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Published: September 6th 2008
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Hello there. So since going rafting on way from Pokhara to Kathmandu, which was great by the way and I really want to do it again, we got on the four hour bus from the rafting site to Kathmandu and decided to ride on the roof of the bus! When our bus arrived in Kathmandu we got a taxi straight to the tourist area of Thamal. Pretty much everyone who goes to Kathmandu would be staying here so we thought it was a good choice. I think it was the first night there we decided to go out and party as Thamal seemed like it had loads of bars and clubs to go too, why not?! We went out and a had a great time and met some really cool people from Canada who were over there doing some volunteer work. Put us to shame a bit I guess, we were like 'ya...we're kind of just here tio enjoy ourselves!'
One thing we were a bit worried about was that in India it was the big cities which we really did not like. But it was very different here and this definately was our favourite city. It has a lot
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lieing in the roof of the bus to kathmandu of things we like, I really enjoy all the buddhist temples and seeing the monks chanting, but also love to party in the night and it catered for both of those wonderful things! So another day we met a taxi guy who offered to take on a sightseeing tour, so after much haggling and him trying to make us feel guilty about petrol shortages we agreed a good price and booked it for the next day. I was really looking forward to this tour as there really are some amazing things to see in Kathmandu. One of the amazing places we went to was the Swayambhunath Buddhist temple, some call it the monkey temple because off all the monkeys that live around it and get fed there. After the taxi dropped us off we had a daunting amount of steps to walk up but it was very much worth it, the temple its self was amazing and from the top you could see all of the Kathmandu Valley, a breathtaking view.
We also went to another buddhist temple (Boudhanath I think its called) and were really lucky to go into one of the sections of the temple and find
these young buddhsit monks chanting, so we quietly came in and sat with them while they chanted. I got a good video of this so will hopefully get it on here at some point.
We then went to the national museum, nto ussually my kind of thing but it was actaully pretty interesting. There were sections on historic art, relations with other countries, weapons sections, a history of animals section and a section on Buddhism. Most of which I got some pictures of, the weapons bit was really good and the Buddhism history was very interesting to me. As museams go, it was good.
The last place we went to on our tour was the famous Durbar Square in Kathmandu. There we saw the Hanuman Dhoka which is a must see there. We also saw a place called the 'Temple of Kumari' which is the residential quarters of the Chaste Virgin Living Goddess called KUMARI. We didnt actually get to see here but apparently she is a 11 year old girl, who is seen to a be a living goddess, sounds like some pressure!The non-Buddhist ant the non-Hindu visitors can go in the courtyard called the 'bahal' but
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Some amazing mandala's cant go beyond upstairs. We also saw countless other temples which was great but one of my favourite parts of being in Durbar Square was just sitting there and people watching. It was such a great to do this, so many weird and wonderful people. And I do love a crazy person, there was one lady that was ranting and raving and I got a good snap ha!
One thing that was offered to us when we were in Pokhara was this Everest flight, and we thought alot about doing it. It was way out of our budget (90 quid) but in the end we decided to just go for it. Its this this small plane with every seat being a window seat, that flys from Kathmandu airport up around the Himilayas and Everest for about and hour and then comes back. There were some amazing sights on that flight, sometimes hard to capture ont he ol' camera but at the same time i couldn't help but feel a bit dissapointed afterward with the closeness that we actually were to Everest. I mean you could see it really well, but in the pictures on the trip, it looks so
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at some prayer wheels much closer...but I guess it would. My 'Big Mac' never looks as good as the pictures either I sopose. What it has made me feel more than ever is that I definately want to come back to Nepal to trek to Everest base camp and see it up close, and do it in season so there is no cloud cover.
On a bit of a downer my wallet was stolen on a night out that night, but I dont really want to chat about that, its very frustrating but everythings almost sorted now.
We flew out of Kathamandu on a crazy connections triangle of firstly flying from Kathmandu to Delhi, then Delhi to Mumbai and then finally Mumbai to Bangkok. The last of those flights was the best flight I have ever been on. There were barely any people on the flight so I had 3 seats to myself and lied down across them, got a free beer, turned on my screen in front of me and watched 'Premier league best goals 07/08'!!! can a flight get any better???...well maybe!
SO we've been in Bangkok 3 nights now but thers not much to stay, this time it
is only a stop over really and so we just went on 2 amazing nights out and are a bit sad to leave. Bangkok is definately my kind of place, but we'll be back in a couple monthes. I've heard reports back home are advising english travellers not to come to Thailand because of riots and protests but as a I cant vouch for the rest of Thailand, Bangkok has been fine. You just cant be stupid, like if you see a protest, walk the other way, no problem. SO tonight we fly to Hanoi, Vietnam which will be our 5th flight in a week, crazy stuff!This computer Im on at the moment is complete shit so cant put any pics on but will do when I get to Hanoi so watch this space! Oh ya and another thing, a bit off topic...I leave for 2 monthes and Man City sign Robinho...whats up with that??? Anyway, speak to you soon and I'll get those pics on soon.
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