Kathmandu Sightseeing:

Thamel, back in Kathmandu

We arrived in Kathmandu in one piece. We decided to stay in a guesthouse recommended by Narayan, and found it to be comfortable and well-located. Annette only had a couple of days until she was leaving, so we had some sights to see! By now, Javier and I had decided to stay in Nepal and tackle the Everest Base Camp trek…and we had convinced Annette to come along! She was so hesitant at first, so we convinced her (it really wasn’t that difficult) to just try and get her shifts covered. It would be an extra 2 weeks. She sent out her feelers. She wasn’t feeling too confident. She had two days. In the meantime, Javier and I had some planning to do. We decided to travel to Tibet after Nepal, and needed to find a tour company to travel with and start the paperwork.

Javier in Bhaktapur

The night we arrived back in Kathmandu we decided to try a restaurant called OR2K. We had heard the Dutch guys talking about it, so figured we’d check it out. It was delicious. Vegetarian, and a mix of Nepali, Mediterranean and Israeli. On our way home from dinner, we stopped by a couple different tour companies to ask about pricing to Tibet. Annette came with us, as she said it would be good for future planning 🙂 The first place we came across didn’t appeal to us. We saw a sign for another place, but when we arrived, it was closed. There was a small place right next door that offered “Adventure Tours.” It looked mostly like treks, but we asked if they had any information about Tibet. Couldn’t hurt, right?? The owner, Ram was there with his wife and two children. They were all very friendly and Rom took special care to explain the process to us. We spoke with him for a while, had all of our questions answered, and left feeling very reassured. We thought his price was fair, and both of us seemed to decide on his services without really even talking about it. We had a good feeling. We tried to talk Annette into extending her trip even longer to join us in Tibet, but she wasn’t having any of it. Apparently, she wanted to keep her job.  

Bhaktapur

The following day, we jumped in a cab to Bhaktapur. Bhaktapur was once the capital of Nepal. The city is enclosed and is one huge UNESCO site. We were dropped off and after entering, realized we were all pretty hungry and decided to grab a bite to eat. It is here that we encountered our first and only, overtly rude, local man. His was the first restaurant we came across, so we asked to see a menu. After looking it over, we thanked him and told him we were going to look around a little bit, and may come back. He very rudely told us to leave and not come back. No problem. We found another place shortly after without rude workers and had a lovely meal. 

Bhairavnath temple, Bhaktapur

We started in Durbar Square and walked from temple to pagoda and beyond. I was surprised that climbing on the sites was allowed. We took lots of pictures, and followed the map to all of the different locations. We were on a scavenger hunt of sorts, looking for the golden spout, which is this dragon/snake looking thing with a bull coming out of its mouth- located inside a pool, which is surrounded by a huge menacing serpent with its fountain head poised, ready to strike- and the peacock window. We watched a man make clay pots in the pottery district, all the while noticing the hundreds of claypots sitting out for sale, wondering why he keeps making more, since his supply seems to greatly outnumber his demand. Our final treasure was the peacock window. Although, when we finally found it, we were actually more interested two windows down at the live chicken who was perched on the window ledge. This bird was so fat, we were in awe that it didn’t tip forward or backward, but just balanced comfortably on the narrow sill. 

Bhaktapur

When our time was up, we left to meet our driver. I had planned on trying the famed Bhaktapur curd while we were there, but had completely forgot! We told our driver but he said never fear, there is a great place right over there, so over there we went. We bought one curd for each of us (our driver included) and Annette didn’t like hers, so I had two! They were delicious!!! They definitely deserve the hype. We made our way back home and had more OR2K for dinner. We really couldn’t get enough of that place. On our way home, we stopped by Ram’s place to tell him we wanted to go to Tibet with his company. We went over the details, which included leaving our passports with him to get the visa. We were quite nervous about this but it was the way it had to be. First things first though. Before we could hand over our passports, we needed to extend our visas. Ram was helpful here as well. He explained the process, and said that it would be faster to complete a portion online, print out the form, and carry it to immigration. He told us to return to his office the next morning where his brother would help us free of charge. 

Bhaktapur

The next morning, Javier and I left Annette to her own devices while we went to Ram’s shop. Long story short, everything that could possibly go wrong, did, but we were able to complete the paperwork…it just took an hour instead of the 20 minutes Ram quoted. Fun story, on the way back to the guesthouse to pick up Annette, we ran into the two Dutch girls from Annapurna. They were the ones we met on the first day, and were super excited to have made it to Manang. We gave each other big hugs and they told us they had heard about the big storm and were wondering about our group and if we had made it. They were relieved to see us alive and well, and we were really happy to see them too! 

When we arrived at the guesthouse, we swooped up Annette and hailed a cab to immigration. This guy offered to take us to immigration, wait for us, and take us to our next destination, Patan and the Golden Temple. We were told by several people that we would be able to leave our passports at immigration and pick them up at the end of the day. Instead, we had to stand around and wait. So again, what was supposed to take 20 minutes, ended up taking an hour and a half. But it was a success! We were now allowed to stay in the country for an extra 30 days. Hooray!

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Patan

Our driver took us to Patan, where we thought we were being taken advantage of when they demanded we pay to enter. It looked like an open square, and to be honest, there wasn’t much to see. What we were really looking for was the Golden Temple, which was outside of this “paid” area. Anyway, after much arguing, we paid the fee and walked through. We stopped for lunch at a bistro, which instantly took us home. It was tucked away in an alley, and was very modern. It was a welcomed change. After a delicious lunch, we followed the map to the Golden Temple. The name is a bit misleading. From the outside, it looks like an old run-down temple. Even when you enter, the open-air space is small, dirty, full of altars, statues, and prayer-wheels.

Prayer wheels at the Golden temple.

As we walked around the center altar, we noticed two young monks. One looked to be a teenager and the other, maybe 10 or so. Both were sitting on the steps in front of the large enclosed altar, on their smartphones. At one point, the young monk went through a ritual of sorts, that made use of a gong, chanting, and lots of bowing. I had overheard a tour guide telling his people that historically, the temple monks were of the merchant class. At some point, the monks started to marry and have families. These families now own the temple. Each family takes a turn in providing a monk to run the temple for a certain portion of the year. They all rotate through. 

Golden temple

As we were leaving, it started to rain. We took shelter, and waited it out. Once it stopped, we walked back to the open square and hailed a cab. We asked the driver to take us to Durbar Square to see the living goddess. While we were on the way there, it started to pour. We got out of the cab and again ran for shelter. As we were waiting around for the rain to abate, it just came down harder. There were rivers flowing down the street and it wasn’t letting up, not even a little bit. After a quick discussion, we decided to forego Durbar, catch another cab, and just go home- or maybe to OR2K. 

Later that day, we stopped by Ram’s place to hand over our passports and pay for our Tibet visas. We were told that the visa fee was $80 USD, so what we paid that amount in Nepali Rupee. We had decided to pay Ram in cash, but with a limit on how much money we could pull from the ATM everyday, and the grand total that was due, we needed a few days before we would be able to come up with the money. We explained this to him, and he was very understanding. He told us to just enjoy our trek and we could pay him for the tour when we returned. 

Boudhanath

The following day was Annette’s final day with us, as she was unable to get all of her shifts covered, and didn’t feel right about calling in sick. She wasn’t leaving until late at night, so we decided to spend one last day sight-seeing. We grabbed a cab to the Great Boudha Stupa. This is one big stupa. We walked around- both on the ground as well as on the first level. We saw our first huge prayer-wheel with its little bell that chimes with every rotation. For the first time, I saw women prostrating themselves in the Tibetan style. They repeated this movement over and over and over again. I was tired just looking at them. We looked at a few of the shops along the perimeter, but didn’t buy. 

Boudhanath

When we returned home, we decided to stop by Ram’s place one last time to make sure everything was in place. We would be leaving the following morning, and the micro-manager in us needed to check-in just in case. Good thing! When we arrived, Rom had some news for us. He said that all of the European passports he had dealt with have all cost $80 USD for the Tibetan visa, but Americans needed to pay $175! I thought that first price was too good to be true… He said he went ahead and paid for it, but we would need to pay the difference at some point. We opted to go ahead and pay for the visa then. Everything else was set and ready to go, we just had to keep our fingers crossed that we would actually get the visa, but for now, we had a trek to focus on! 

Jackie and Annette in Bhaktapur

We decided to try somewhere new for Annette’s farewell dinner. Probably not the best decision. Javier left early to meet with Narayan, while Annette and I stayed back for a few last minutes of girl time. When we arrived back to the guesthouse, she ran upstairs to get her stuff together, while I said hi to Narayan and met our guide for EBC, Ganga. I went up to help Annette bring down her stuff, we said our good-byes, and off she went to the airport. 

Narayan sat down with all of us, and finalized our trek. We said goodnight to him and Ganga and went up to finish our own packing. Ganga would be picking us up at 5am the following morning to ride with us to the airport. We were about to embark on another amazing adventure! 

 To see more pictures of Nepal, click HERE.