Kakarbhitta
As our first glance at Nepal, this place is just the same as India (but we remain hopeful as this is only the border town so we figure it will change when we get about 12 hours west of here!). Kakarbhitta is a glorified bus stop in reality and we were only there to catch a day-bus headed for Kathmandu so we could take in some scenery along the way, plus the night-bus is meant to be a little dodgy in the old theft department.

Kathmandu
We got aboard the ‘Hell Bus’ at 3.30am not really looking forward to 12 hours of discomfort, little did we know it would take much longer… Everything, although very uncomfortable, was going OK and according to schedule, that was until the windscreen shattered (no safety glass here folks!) after a passing truck threw a rock up from under its tyres, well, what can we say, we got a free upgrade to an ‘air-conditioned’ bus for the next few hours until we could get a new windscreen… All in all, the journey took nearly 20 hours – for you older folks you can insert your own expletives here!

We somehow managed to blag a fancy room; well it’s about Posthouse standard, for the rock bottom price of 300 Rupees, about £2.50. It’s really strange having a proper room, fresh sheets and towels every day, carpet, and the most shocking – free toilet paper!

Our first excursion here in Nepal was to Durbar Square, a meeting place for fake holy men, beggars and annoying tour guides. Apart from this Durbar Square is really quite interesting, the 30 temples are great to wander around and although the holy men are mainly fakes – they make an excellent photograph (for a fee of course!). We wandered around for a while but it was just too hot so we plan to go back again before we leave and we’ll fill you in with some more details then!

The day of our first wedding anniversary arrived and we decided to spend the time relaxing and enjoying each others company at a café that stupidly offers a bottomless filter coffee for 50 rupees each – we totally abused that!! Jon commissioned a beautiful ring for me (as I’m missing mine that’s locked away in Barclays) made from Alexandrite and Silver, the stone is amazing, it glimmers green and purple in different lights – very beautiful. We had what we class as a fancy lunch and dinner; a fantastic day that we get to repeat on the 12th May for our 5 year anniversary.

Pokhara
Next on our hit list was Pokhara, about 6 hours drive from the hustle and bustle of Kathmandu. Our main goal was to climb up to Sarangkot, take a walk around the lake (which turned out to be impossible unless you wanted to swim a lot!) and see the Annapurna Mountain Range – so managing two out of three isn’t bad!

When we arrived we were instantly swarmed by about 20 touts desperate for us to go and stay at their hotel (since all the trouble with the Maoists etc no tourists seem to be coming to Nepal). I wish we could have taken a video but it was just too crazy to even think straight, let alone get the camera out… We finally picked a room and collapsed for a few hours!

When we were in Goa we met a nice guy who was from Nepal called Suraj, we said we’d meet up with him when we arrived but we weren’t sure if we still could due to the fighting but as luck would have it, on the second day in Pokhara, someone was shouting my name out of a restaurant window, and guess who, our friendly Maoist friend Suraj was there! He was heading back to Kathmandu the next day so we went out for a nice local dinner and went to a festival (celebrating New Year 2063?! Strange calendar over here…) to watch some funny Nepalese guys cover some classic rock tunes – needless to say that was quite amusing!

The day of our 5 year anniversary arrived, for which we had planned to climb up to Sarangkot, but as always the weather was not in our favour, and as it had rained all of the night before it seemed like a bad idea to start a trek!! Instead we just had a nice relaxing day walking in a park on the lakeside, having a little paddle and then having a nice dinner in a little place we found on an earlier exploration that was right out of the way and overlooked the lake, perfect.

We had planned on leaving the following day but changed our minds at the last minute as we wanted to climb up to Sarangkot, good or bad weather. Luckily for us (for a change) it was a lovely clear day and after a few hours of walking on a never ending road and some dubious shortcuts, we reached the top. We decided to relax and find some tea before the battle of where we were going to sleep happened, and we caught out first glimpse of the Annapurna Mountain Range, pretty much covered by cloud but we could see bits!

The ‘where we were going to sleep’ issue was solved in about 20 steps; we found the most amazing location with a shabby tin room thrown on it, but it was cheap and the views were unbeatable. The people who owned the shack were really nice, they let me play with their cute little puppies (half huskie, half something else, I forgot…), gave us some rabbit to try and then gave Jon a magical drink (mushroom brew we now think, but he asked for some, so it’s his own fault for not asking what it was?!). With Jon staggering behind me, we set off back to our shack – which was across a few vegetable patches so really hard to get to in the dark, but harder still for Jon who was still obliterated by his potion!!!

After a good night’s sleep we woke up and were presented with an almost clear view of “Fishtail Mountain”. The picture really doesn’t do justice to the actual size of this thing; we’ve never seen anything so big. The walk down was much easier than the walk up although it was still pretty hard as it was all dirt tracks instead of road but we made it down safe and sound (only to be almost charged by a water buffalo!).

Kopan Monastery
Kathmandu was calling as we’d booked on a 10 day introduction to Buddhism at Kopan Monastery. Not knowing what really to expect we arrived and got shown to our rooms, separate of course, and had a quick look around before the course started. We won’t go into massive detail as 10 days of Buddhist teachings would take about 4 years to write, I have a scrapbook full of notes and Jon has a mental scrapbook full of contradictions if anyone is interested!

One thing we will mention is the timetable; it was, to say the least, hard work… Wake up at 5.45am and go to bed at 9pm – everything in between those times is Buddhist related (apart from the secret sect of smokers outside!).

All in all it was a great experience and even though we didn’t agree with everything, definitely worth it. We met some really nice people on the course, and met up with a few once it had all finished and we were back in the real world outside the monastery walls.

Kathmandu
We went on a few trips with one of the women we met at Kopan, Kathy; Swayambhunath (a.k.a. The Monkey Temple) was one of our first stops. Apart from the Tibetan ladies hassling you about jewellery and the countless beggars it was quite good, but there isn’t much to say about it really, it’s a temple, the pictures tell you everything you need to know (or that we do anyway!)

Being lovers of strange things Kathy, Jon and I thought a fun day out would be to visit Dakshinkali and Pashupatinath, animal sacrifices to the Hindu Goddess Kali and Open Air Human Cremations respectively!

The first stop was the animal sacrifices and well it was certainly strange; poor little goat knew its time was up but couldn’t do anything about it, we expect Kali was happy though as it provided lots of blood once its head had been lopped off (for the sick ones among you, Jon has a video…) – that’s all we can say about that, we went, we saw and we left (with blood on my lens cap after Jon dropped it on the floor, gross…)

We then went to see the cremations which were more open than the ones that we saw in Varanasi a few weeks back, but there was only one going on when we arrived, folks must be healthier in Nepal than in India. We found out it was a man from his friend but that was all we knew, and all that was left were two feet hanging over the pyre. Walking back out of the cremation ghat there was one more body being blessed before her cremation, very strange as it just looked like she was lying down for a rest.

Enough of death anyway, on to near death and a 160 metre drop hanging only by a rope! (Sorry mum’s…)

The Last Resort
Bungee Jumping is scary, so is Canyon Swinging – so we had to do both… The Last Resort, as it is known, offers the worlds second highest Bungee Jump at 160m and the worlds highest Canyon Swing (basically the same but you jump with the harness on your waist, you freefall for an extra 5 seconds and then swing through the canyon instead of bouncing up and down). We had the whole ordeal filmed so we won’t try and describe what it was like, plus we can’t swear and that limits things a lot! The few photos’ we have aren’t great but you’ll have to make do with them until we decide to come home!

Giardia
Yup, Kimmy got sick, very sick – Giardia. I won’t describe the symptoms but if you really want to know go look it up yourself! We had booked onto a 2 day rafting trip followed by a stay at Chitwan National Park with our friend Kathy but as I couldn’t move we decided to skip the rafting and try and get a bus to Chitwan when I felt better…

Chitwan National Park
The bus was as bad as usual but once we got there it all seemed worth it! You’re surrounding by jungle, open grasslands and smiling people all around. The resort itself was quite nice but the rooms were really beautiful, I’ve stolen some ideas for wherever we decide to buy a house next!

First plan on our itinerary was to do an Elephant Safari in the National Park, but to be honest it wasn’t all that great, the seat was covered in dog hair, the poor elephant was far too old and the guide didn’t speak English! We did see our first wild Rhino which was pretty cool and the other one we saw legged it before we could get close!

Elephant Bathing was next and that was one of the best experiences yet; you climb up the trunk of this giant animal, get splashed by its constant spray from the trunk, it tries to roll you over (a little like rodeo) and then it relaxes so you can give it a wash, with rocks of course! We both really enjoyed it and managed to get a few arty shots too – the pictures say it all really…

For most of the next day it rained constantly (apparently monsoon season now – oops) but we went on another Elephant Safari in the Community Forrest when it had calmed down a little. Now this was a proper elephant safari, we saw another Rhino and got ridiculously close, saw wild boar, a snake, a few deer and a crocodile – totally fantastic!

The Safari was followed by a canoe boat ride to the elephant breeding centre, this was great as well because we managed to see both types of crocodiles in Nepal, one common one and the really rare one – yay! It was really relaxing, that was until our guide told us sometimes if you get too close to the common crocodiles they attack the boat – how nice?

Our Chitwan experience ended at the breeding centre, which in all fairness was a bit boring – apart from the 15 day old elephant which was the cutest thing in the world (with the exception of our new Nephew, Jack).

Getting back to Kathmandu is always bad, but as I hadn’t eaten in about 5 days my energy (and tolerance) levels were very low… But we made it and we’re off to Tibet in the morning!