24th February –
19th March 2017
Crossing the
border to Nepal, we found ourselves in the land of smiles. People smiled to us everywhere
and they really meant it. The street was more quiet, clean and not full of cows
anymore. Easily, we found hotels with wifi, hot water and surrounded by
restaurants with real coffee. Well, India was truly left far behind! We had
some relaxing days in Hetauda, the green and nice city with its delicious momo
heaven (the Nepali version of steamed/fried dumpling).
We even did a
small trek towards a beautiful temple on the top of the hill and had a nice
look down to the town. While I was resting in the hotel room, Péter went around
the town and talked to people: from the shopkeepers, the tea-stand owner, the
sim-card seller to the chef of the momo restaurant. He was super happy for the
rest of the day because everyone was so friendly and polite to him. We started
to believe that visiting Nepal was the real pain-killer for our tough days in
India.
We also discover
the main Nepalese cuisine by eating Dal Bhat, the national super power. The
refilled vegetable Dal Bhat set contains: Dal - a thick soup of beans (lentils
or mung bean), Bhat - rice and together with two kind of vegetable, a small
portion of pickle and some pieces of fresh salad. Nepalese people have only two
main meals per day: one at around 9-10 in the morning and they call it lunch;
the second meal comes only at around 7-8 in the evening and both of the meals
are 95% of the time Dal Bhat. They drink milk-tea quite often too.
Nepal is the home
of 8 out of 10 highest mountains in the whole world, including Mount. Everest. And
so the country is divided into 3 main regions: the plains, the hill stations
and the mountains. Hetauda is on the plains and in order to reach Kathmandu, we
needed to climb up to the hill stations. The geography lesson was never leant
in a more painful way. We first tried to climb as we had done quite many
mountain passes in the past months. Later on, the situation was that we tried
not to slip down as the road got way too steep and we had to quit pedaling. It
was a long day for Péter as he had to first push his bike up for some hundred
meters, then ran back down to me and push my bike, meanwhile I just walked up.
He was definitely the hero of the day!
From 8 a.m. until
4 p.m. we could make only 9 km, what a record! The sun went down slowly and we
were still going downhill in the middle of the mountain, struggling with the
dirt road as there was a huge construction going on for almost a year now. We
wanted to find a place for the night but all the rooms were taken and the only
hope was a “hotel in the next village which is just 10km from here”, said a
Nepali motor cyclist. We had no other choices than just keep going until we
realized that the road was uphill again. We started to think of hitchhiking a
pickup to move on. And yes, a perfect empty pickup appeared! Moreover, the
driver was on his way back to Kathmandu. There was a flash on my mind in a
moment and so I proposed him to bring us to Kathmandu. Guess what, he agreed on
a fine price, and after 2 hours of unpleasant ride on the terribly bumpy and
dusty road, we arrived at Pushkar’s house in Kathmandu.
Pushkar Shah is
the most famous world cyclist in Nepal. He left home with empty pockets; spent
11 years (1998 - 2009) to cycle to 150 countries in all continents and finished
his trip by conquering Everest with the 150 flags of all the visited nations.
He is the living cycling God to all of us! Now that he’s back from his world
tour, he rents a flat just to host all cyclists who visit Kathmandu. He was the
most modest legend we’ve ever met and we felt really comfortable spending a
week at his place meanwhile discovering the capital city.
Kathmandu was
partly damaged by the earthquake in 2015 but at most of the attractions, the
entrance fees was increased to support the renovation work. We understand that
the government needs help but ripping off the foreign visitors is not nice. We
would have felt more comfortable to first visit the site and then donate some
money based on how much in bad shape the building was. One more unexpected
thing about the city was the dust, so walking tour might be painful for foreigners.
The new ground sewage system has been built, together with the dust from the
destroyed houses from the earthquake created a thick layer of tiny particles in
the air.
We visited
Thamel, the most touristic place in Kathmandu and quickly got bored of the same
scene as all the other tourist areas: western food/cafés, gift shops, travel
agencies, trekking gear shops and foreigners. We also had a look at the 3 old
royal palaces (Dubar squares) in Thamel, Patan and Baktapur. They were all
affected by the earthquake and the entrance tickets were expensive only for
foreigners. Kathmandu seemed to be boring for us after some days. Péter tried
to cheer himself up by taking a daytrip by bicycle to Panauti after climbing up
to Lakuri Bhanjyang peak. There he met a group of local who camped on the top
last night and encountered a tiger at around 2 a.m. while dancing around the
bon-fire. I guess tigers like to party too.
Leaving our
bicycles and stuffs at Pushkar’s, we took a bus to one of the most visited cities
in Nepal – Pokhara. Pokhara is the home of the beautiful Phewa lake which
reflects the whole Anapurna range on clear days. Tourists from all parts of the
world come here for trekking, paragliding, mountain climbing or just simply
enjoying the lake view. We were lucky to visit Pokhara at Holi – the annual
biggest color festival in Nepal where people celebrate the end of winter and
the arrival of Spring with sprinkling organic colorful powders and water on
each other. Together with our neighbours at the hotel, we strolled around the
lake and had fun as small kids. And when everyone was “painted” totally and
laughed in happiness, the strict caste system suddenly disappeared...
The next day, we
did a small trip to one of the two Tibetan refugee camps in Pokhara, the
Tashiling village. Here we had a nice afternoon visiting a nice and touching gallery
about the history of the refugee camp, checking sophisticated handicrafts and
trying the real Tibetan food. We loved the food a lot so that we came back the
next day to the same restaurant after climbing up to the World Peace Stupa.
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| Every Tibetan house has 1 picture of Dalai Lama |
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| World Peace Stupa |
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| Butter tea - a traditional Tibetan drink |
One last gift
from Pokhara to us was the breathtaking view of the whole Anapurna range on our
way to the bus station as we wanted to go to Lumbini. We had the fanciest
breakfast right at the bus park, watching the mountains with a cup of tea and a
fresh made croissant, how lovely!
The “supposed to
have wifi” tourist bus brought us to Lumbini in the late afternoon. Here we had
a nice time visiting the United Nation of Monasteries and a touch to one of the
four most sacred places of Buddhism, the birthplace of Lord Buddha...
Linh
nice post
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