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It's 143km from the Tibetan border to Kathmandu. First continuining down the river gorge that we'd been following yesterday, up another mountain pass and, finally, down into town. The 'road' was bad, pretty much as the last bit of the Friendship Highway - unsufaced, holed, rutted, bouldered, winding, narrow and full of oncoming traffic - dangerous.
Apart from the arsy Chinese guard at customs, getting out of Tibet was easy. Seven of us then squeezed into a mini van for the 8km descent through no man's land to the Nepali border, over an hour later we got out and, amidst choas, walked the last 500m and crossed the Friendship Bridge into Nepal. Formalities were minimal and chaotic and we walked down another 500m to await a bus that some kindly Nepali had organised for us. We paid the guy 3 quid (a bit steep, but) for a 3 hour 2 bus ride to Kathmandu.Now, I know that "we were straight off the boat" but one of us shoulda' seen it coming. The first bus drove us another 40km down the valley and took over 2 hours, it was then that we realised that we'd been scammed. Our guy had disappeared and we'd no tickets for the next bus. Horrified at the antics of one of her countrymen, a Nepali girl insisted on helping us - she bought our 80p tickets for us and joined us on the journey.
The views along the way were tremendous, especially as we rose from the valley and saw the Himalayan peaks from the other side. Yesterday Lotte had commented on spotting a tree, it was the first that we'd seen in two weeks, now the world was getting much greener and more colourful - wild flowers even. Villages looked poor, not much better than in Tibet, but every home had their goats and chickens - I like goats.
You've probably heard stories of busses in Asia - they're all true. Packed inside with people, their belongings and animals: packed on the roof with people, their belongings and animals. Mad drivers, food through windows (hottest samosas ever) and the occasional bang. Chaotic. A great experience, but it needn't have lasted so long. It was a busy, dodgy road: twelve road blocks (the military searching for Maoist Terrorists and their bombs - there's a big political story here too and tourism has been badly affected); there was an accident; the driver had a fight with another driver; it got dark and.... But over 5 hours to get 90km?
Twelve hours later we arrived and our Nepali saviour insisted on putting us into taxis and escorting us to the guest house we'd chosen. 'Dhanyabad'. We arranged to meet her the following evening and buy her and her brother a meal in gratitude. Sadly, they didn't turn up. Shomie, Peter and Dan went elsewhere and, for a time, the nine became six. Gordi and Tanyia took one room, the rest of us shared another - clean sheets, hot shower and sit down bog, luxury at 2.50 a night. We met up later that night, had our first good meal in ages and an early night - it'd been a long day, a long week.
Now Kathmandu awaits....
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Posted by maddlestone on 2007-11-20 04:49:06 | Rating: | Views: 112
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Have you bumped into Bob Hope or Little Bing on your "Road to" travels? - Just curious, you know me and my love of all things celebrity related
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Posted by welshbeermonsta
on 2007-11-20 09:13:34
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Now I may only be guessing, but I will bet that you will have in your albatross bag when you get back:
a goat
A very hot samosa
a white glove from Japan
more than a few phone numbers
The keys to the "scam" bus
Yak shit
A handful of snow from Everest base camp
Am I close ??
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Posted by welshbeermonsta
on 2007-11-20 09:29:58
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Hiya' Gale
Great to hear from you, no room for the above - my bag will be packed with Everest beer - have fun
Mx
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Posted by maddlestone
on 2007-11-21 04:16:34
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Hi Mike - how do you like your goat - fried or boiled??
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Posted by labsandydog
on 2007-11-21 17:43:42
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Mike, could you save some of those red hot samosas for the Hope & Anchor?
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Posted by JohnMcNally
on 2007-11-22 13:42:32
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Liam says was it his goat you saw?
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Posted by jallman
on 2007-11-23 15:37:09
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Dunno a lot about goats except - We had a bloke called Tony who was an animal lover (or nutcase depending on one's view) working for us in Essex. One day he saw this woman ill-treating a goat and was told the goat was too old to work so it was going to slaughter. Tony didn't like that so he bought it. Next day the woman asked one of our other workers "Is that bloke Tony about? I've got him another goat". She was buying them in to sell on to him.
90km in 5 hrs? Left Bournemouth Stn at 1.30 yesterday and didn't arrive back home in Poole until nearly 6. Musta been the same bus.
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Posted by CatsWhiskers
on 2007-11-27 06:11:31
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