I survived my first Nepalese Road Trip!!

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So amazingly I am writing this relatively unscathed following quite the adventure on a 2 day Nepalese road trip to Royal Chitwan National Park. Picture this...Groat Road for 4 1/2 hours, on roads kinda like around Westmount in the spring only worse (i.e. potholes, huge holes in the road, parts of the road that are mostly boulders, parts of the road missing, you get the idea??), where there is a mountain on one side, and cliff on the other which sometimes had a barrier to prevent falling into the river or canyon, but mostly didn't.

Then picture a place where by law you are supposed to drive on the left hand side of the road, but really it is however you can get there the fastest. Truly I am not even doing it justice. Oh, did I mention there are no seatbelts in the vehicles here. There are technically 2 lanes, but sometimes up to 4 items (cars, buses, motorcycles, pedal bikes, pedestrians) can be in a row at a time. Oh and we even saw a family of 5 on a motorcylce. The kids ride on top of vehicles and the buses are jam-packed full of people. the pollution is really bad and a lot of people walk around with masks on, and we had our shirts over our faces at times too due to the exhaust. I tried to take pictures, but we were going so fast, and then the vehicle would lurch the other way to avoid a pothole or person, and the shot would be ruined...truly we just gave up on getting photographic proof! I just put my music on (thanks Ryan!) and closed my eyes and said a hail Mary!

All that being said, it was well worth getting the heck outta Kathmandu for a while, away from all the honking, pollution, garbage, and congested streets to a lovely little getaway on the edge of a National Park. We stayed in these cute little cottages with much more comfortable beds then we had in Kathmandu, and we got to go on an elephant safari through the jungle for 2 hours, got to help wash the elephants in the river (you use big rocks and just rub them all over, scrubbing really hard...their skin is VERY tough and course) and got to climb up their trunks and then they shake you off them back into the water. They obviously very domesticated and they just walk down the roads there...quite a bizarre sight!
It was quite hot and humid, but the trees gave us a nice refuge. We are drinking water like crazy so my filter and purifier are saving us a lot of money. And no sickness yet so it must be working!!

We also walked around the area a bit this morning before heading back. One thing is for sure, they people are very kind and welcoming, and it doesn't matter what language you speak, a smile is universal! So we put on our brave faces for the 5 hour drive back (took much longer to get through Kathmandu on the way back) so we were a little disgruntlted to find out our hotel had no room for us even though we had a reservation, but they did find us a room at a place nearby, although it is not nearly as nice.

We are heading out on our trek on sunday morning, we fly to Lukla and begin our 21 days of trekking. Please pray for my muscles, joints, and sanity as the altitude can apparently make people a little wingy.

Well best be off, you have plenty to read up on. It has been great so far....it is not everyday you can say you are living a dream!
Love,
Carla!!

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Comments

[Jeanet]

WOW
Carla's Excellent Adventure...so happy you are getting to experience so much and it has just begun...enjoy and I'll be thinking of your muscles. If it helps this baby is beating me up from the inside out :) Take care...Jeanet