Final post...?

Hi all

It's been a while since my last post but apparently in Tibet the Chinese government doesn't like you accessing your own blog site....

Anyway I will just wrap up by saying that we returned to the village on the 14th of may for the house dedications. It was a happy and emotional time for all and some of the smiles were as wide as the Himalayas. Suffice to say that I think everyone has had a great time here in Nepal and each of us has experienced it in own way and been touched by the country and it's people in different ways as well. So while this may be the final post for this trip, r may not be the final post for the story of our involvement with the Baluwa Village...

Final Day in Pokhara

We were up very early (3.30am) and on the bus to Sarangot. This is a hill overlooking Pokhara and offers excellent views of the Annapurna ranges. The reason for getting up so early was so that we could catch the sun rising over the himalayas. Luckily for us because of the heavy rain we had very clear skies and had an excellent view of both the sunrise and the mountains.

After breakfast back at the motel it was again free time as another Banda had been organised, this time by the transportation companies. This included restricting travel on roads by parking lines of buses on them and then later a mass line of taxis, probably 150+ streaming through lakeside all tooting their horns. Luckily the bhanda finished at 12pm and everything went back to normal again.

After lunch we boarded the bus and headed to the devils falls and mahendra cave. This where a river falls through limestone caves and then disappears underground. The final stop before the airport was the Tibetan refugee camp where we saw woman making carpets.

From here it was a short drive to the airport where we said our goodbye to Rajev and Lalit our driver. While we had a 25 min flight back to Kathmandu, they had a 5 hour drive back.

Pokhara

With another bhanda (strike) organised for today we had a free reign on the day as our sight seeing scheduled had been destroyed by the strike. That being said it was nice to go off and do our own thing at our own pace.

Pokhara seems to be the adventure capital of Nepal. There are lots of bikes, boats and scooters for hire. So we all went our separate ways today and explored the city ourselves. Some off us went off on push bikes, others went off in boats and some even braved the Nepali roads on motor scooters, which I have to say was a lot of fun. I think everyone enjoyed doing things at their own pace, and this was finished off with dinner at "Public Cave" a restaurant owned by a friend of our guide Rajev.

While we were having dinner a presentation was made to Max for being one if the instigators of talking a lot of "shit" in the back of the bus. So despite the frustrations of yesterday, today was a lot of fun.

Journey in to Pokhara

We have finally arrived in Pokhara after what has been a bit of a mission. The protests were still on going today and we saw evidence of some of these along the way, with rocks strewn across the road.

As we arrived in Pokhara however we found that everything was closed. Some police then told us that we couldn't take our bus in to town as it would not be allowed to go past the protestors. So we had to go and park up the bus and the poor bus driver had to wait till after six to drive the bus in to town. So we then had to walk about twenty minutes into town to the lake, from there we climbed into some boats and were rowed around to near where our hotel was, this took about an hour, and then it was a short walk to the motel. We did pass the protestors along the way and it was a typical type of Nepali protest with a lot of people just standing around and not doing a lot. So it's been a long frustrating day as we had a five hour bus ride and then a difficult journey in to town. This is now being compounded as we have been waiting over an hour for our lunch to be served, it's now four o'clock and we were scheduled to have dinner at seven...

Tansen

We had a shortish trip from Lumbini to Tansen. The trip took us from the low plains back up in to the hills as we climbed from 80m to 1500m. There were still strikes going on and we had to stop several times at road blocks made by the protesters. At all but one stop we were waved through. At the final road block there was some discussion as to we should be allowed through but through some sweet talking from our guide Rajev and driver Navin we got through. The advantage of the protests were that we were the only vehicle on the road which meant the trip was quite quick and a lot safer without having to worry about a truck coming around a blind corner on the wrong side of the road.

Tansen is a hilltop town, much like you would find in Tuscany. The temperature was a lot more suited to us Kiwis so we were quite happy to arrive.

After lunch we walked down in to town to explore a little. We saw a palace that had been built by an exiled minister in 1923, this was then later gutted by fire in 2007 by the Maoists after they threw out the Nepali King.
We also visited the towns major Hindu temple.

As we walked through the streets we came across lots of friendly children saying hello and asking us where we were from. Some of the kids were playing cricket in the street so Kiwis being Kiwis we joined in a few games and had a bit of fun with them. On the steep walk back up to the hotel, which was at the top of the hill, we came across two women carrying an old pedal operated sewing machine. They were clearly struggling so Jim, Max and myself helped them carry it to the top of the hill to where it was going to be fixed. You could see on the faces of the two women that they were a little embarrassed by three men helping them out, but they were most grateful and we had done our good deed for the day.

As we were walking back from dropping off the sewing machine we could see down in to the opposite valley. It was getting blacker and blacker, as we arrived back at the
Hotel the wind hit, we were the treated to a spectacular electrical storm as we watched forked lightening streak across the hills and valleys.

This morning we are in the bus again heading to Pokhara. I've written this post in the back of the bus as we wind through the hills so I apologise for any spelling mistakes or typos !

Lumbini

Yesterday we left Chitwan for Lumbini. As we left we stopped off in the village for a bit of shopping. Mainly t-shirts and trinkets.

We then had a long hot journey to Lumbini. Along the way we ran into protestors who were blocking the road. The political situation in Nepal at the moment is tense as they are trying to form a federal government. The Maoists have suggested creating states based in ethnicities, and this is what the people were protesting about. However it seems like the government will not form states on this basis. Either way we did have a police escort at one stage through a town. We never felt threatened as if you smiled and waved the protestors would generally smile and wave back.

Because of the threat of protest we decided we would look around Lumbini after we arrived so we could leave early in the morning.

Lumbini was very hot and humid. It's a complex of temples and monestarys built in honor of lord Buddha who was born in Lumbini. So we visited the place where he is said to have been born from the armpit of his mother. We also viewed some of the various monestaries that have been built by different countries. Most impressive were the Chinese and Korean.

After this we finally checked into our hotel. Unfortunately the hotel was not what we expected. The place itself was nice but a lack of power and water made out stay there a little uncomfortable. Espiecially when it's forty degrees outside and there is an air conditioner on the wall that won't work. This however seems to be the way things are in Nepal, things aren't always as they seem, and while things may be started out with best intentions, so often it seems as though things are left half finished or incomplete. So it was a restless night for all as we sweltered in the heat and listened to Mosquitos buzzing around our heads. We were all quite happy to board the bus and head to our current stop, the hilltop town if Lansen.

Elephants and Tigers (shit)

We had an amazing time in Chitwan. We started our day early with a ride on a jeep to the elephants. When then had an hour or so far safari on the back of an elephant through the jungle. We saw a mother and baby rhino cooling of in a small pond. We also saw some deer wandering around and several peacocks.

But the real stars are the elephants, they walk with such a quiet nonchalance. We had some banana to feed ours, so our driver would tap him on his head and the next thing a trunk would appear looking for the banana. This was then taken out of the drivers hand and then consumed. Trunks really are amazing appendages.

After the elephant ride we then had the opportunity to ride them bare back as they went for a swim. Again this wax an amazing experience, first getting hosed down by water sucked up the elephants. Then the elephant would crouch down in the river and slowly roll over, throwing us off his back. We would then climb back on and get hosed down again.

After lunch we went for a ride down the river in a canoe where we saw some crocodiles lazing on the riverbank. This was then followed by a walk through the jungle where we were lucky enough to see to full grown rhinos bathing in a small lake. We also saw evidence of Tigers , we came across some "shit from the tiger", would have better to see an actual tiger though. Finally we visited the elephant breeding centre where we saw a very cute baby elephant running around.

That night we mismanaged to finish of a bottle of scotch and a bottle of rum. All while we had a discussion about rotary and how it works and how it can keep its appeal especially to the younger people. All in all a great time was had at Chitwan.