for the festival but they'd seemed a little vague. When we got up however, plans were being made for us to head out into the town and Surita had bought us powder and some squirters and had made some home-made water guns for us out of plastic bottles.  Before we'd even made it  a few metres from the hostel, half the group were already bright pink.
As we headed throught he main streets of Patan there were groups of boys roaming the streets with faces painted in grease paint and pockets full of powder ready to mob us, some more friendly and well-intentioned than others. Children were popping out from small alleyways to fling water and then scarper, usually chased by Megan, the only one who'd thought to wear trainers. Buckets of water were thrown from the top of 4 and 5 storey buildings, often coming quite keen if particularly unexpected but always a real shock, especially if it was really cold.

As we progressed up the street, our faces were smeared with more and more colours, sometimes thrown from a distance but mostly wiped on our cheeks, noses and foreheads. We got to the point where we'd actually offer our faces to people because  it prevented us getting so much paint in our eyes and mouths, which was pretty uncomfortable and none of us were convinced about the non-toxicity of the stuff. Because we were building up layers of paint on our faces and clothes, we made it a game to try and get an even range of colours and so searched out people with powder that we 'needed'.

After a particularly prolonged attack from a bunch of boys in silver and black face paint, and a few incidents wth kids collecting more water from the gutter, we decided to take some time out and stop at a pub for a beer and a break. We thought we might find struggle to find somewhere to let us in but the bar we found seemed more than welcoming and even had it's own pile of paints, which we used to decorate our bags and clothes. We were also grateful for a chance to dry off, though the paint felt more uncomfortable when it dried and cracked on your face. It was a nice opprtunity to get to know the people from the hostel a bit more and I chatted to Betsy and Paula quite a bit.

After our beers we set off towards Kathmandu but since it was after 12, it had all calmed down quite a lot. A couple of the lads seemed to take a bit longer to notice this and so seemed to annoy a few locals by carrying on but it was all good. There were still a few groups of boys around lots of people were highly entertained by the state of us all so there was still a good atmosphere.

The only low-point was a group of guys who attacked us with really foul pink paint. They mostly caught us from behind and so quite a few of us had our eyes and mouths open when they put it in. Unlike the other stuff, it really stung and tasted disgusting and seemed to take forever to wash away. It also left a stain that looked much less likely to wash away. The add insult to injury, one of them also managed to get a good grab of all of the girls boobs. I didn't realise this at first and kicked off when he grabbed at me, but I couldn't help but laugh when I turned round and Paula had two wet, pink patches on the front of her hospital scrubs.

At the main Durbar square, Paula, Betsy, Matt and me managed to sneak in without paying the exorbitant fee (to be perfecty honest, I didn't realise and just wandered in oblivious) and Betsy went back to find the boys but we'd lost them. We stopped for momos in a restaurant overlooking the square so we could look out for the boys and watch the festivities going on there. There was a stage with music and loads of street stalls as well as other smaller ceremonies. We had to wash our hands 7 or 8 times to get the water to stop running pink but our hands were still very stained.

We looked around the square for a while and watched a line of ladies queueing with bowls of offerings so they could tie coloured string around a tree and pray. There were groups of ladies also sat on the floor, rolling up mud and sticking in pieces of grass to sell for the offering plates. We wanted to find out more but it didn't seem appropriate to disturb them.

Betsy also showed us around some of the pornographic carvings on the pagodas in the square and they were absolutely disgusting, though quite fun. She also pointed out the house the Kumari, the 'living goddess' in the Hindu religion. The current Kumari is 4 years old and was installed in 2008. Kumari is selected from lots girls who are presented as possibilites due to their possession of a number of attributes. Likely candidates are then examined for 32 other 'perfections' and along with their family, are put through a rigourous testing procedure to confirm her legitimacy as the vessel of Durga. Look it up on Wikipaedia because it'd fascinating stuff.

We went to meet some of Betsy's friends in an interesting bar in the tourist area of Thamel. It was very dark with cushions scattered on the floor around low tables and black light, making decorations hanging from the ceilings and walls glow. Betsy's friend's told us all about their trip to Everest base camp. It was something that we would both have liked to do but didn't have time for in the end and they made it sound like it was quite enjoyable. They did give the impression that even though it was possible to organise by yourself, it was probably better to go on a tour so maybe it'll be something we organise when we get back home.

Back at the hostel we showered (mostly in cold water but Surita brought us warm water buckets) but no amount of scrubbing would get all the paint off. The boys had come back earlier and were almost perfectly clean but we'd been out longer and had dried out more. I was pink in the most peculiar places and there was nothing I could do to get my ears, chest and hands clean.

After dinner, we all had a party on the roof and Forrester plied us with wine, rum and all sorts of stuff as we chatted and giggled until the early hours of the morning. It was really good fun and we really enjoyed chatting with everyone and sharing silly stories. One by one we drifted off to bed feeling a little more woozy than was sensible.

Day 35 - 6th March - Bandipur to Kathmandu

We explored the very small confines of Bandipur town a little more and headed back to the restaurant of last night for a spot of breakfast, some internet access and to see if they had Matt's eternally elusive missing hat. Thankfully they did because so many hours had gone in to finding the darn thing in the first place. They had obviously had some fun trying it on because it had been adjusted to fit a smaller smaller head than Matt's.

We walked to the corner to get the bus but even though one turned up soon after, he woud not let us on and told us to wait for the next one. We went back to the restaurant to wait in the shade outside and the waiter told us to make ourselves comfortable and use the internet until the next bus came. Eventually they let us on the first bus anyway but there was no roof-rack for a return adventure. Luckily we managed to get a seat though because after the bus was crammed full, people just hung off the side all the way down. I could see their muscles bulge as they rounded corners hanging over the umpteen hundred metre drop and watched them tiring as the journey went on. They were hanging on over the top of other people and kept having to change arms to shake out the cramp. After the pain of hanging on the the vertical bar INSIDE the bus on the way up to Bandipur, I really felt for their ordeal. Some just couldn't take it any more and dropped off on safe parts of the road.

In the town of Dumre we did the rounds of the cash machines but none of them woud give us any money. The more people cram on a bus, the more money they make and we had been collared by one of the boys working on the bus to Kathmandu. They wanted us on the bus so much that they accepted the 400 rupees we had (instead on the 700 actual fare), crammed us on the back seat (for a change!) and set off to Kathmandu. One of the downsides of being a foreigner is that you can never be nippy or knowledgeabe enough to grab a seat that doesn't jar every bone in your body.

In may ways the back seat wasn't so bad because there was absolutely no leg-room and so at least Matt got some space for his knees in the aisle. The downside was the tiniest little old lady who was huddled up in the seat next to me. She took up hardly any space at all but spent the whole journey vomiting out of the window and hacking up phlegm into a carrier bag for the length of the journey.

On the other side of Matt was a young woman with a baby on her knee and a sleeping toddler next to the window. Some time later a guy got on the bus and started to insist that the toddler moved, despite there being a seat just a few seats in front of us on the bus. He was getting really irate that they would not all move to the one spare seat but the woman clearly could not have held both kids on her lap. Lots of people were objecting but he was determined. He started trying to climb over Matt by putting his foot on Matt's knee but we shoved it off. Eventually, he went and told the bus-boy who came and insisted, obviously because of some crazy Nepalese caste reasons, that everybody moved. The toddler ended up on the knee of the guy in front off us while the woman next to him holding the baby and the git of a guy curled himself up over 2 seats and slept.

At the next rest stop we reached a new low. There was a shop and a fruit stall there but we only had enough money for water. We were pretty hungry and so asked at the fruit stall to find out how much a kilo of oranges were. We did not have enough for a full kilo and tried to get half a kilo but the bloke refused.   I went back and tried again a few minutes later when there was a girl on the stall and she clearly felt sorry for me and agreed to take what money we had. We felt very shoddy pretty much begging for cut-price fruit from the Nepalese.

Overall, despite the puking lady, the arrogant bloke, the back-seat place and the lack of funds, it was one of the better journeys we'd had, and was only 2 hours longer than the estimated time of 6 hours.

Unfortunately, when we arrived at Kathmandu bus station, it turned out not to be the one we were expecting to arrive at. We did manage to get money out but we couldn't work out how to get to the hostel. We tried calling our hostel using the phone of a guy who was trying to get us to stay at another hostel but I could barely hear the lady. All I could work out was that it was fine for us to go a day early and that there was a bus available to her hostel.

We asked around but seemed to go in circles for quite a while, and although people kept pointing us to the stop for the bus which would take us to the other bus station, we still couldn't work out which bus we needed to get or get a straight answer from anyone on the buses. Most people could not understand us when we told them that we wanted to go to 'Patan', no matter how we pronounced it, but when we showed it to them, they said 'Ah, Patan!' in exactly the same way we'd started by saying it. Eventually we gave up and got a taxi. We were glad that we did because the traffic was crazy busy and all the buses looked very full.

The taxi driver wasn't even sure where to go and had to keep calling the hostel. He seemed to be getting pretty exasperated by the time we got there.  This was confirmed when he took the note we gave him and refused to give us any change. We were just pleased to be there and so didn't argue too much.

Thankfully, Sirita was waiting by the door of Sanu's House for us to arrive, bearing a big smile. Because we had arrived a day earlier than expected, she only had a smaller room but busied herself adding an extra 'mattress' to the floor (layers of blankets) and explained that she had a bigger room for us in the morning.
She insisted that we rest up for a few minutes and then come downstairs if we wanted to join everyone for dinner. The kitchen had sounded bustling when we had signed in and Surita was so welcoming that we did. Dinner was fantastic and everyone just sat around in a big circle on the kitchen floor, helping themselves to the endless bowls of food and chatting about their day. Diego had spent the day being driven in circles about his visa for India, a few people had been to work at local hospitals and charities, Katrin had been to a job interview and David, Paula and Forrester had spent the day at a monk's birthday party being stuffed full of huge plates of food and listening to speeches they didn't understand.

We went to bed pretty happy that we'd perservered and made it to Sanu's House.

Day 34 - 5th March - Pokhura to Dumre to Bandipur

It was clear from all the traffic flying past our hostel that there wasn't a strike so we took the opportunity to head to Bandipur. I was disappointed at not being able to go to the lake at Begnas Tal but Bandipur was meant to be nice and was on the way to Kathmandu.

The bus to Dumre was pretty uneventful on the whole though, of course, was still the nail-biting, over-confined experience we were getting used to. It's nerve-wracking just watching the way that the young boys who work on the buses climb from the roof to inside the bus while it's in motion. Their job seems to be to secure the luggage, take payment and press their own horn when there's something the driver may not have seen, or if they think it's been too quiet for more than 3 seconds.

At Dumre we were lucky enough to run straight into the bus up the hill (more of a mountain) to Bandipur. Now, we are quite used to being too wide to fit in the seats but being too tall to stand on the bus was a bit of an experience for us. Matt had his head bent forward so far that the top of his spine was touching the ceiling. I was trying to half-squat but there were so many people standing that it meant I was taking up an unfair amount of room and so I had to bend my neck too.

As soon as the bus got away from the main road, they stopped it and herded all of the taller people on to the roof. Unfortunately, I wasn't quick enough and Matt very nearly wasn't either and so was only half way up the ladder at the back of the bus when it set off. The journey was much longer than I expected and every time we rounded a steep, narrow  corner on the road, I craned my neck further to see if I could see Matt freefalling down the side of the mountain.

Matt arrived safely, a little pasty and pretty excited and had become more acquinted with a young English guy who was working in Bandipur teaching at the school and helping in an inn. He showed us to the main section of the town and had pointed out a cheap place to stay but they were already full. Bandipur looked a little like the Wild West. Most of the main buildings were arranged around a square and were wooden with porches and balconies. We managed to secure ourselves a room in a place on the square where each floor had a trapdoor and a drop-down set of wooden steps. The ceilings were so low we had to stoop (maybe people were just shorter around here?) and the bathroom was at the other side of the building but there was a window and a little balcony that we could sit on nearby and which over-looked the pretty 'library' in the square. It was nice to sit there, see people milling about and watch the kids try to flick elastic bands to see if they could get them to attach to the intricate light fittings.

We had lunch in cafe nearby where there was a beautiful view out across the hills and some guys playing wit a giant chess set on the staged area next door. We had a brief chat with a nice couple who had been on our bus and had kindly held one of my bags for me, and vowed that we were going to stop ordering chow mein and fried rice because, even though it's cheap, we're going to be sick of the stuff before we hit China.

Bandipur is also known for its walking opportunities and so we took one of the paths snaking further up the hill. The first person we came across was a tiny old lady with a pile of sticks and leaves 3 times her size strapped to her back. She was bare-footed but making her way across the loose stones and narrow pathways much better than we were. Another lady followed soon after and she stopped to say 'hello'. Even though we couldn't speak in the same language we managed to understand that the leaves were food for her goats and that she had to make the journey every day to be able to feed them. We also gathered that the next town along the path would be Ramtok but we suspected that there would not be enough time to walk there before it got too late.

The views along the path were pretty amazing and we stopped frequently to take in the beauty of the rice terraces and the mountain ranges. We made good progress in the time time that we had and I found a lovely stick to use for the walk. We made it to the top and round the other side of the hill before we decided that it was probaby wise to turn back. Some of the paths were quite dangerous and it would have been foolish to walk them in the dark.

On the way back we saw a line of girls in neat and perfect school uniform making their way home down the mountain paths. It was such a touching sight to see them all in single file, carrying traditional satchels and concentrating on where to place their feet.

We had read in our guidebook that it wasn't uncommon for kids to flap their arms at you as you pass because Bandipur is common launching point for paragliders. We'd seen a few bobbing through the air as we'd walked around the mountain but we passed two guys setting up on a flat plain as we made it closer to our starting point. We asked if they minded us watching for a short while and I was stupidly surprised by what a scary process it is. I'd never really thought about what it must take to set up the equipment needed and how much faith they have to have in their abilities and skill. The network of flimsy wires that can potentially get twisted broken is simply terrifying and trying to keep everything where it should be whilst standing on a windy hill is really quite a challenge. My heart was truly in my mouth as we watched the first guy run forward and launch himself off the cliff.

The second guy climbed into his suit just a few minutes after and was about to follow his friend when his parachute seemed to blow closed and he stopped himself right at the edge. He spent quite a while setting everything back up how it was and re-checking things and asked us if we didn't mind helping a little. He wanted us to drag his parachute back further inland but I think we may have picked it up too much because he had to faff around with it again for quite a while. His friend was circling above and we watched him as the guy in the ground got himself sorted. Eventually, he asked for our help again though and we stood terrified that we may have done something wrong as he ran forward and lifted off the edge and into the air. We were quite exhilerated as he shouted his goodbyes and floated away so he must have felt even better.

We stopped for a cup of tea at a nice restaurant and they happily let us use their internet connection for quite a while, which was really handy. On the way back to our hostel we watched a few foreigners giving piggy back rides to local kids and enjoyed the glowing ambience of the town. Matt was feeling rough though so he fell asleep at 7pm while I sat on the balcony, tried to catch up with some blog, and watched the town slowly close down and fall asleep too.

Day 33 - 4th March - Pokhura (and not Begnas Tal!)

We were up early so we could go to Begnas Tal and enjoy a less touristy lake. We took a walk round Pokhura lake to go to the bookshop and do some more swopping but were surprised when it wasn't yet open. We hung around until 9am munching on fake chocolate croissants and sitting by the lake.

When we came back to shop street there were people playing football and badminton in the middle of the road and it didn't take long to work out that there was yet another strike! There was a possibility we'd be able to get by the road blocks on bicycle but it was quite a long way away and we had no idea how flat the road was. We'd already asked about a moped but that was no-go.

We thught through other options in Shiva Cafe by the lake. We hadn't had the famous Pokhura steak so far and they had one on the breakfast menu. It felt very decadent and a little bit gross to order it but it was quite small when it came, and very tasty indeed. The guy who ran the bar came over to chat a little and asked us whether we liked a number of herbs and spices because he was going to make us a special drink. He hopped over the fence, dug around in the bushes for a while and came back out with a handful of leaves. A few minutes later he came over with some 'Himalayan iced - tea'  that he'd made from them. It was absolutely stunning! He also suggested that it might be nice to spend the day on a boat on the lake and we agreed.
Being out on the boat was great and made us realise just how big the lake was. We kept stopping for the odd game of cards and relax in the sunshine. I also think it helped Matt not to go crazy because I really am very bad at rowing. The last time I was in a rowing boat I cracked my cocyx just trying to get in the thing and I have no common sense when it comes to rowing. I always felt like I was at odds with what he was trying to do and I think he felt the same. I tried asking him to direct me but in the end it said it was best if I left him to it.

We crossed to a bay at the otehr side of the lake. There was already a group of people there who'd travelled on an awesome pedal boat so we made ourselves comfy on a little  handmade bench at the other side and listened to music for a while whilst Matt came to terms with his pedalo envy. Paddle boat envy.
We hadn't been there too long when we noticed a pair of eyes and a long back gliding through the water rond the edge of the bay. Having recently been so close to man-eating crocodiles we were pretty cautious and started wondering what the hell we were going to do. We'd been told how to deal with tigers, rhinos, bears and bison but didn't have a clue how to escape a crocodile. When we saw a number of others following in the same path we were pretty close to panicking. As they scrambled on to land and turned out to be cows we felt pretty foolish. I'm not sure that I knew that cows could swim before though.

At 5pm the strike ended so we got new books and spent some chatting chatting to a group of German lads staying at our hostel. One of them was pretty tall and had the most calloused, horny feet I could imagine. He'd broken his shoes and had been unable to get any in his large size in India and so had worn sandals in all sorts of conditions. When his sandals broke too he'd had to get them fixed but the guy at the street stall had sewn up the foot holes too!

Matt and I went for dinner in one of the intimate cabin restaurants, lit by candlelight rather than noisy generator. We had a gorgeous peanut Sedeko and enjoyed some lovely tea but rest was a little tasteless. It didn't matter though because there was a nice atmosphere and we ony had a short stumble through the dark to get back to our room.

Day 32 - 3rd March - Pokhara

We packed up and moved to other side of lake to Fewa corner. We were starving by the time we got there and so confused the smiley boy by ordering a motley assortment of food. When it arrived, we understood why he'd been a bit bemused because there was loads of it. Since they had clearly spent the last hour or more painstakingly making it all, we had to trough the lot.

Matt had spotted a bookshop which bought books and so we took the India travel guide along. They gave us quite a lot of credit for it so we came away with 'The Snow Leapord' (recommended by Lonely Planet but not by Matt it would transpire) for Matt and the mini idiot's guide to yoga for me. Unfortunately I wasn't idiotic enough to appreciate it fully so Matt is currently carrying that around too.

We wanted to go to the World Peace Pagoda that we could see nestling at the top of the peak at the other side of the lake and so walked round to the damside. The river in front of the dam was packed full of people washing themselves and their clothes. It was a riot of colour and activity and we sat by the ropebridge for a while to watch.

We were soon joined by some kids who were trying to exchange Matt's carabenas for a tour up to the Peace Pagoda. It's probably the ethics of working in a school that are ingrained in us but we didn't much fancy enticing children into a forest with us to lead us up a deserted hill path in exchange for shiny things so we politely declined and said we'd find the way ourselves.

The World Peace Pagoda ia a Buddhist Monument to promote world peace and the movement is in the process of building 100 of them in significant sites around the world. The first attempt was initially knocked down by the Nepali government who cited petty reasons but it was built again later after political change. It was a pretty steep climb and we were glad that we did not have any chattery children in tow to witness us sweating and heaving ourselves up the hill. There were loads of people  there who had caught the bus up , lazy buggers, and of course there were the obligatory mobile phones blaring out tinny music but it was still worth it. It was a really striking monument and had fabulous views over Pokhura, the lake and the old town.

Day 31 - 2nd March - Chitwan National Park to Pokhura

Another early start but this time to do some 'Birdwatching'. Our usual guide had taken some people on a jungle walk and so we went with a different guide to look at some birds. We couldn't imagine seeing many more than we had seen on the canoe yesterday, especially when we were only going round the back-end of the hotel and it turned out that we were right. Another guide had taken the binoculors and so when Babu heard or saw a bird in the distance, he just showed us what we would have seen in the handy little book that he'd brought with him.

Waiting outside the hotel for our departure was a big lovely, spacious bus and when we asked, they told us that it was going to take us all the way to Pokhura. We settled on it and, for once, had space for both our asses and our bags. It wasn't very long-lived and they slung us out at the bus park about 10 mins down the road and made their merry to Kathmandu.

Our own bus was the crappiest bus on the wasteland and we had to wedge ourselves into yet another set of narrow seats. It was still a tourist bus and so there at least weren't another 15 people rammed into the aisle with bags bigger than our rucksacks, but unfortunately the seats were reclinable. This is normally not a problem when there's handy little knob underneath or a discrete handle behind your knees but since we both then had to spend the next 5 or more hours with an sharp metal stick digging into our more delicate regions. To make matters worse, the lady sat behind me instigated a battle of window wars which lasted the whole journey too.

On arrival at Pokhura bus station we doubtfully scanned the waiting touts and hotels reps for the guy from the hotel we'd booked as part of our National Park trip. Unsurprisingly there was no-one waiting. We did however, get approached a different hostel by a guy who was the mate of the owner of The Dharma Inn and so he arranged for a taxi to take us there for free. We expected them not to have even heard of us when we turned up but after a quick phone call we were settled into a rather nice room, with a bath, a TV and a balcony.

Matt had been wanting to try momos and was desperate for meat after his long stint of enforced vegetariansism and so we made the apparently famous Lhasa Tibetian Restaurant our first stop. My first surprise was that I like momos, which was unexected enough given their texture, but it also transpired that I liked buffalo momos better than the flavourless cheese and spinach ones that I ordered. I think I'll experiment in making them when I get back home unless Nic or Claire beat me to it with their baking skills (hint hint ladies!).

We wandered past the endless outdoor shops with convincing looking fake trekking brands and marvelled at the number of people wearing massive down jackets despite the fact it was actually quite warm. Not sure how any of them would have coped on the cold, long treks of the Annapurna.

We had a look around a variety of more affordable hostels, including a great looking one by the lake which was part a a bar and restaurant complex where all the seats were mini pagodas balanced over pools of koi carp and water lilies. Matt said it was 'too cool' but I insisted that I wanted to have a look at the cute little wooden shacks they had to let. They were about to shw them to us but when we asked about their availability they said they were full for the forseeable future. They were still going to let us have a poke around the rooms that somebody had locked and left, thinking that they were secure though!
#
After looking round a number of good, bad, ugly and so high up a hill you wouldn't want to carry your rucksack up places, we settled on one that was very basic with a scary bathroom (the light not working in there was a bit of a blessing) but had a beautiful view over the lake and a very smiley boy running it.

We planned to spend the remainder of our evening enjoying the rooms facilities. We had high hopes for a bottle of rum and a game of cards, followed by a nice bath and a bit of crappy TV in bed. Unfortunately it started to rain, there was no electricity and no hot water so it was mostly just a tease.  The rum did live up to expectations though and Matt was soon sound asleep.

Day 29 - 29th Feb - Chitwan National Park

The view from the hotel balcony...

Woke up at around 6 and packed our bags for the tour to Chitwan. Over breakfast we had a chat with a cool Italian lady who'd spent her whole life since the age of 18 just working for 7 months a year and travelling the rest of the time. A very smart teenager indeed.

Our luxury tourist coach

We met the guy who'd arranged the tour and stood in expectation of the comfy-looking tourist buses we'd seen stacking up during yesterday's strike. We were soon led to the local bus, an apparently "luxury coach", where we squeezed, rattled and fidgeted as our driver hurtled along with reckless abandon. No-one else seemed to squirm and brace themselves like we were  compelled to do so maybe we'll harden to it.

We arrived gratefully at 11am and were met by a guy from the hotel - who promptly marched us to another smaller bus where we spent an additional 40mins developing new bruises.

At the next stop, the promised jeep was beaten to it by public transport and we were loaded onto yet another bus. However, this one was full of Westerners who had had quite a cosy non-stop journey from Pokhura. This just added insult to injury since they'd come twice as far in the same amount of time and had no war-wounds to show for it.

The most comfortable transport yet

10mins later we got off the bus and realised how unecessary an organised tour was. There were loads of touts for various hotels all clamouring for business. Having side-stepped this decision, we were finally bundled into a jeep and whisked away to our Hotel.

The Rainbow Lodge didn't look too bad and we signed in over a 'welcome drink' before heading to our thankfully clean room for the first hot shower we'd had in a while.

Lunch wasn't the a'lacarte affair we'd been led to believe it was and we were soon handed our spaghetti filled pancake roll, chips, cold veg and a slice of melon to ponder over. We weren't sure of the function of the melon but were saved from the quandry of deciding whether it was decoration, dessert or part of the main event by discovering it was too hard to eat anyway.

We took a walk past the hundreds of almost identical hotels offering almost identical packages and down to the river. On the other side of the river was a great big crocodile basking in the sun. It was so unexpected that we almost didn't see it. We gazed at it for a while and chatted to a lovely German couple who were travelling with a little girl.

We went back to the hotel for our first excursion. We intially weren't very impressed as it started out the back of the hotel, but our guide, Anu, soon won us over. We walked through a Tharu village, talked about traditional Tharu village life and learned how rice grows.

Anu then took us to the 'elephant village' where we saw lots of elephants chucking dirt over themselves and preparing to go out. It was so impressive to see how well trained they were. All of the elephants had 3 specific people that they worked with and if I remember, I'll find out their names and roles when I get online. Anu also showed us elephant sweets: a combination of all sorts of lovely elephant goodies including rice and salt which they wrap up in grass. I got to feed one.

One of the poor elephants only had one tusk because wild elephants had come to the village and attacked him. He looked all wonky but not too sad. They seemed so much better cared for and loved than the ones we'd seen before.

As we left, we passed a group of Nepali woman who were carrying their handbags on their heads the same way that they carry baskets. It was really comical to see them all in saris with Gucci handbags strapped around their foreheads but we couldn't take a picture without looking rude.

We took a walk  around the edge of the park and saw more man-eating 'mugger' crocodiles. After realising just how real it is that dangerous animals live in this place I've started to feel less enthusiastic about seeing a rhino, tiger or bear.

We sat by the river for a while before going to the 'visitor's centre'. It was very basic but actually better than I expected. And it was small, which was nice.

After sunset and a little bit more riverside sitting, we realised it was getting dark and headed back. The darkness came quickly and I was very grateful that our guide was as skilled as he was. It was fascinating to watch him with his senses on full alert. Thankfully, we saw nothing but deer.

After another foul meal (I miss street food!) which reminded me of my all-inclusive holiday to Spain with Nic, but with no choice, we were chucked into a jeep to attend the 'Cultural Programme'.
We knew we were going to watch a traditional Tharu stick dance and had learned a little about their lives so we were expecting a ride to a village, have a cup of tea in a tent and a watch few oldies perform around a fire.  Not quite.

We arrived at a type of village hall and were seated on the back bench behind the large number of people who were already there. We were giggling about how it felt like we were about to watch a school play when the narration started. I would have loved to have seen the guy speaking because he sounded like a young country gent crossed with an old Nepali guy and mixed up with a cumputer generated voice where all the pronunciations had been mixed up.

When the young male dancers came on we were quite amazed. The skill, dexterity and accuracy they showed was very impressive. Some of the dances were a hybrid of morris dancing and 'Strictly'. Claire and Jane would have loved it.

There were some other stranger dances. One was apparently a dance for if a young man had died in the village but it was quite farcical. It seemed to involve one boy beautifully dressed as a young woman and very gracefully ballet dancing whilst trying to escape the clutched of a crazed Andy-Pandy style character.  Another was a boy in a giant peacock costume. I couldn't see much of his legs because of the crowd but I did see him fan his tail out and that was quite impressive.

Finally, there was a rousing group dance with crowd participation where we were highly entertained by a Japanese fella who stole the show. It got a little awkward because when the dance finished, all the people who'd been on stage just walked out and were followed by their friends from the spectator benches. The Tharu dancers whirled their sticks one last time and knelt down in formation just in time to see the last few people filing out of the door.

Day 28 - 28th Feb - Gorakhpur (India) - Sonauli (Nepal)

Arrived in Sonauli at around 1:30am, asked where the border was and were pointed in the right direction. It was pitch black and we couldn't see much at all.

We thought we saw the border barrier but when we spoke to two gun-toting guys there, they told us we'd got to the Nepal border but needed to get our passports stamped at Indian immigration. We asked where that was and they pointed out a building that we had strolled straight past.

We knocked on the door but we could hear faint snoring so we assumed they were fast asleep. We had little choice but to persist, despite their sleepy shouts of 'closed'. Eventually we were shouted through and had to find our way into the right room in the total darkness.

An Indian official was sleepily sat in his pyjamas and thrust some forms at us. He kept telling us to complete them quickly but they were the same forms given to us on the plane and not everything was relevant. He eventually snatched mine off me after I asked for clarification and started grumbling at me quite angrily. He even swiped the water bottle that I had put on the desk to the floor because it was blocking some of the light from the only lamp in the room. He then asked us to fish around in the desk drawer to find the official stamps that he needed. As we left, he said "thank you my dear" in a really genial way, which seemed odd given the way he'd acted.

We then trundled over the Nepal frontier to find the Nepal immigration desk. We knocked and were told it was closed until 6am. This was obviously a bit of a problem as we couldn't go into Nepal but couldn't go back into India. We walked further and approached the soldiers who were manning the actual Nepal border and had a very circular conversation. Eventually they accompanied us to the desk but got the same answer. After a while they just told us to find a hotel and come back in the morning so we officially entered Nepal illegally on the say-so of the border officials.

We checked into the only hotel that appeared open, Holiday Inn, which actually wasn't to bad but wasn't very holiday-like.

Woke up around 10am and checked out. Tried to get a bus to Lumbini but was a strike because a politician was kidnapped. We initially did not believe them because we thought they were trying to get us to have a rickshaw but it turned out it was the truth and there were no buses until 5pm. Couldn't really see the point of visiting the birthplace of Buddha at night so we wrote the day off and checked into Hotel Paradise which is not as nice (or rather, more nasty) but cheaper.

Exciting Sonauli

We weren't too distressed about the delay because we'd remembered it was a leap year and we had a day more than we thought so we went for a wander around the nearest village instead.

Even though it's literally yards away, Nepal seems very different to India. It's cleaner and the people seem more relaxed. They are also covered in labels and brands with funky haircuts. Everyone seems to be wearing at least one brand and we've seen several old ladies wearing full traditional dress and carrying a 'Diesel' backpack and such-like.

We arranged a tour to Chitwan National Park for tomorrow and I've got my fingers crossed that it's more impressive than our other 'tours'.

We finished off the evening at Prakash restaurant, where there wasn't a menu, just whatever was available, and Matt had an awesome mutton curry followed by a debate with the Indian guy on the next table who couldn't understand why we had to stick to a budget.

Day 4 - Feb 4th

After a couple of hours sleep, we dragged ourselves out of bed to go to breakfast on the rooftop cafe. We were given a fried egg sandwich, cornflakes, a banana and a rather nice coffee and so started the day in a pretty standard India tourist way.

Veg Market

We wandered the narrow market streets of Paharganj, taking in all the sights and smells. Unlike my first experience of Bangalore, there was very little hassle and we walked mostly unhindered past hundreds of stalls, people, dogs and cows. Well, kind of unhindered, when we weren't avoiding being knocked over, run into, bitten or tripped. There were so many different stalls selling eveything from deep-fried pretzels to  'little dancer wrestlers'.

Potato King

After a long 5 hour nap, we went exploring again, this time focusing more on the smaller streets dedicated to fruit, veg and general food stuffs, where we discovered lots of new things we didn't recognise and a few things we think we did. Matt's convinced he saw half a dog hanging on a butcher's  stall! We bought some fried potatoes (yep! first food in India - chips!) from the self-proclaimed 'Potato King' and went in search of something a bit more substantial.

Awesome photo,

We found a vegetarian restaurant where we could see lots of nice looking food being served and were sat next to a lovely couple called Stefania and Guillaume. They'd been in India three weeks and were off back 'home' to Shanghai tomorrow. They shared some wisdom and experiences and we will hopefully catch up with them again when we get to China.

We now need to focus on trying to get our body clocks back to normal. It's now 11.20pm and we've only been up about 6 hours.

Day 3 - Feb 3rd - London to Delhi

After lots and lots of food, big baths and attentive service, we were hoping that the plane would be full again and that we might get another night of luxury. Unfortunately not.
We arrived at the airport early, as requested, but were told almost immediately that there would be no volunteers list. After a long wait, made longer by delays, we were on the plane to Delhi. This pretty much took up the whole day and we arrived in Delhi 3.10am. The queues to visa and customs were massive and staffed by the obligatory  impatient grumpy old men. 2 hours later we were on our way to the hostel with the driver we had booked.
The death-defying drive to the hostel very quickly proved to Matt that I wasn't exaggerating when she went to Bangalore. Most people straddled lanes, weaving in and out of other traffic - regardless of how much bigger it is or faster it is going. The police drive no differently.
The driver was quite chatty but as neither of us could hear much after the flight, the crux of it was how long her had had to wait for us, interspersed by a bit of geranl chatter and tourist info. He stopped the car in a web of small streets he had told us was a market, asked for the tip and then helped us to the hostel with out bags. I remembered how difficult it was to please with tips in India. They all know what the exchange rate is and how little you get for your money in sterling and so are not even satisfied with a few hundred rupees.
After a short trip through a couple of very dark alleys, we arrived at the hostel, banging on the door and squeezing our bags past the staff sleeping in reception. We were told that we were in the other 'wing' -a street round the corner and made our way there. The room was about on a par with my first visit to India (before Nic and I went upmarket) so wasn't quite what the pictures looked like online but  was clean and tidy enough.

Day 30 - 1st Feb - Chitwan National Park

We had an early start to go down to the river to where we saw the crocodile yesterday and board a canoe.
I felt very vulnerable as we climbed in and were almost level with the water. It didn't help that Anu had just been telling us of how his guide friend had had his canoe attacked by a crocodile 'one month before' after it had accidentally collided with it. All passengers survived but I still wasn't exactly confident.

Being on the water in the morning light was absolutely stunning. There were so many birds and we spent an hour floating along, enjoying the view and taking lots of pictures.

We came across a few more crocs too. They rowed us closer than I was comfortable with and would probably have taken us closer if not for the mute (and very slow) head shaking and warning eyes I was directing at Anu. It was all I could do not to squeak.

When we arrived at the starto of our jungle walk, we were given very  serious instructions for what to do if we came face to face with any of the deadly animals in the park.  Rhinos have bad eye-sight so you're just meant to chuck something to draw it's attention elsewhere, and find a tree to climb. With a bear you should stand close together, wave your arms and make lots of noise. Anu suggested singing. He also reminded us not to try and climb a tree. With a tiger you can do little more than just stare at it. How reassuring. After a quick hat-slinging practise and the transfer of all my valuables to Matt in case I needed to ditch my red bag during a speedy retreat, we were on our way.

It was a nerve-shredding hour but other than tiger tracks, all we saw were deer and a few more crocs. I'd still like to see a rhino but maybe from a safer distance!

Our walk led us to the 'Elephant breeding centre' where we saw some very cute babies. They were so young they were still suckling and we stood for ages just watchin them play in between stopping for milk. We also saw some baby twins who were a little older. They were only 2nd pair of twins recorded (worldwide I think) and the first recorded in Nepal.

After dragging myself away, Anu surprised us by taking us to watch the elephants bathing in the river. I got to have a go at sitting on one and it was fantastic to sit astride its bare back and be lifted into the air. The trainer kept pulling on its ear and shouting instructions to make it squirt me with water so I got drenched. The same pleading look I'd practiced near  the crocodiles earlier was used to persuade him not to make it roll over and chuck me in the river.

After a quick shower and another odd lunch, we were taken along with a Russian couple to go on the 'elephant safari'. This time we were all sat in a large crate-like contruction with a bamboo stick between our thighs and our legs dangling on the outside. It was less than comfortable whenever the elephants went downhill and through rivers but it was great to trample through the jungle trees.

Some of the elephant leaders nearby started making calls and I thought they were just trying to work out one anothers location, but pretty soon we were all gathered together around a rhino and its baby. It was absolutely amazing to see them so close but didn't look real. The elephants did not disturb them at all so we sent a while watching them graze and taking lots of pictures.

On the way back we saw some rather rude, lady elephant trunk to male elephant undercarriage action. We also saw quite a few deer and monkeys, also with very cute babies. (Note to Zeena: I am not getting broody, there actually were just lots of babies!)

After a fun, elephant-filled day, we had a free evening to spend how we wanted. Unfortunately, we mostly spent it unsuccessfully trying to find a cash machine that didn't charge more than the price of a room for the night.

We took a walk down to the river just after sunset and saw a massive rhino, which was even closer than the crocodile we had seen there yesterday. It's so strange to see such wild animals just meters away from a built-up touristy area.