Three More Days in Bodhgaya, 12/23/08 - 12/25/08 - jim

Tuesday morning we woke up and decided to go across the street to one of the two recommended restaurants, they had similar names and both claimed to be the original. The first one we walked into the staff was still asleep on the tables so we quietly moved on to the next one, where the staff was slightly more awake. After breakfast we walked down the street to an Internet cafe to catch up on email and to update this blog. After a while Adam left to go out to Root Institute for morning Yoga. I was feeling a lot better but not quite up to 1 1/2 hrs of yoga so I stayed behind to work on the Blog. About noon I walked out toward Root to meet Adam for lunch at a new place we had heard about, good lunch.

At this point we had still not seen the main event in Bodhgaya, the Mahabodhi Temple with it's descendant Pipal tree at the sight of Siddartha's enlightenment. The previous day we had decided not to go until we had sufficient time and weren't so tired. So, after lunch, after a swing through a park next door which had a beautiful rose garden and a metal stairway that allowed you to view a statue of an unnamed person from above????, we entered the beautiful Temple grounds. Considering all the people who moved through the Temple area in a day and the general difficulty of keeping anything clean in India it was a miracle of some large degree that the grounds were clean and serene. We spent a good part of the afternoon simply enjoying the Temple grounds and seeing all the different sites and sights within. There were hundreds, if no thousands of Tibetan monks chanting, monks and others doing full prostrations toward the Enlightenment tree and just a lot of people enjoying the grounds in many different ways. It had the feel of a sacred site but it also had a definite feel of a community, friends and neighbors, and complete strangers enjoying each other company while walking or sitting on the grass. We spent a serene afternoon there before going back to our guest house for a little nap, my idea, and then dinner. After dinner we went back to the temple complex to get some nigh time pictures, to compliment all the daytime pictures we had taken earlier. They look like they turned out well, so you will all have plenty of travel photos to look at. We are getting close to filling up the 2 Gig card that Adam has in his camera. After the photography it was back to the hotel and to bed for a good nights sleep.

We had nearly two more full days in Bodhgaya, our train to Varanasi, left Thursday night, Christmas Day from a train station about 8 K away. During these days we stopped to look at some of the numerous monasteries in town, from many different countries and sects of Buddhism. One of the places we stopped, the Bodhgaya monastery of the Tibetan Kagyu school was hosting the head of that school, he is called the Karmapa, some of may remember reading the news stories about his escape from China 6 or 7 years ago when he was a teenager. We also tried to go to the Root Institute for Yoga again but it was cancelled due to the holidays and their preparations for a huge group they were expecting right after Christmas. I haven't mentioned it yet but winter is the really busy season in Bodhgaya, it gets cold in the foothills where many of the Tibetans, monks and lay people, live and they flood into town for the relative warmth. The summers, on the other hand, are very quiet, Bodhgaya is on the Gangiatic plain and the temperature can reach well over 100, a very nice time to remain in the foothills. Though warmer than the foothills, it is quite cool this time of the year, lows in the 40's and 50's F - highs sometimes in the low 70's, it is also quite damp which makes the weather feel colder than it is. This is probably more true for me than for Adam since I've been bothered by sinus and respiratory problems for part of the trip. During these two days we also visited the Temple area many more times, I went both days to meditate and Adam and I spent some time hanging out and talking there. We ran into our Sikkimese friends from the train several times and had some nice talks with them and Adam somehow attracted a slightly crazy Korean guy who told him that he had to leave Korea or be killed by some people associated with King Arthur, that's right, the mythical English King. I don't remember the story clearly but ask Adam when you see him. Bodhgaya was a great place to celebrate Christmas, quiet and laid back, at least in the Temple area. We also made our way out the the nicest hotel in town to celebrate the holiday with a good lunch.

Moving On From Darjeeling - 12/21/08 = Jim

Feeling pretty good today, and it's a good thing, it is time to move on from Darjeeling, we have train tickets from a station about 4 or 5 hours away. We packed last night so we were pretty much ready to move out early in the morning. We had some breakfast, food we bought last night so we didn't have to go out this AM, checked out of our guest house and went to the area where the share jeeps congregate before leaving for various locations. We were going to the NJP railway station near the city of Siliguri. After a while we began to despair that a jeep going our way was going to fill up in time to get us to NJP in time to catch our train and worked out a deal with a driver where we each paid to two seats instead of one, it gave us more room, a real plus in these overcrowded vehicles, and the driver agreed to leave right away. The ride down the hill was pretty uneventful but quite beautiful, we were at about 7000' in Darjeeling and we were going down to the norther Indian plain, probably between 300' and 500'. Once again the jeep made the trip in far less than the advertised time and we were at the NJP Railroad station in about 2 1/2 hours. This gave us plenty of time before the train, which in a train station can be a negative because it exposes you the the various touts for a longer time than usual. We decided to find a little use track and camp out there for a while. This worked pretty well, only a few people begged from us and/or tried to sell us something, one of the beggars however confirmed one of my suspicions about some of the beggars. She came by begging for money for food to feed herself and her family and as it happened we had some food with us which we offered to her, she rejected it insisting on money, which we did not give her. Now, I believe that many beggars are truly in need but I also know, from experiences in the Philippines, that some of them are organized by gangs which use them to raise money, giving very little back to the individual beggar - a shame because it makes it hard to give to the truly needy. Another person came by and struck up a conversation with us while we were waiting, at first we thought he might be trying to sell us something but he just wanted to talk. He seemed to be pretty well educated, his English was above average, and he had an inquiring mind, asking us a lot of good questions about other places and life outside India. It was obvious, though, from the clothes he wore and other things he said that he was jobless and that without some kind of inside track he wasn't going to be able to use his inquiring mind to earn a living. A sad fact of life for many in India.

Finally, it was 2:30PM and we boarded the train to Patna, in Bihar State, from where we would make our way south to Bodhgaya, the village where tradition tell us that Siddartha Gautama became enlightened under a Pipal tree and became the Buddha. We settled in on the train, had a bit to eat from the vendors and about nine I crawled into my top bunk for a bit of sleep, a bit because the train arrived in Patna at around 3:30AM. As I pulled myself into the bunk I heard a voice say "welcome to the attic". It was the guy in the next bunk, separated from me by a partial wall and some grating, who turned out to be a friendly guy about my age from Sikkim who was, together with his family, also headed to Bodhgaya. We talked for a while about life, travel, education, the usual; he had been educated by European priests in Darjeeling which explained his really good English. By the time we finished talking we had agreed to go together in renting a jeep to Bodhgaya the next day, he had a total of five people and there were the two of us, enough to afford to rent the whole jeep. This saved us at least two bus rides and probably more, and a whole lot of hastle. On arrival in Patna we rested for a short while, Sonam, our new friend, had his 83 year old mother in law with him, and then he went outside to negotiate with the jeep drivers. We had agreed earlier that it was best for Adam and I to keep out of sight, the sight of foreigners has an inflationary effect on all prices in India. The deal was cut and we started out in the early hours of the AM for Bodhgaya. However, we were no sooner out of the parking lot of the train station when our driver was pulled over by a local Patna policeman who, quite blatantly, demanded a pay off in lieu of a ticket for some imagined offense. Bihar is known as one of the more wild and lawless parts of India and it was living up to its reputation. After only one more pay off, in the town of Gaya, about 10K from our destination, we arrived in Bodhgaya and incredibly just after entering town I spotted our hotel and we were there. Even more amazing, though it was only about 8 AM, they had a room for us. We moved in, ate a bit, cleaned up and because we really weren't really ready to sleep went out for a walk. Our walk took us to the Root Institute, a Buddhist meditation center and school, were we wanted to check out programs we might take while we were in town. It turned out that there were no two and three day programs while we were there, because of Christmas probably, but there was a talk that evening by a Tibetan Monk, so we arranged to have dinner there and then attend the talk. We then headed back to our hotel, stopping along the way for a good Thai lunch. Now we were tired and we spent part of the afternoon resting before heading back to the Root Institute for dinner and the talk. It was a beautiful cool evening and the walk was pleasant as was the simple dinner. Unfortunately, the speakers command of English was not so pleasant and his talk wandered quite a bit, to bad. We left a little early, walked back to our hotel and quickly fell asleep.

Darjeeling Part 2

So when we last left off I had gone to the movies. I got back to our hostel and found the common room full of people so I decided to sit down join in. Turns out I was joining a French couple who were on their sixth trip to India and preparing to go up to Sikkim, a French bus driver who had been to India at least as many times as the french couple, and young Japanese guy who didn't talk much, our in keeper, a young lady from Nepal, and the young lady's husband Mark. Out of this rather random group Mark is the most interesting mainly because hes a little mysterious. He's an Australian who has been living in India for some time now. As far as we were able to determine he doesn't ever work. He married an Indian woman from NE India had a daughter got divorced married the young Nepali woman and basically just travels about. He travels on his motor cycle and has visited every state in India (no easy task). He also made references to connections he had in Delhi. So whether he had money from family or was involved in some illicit business we'll never know but he did not appear to do anything but travel.

The next day I woke up to Jim saying that we weren't going to Kalimpong. Turns out Jim had come down with a case of Vertigo. According to him it had happened a few other times in his life and usually gets better with rest. So rest he did. I spent the first part of the day writing some emails and working on finding lodging at future destinations. After wards I ventured down into the market to buy some fresh Darjeeling tea. After smelling a bunch of teas I came to the conclusion that I couldn't tell the difference in various qualities...so I bought some of each. When all was said and done we ended up with a lot more tea than originally intended...oh well. That afternoon I decided to see what was playing in the theater again. I had visited everywhere I wanted to in Darjeeling proper and couldn't justify paying for a jeep to take me out of town so I could see the other tourist sights none of which I was horribly interested in. Turns out the only other English movie playing was "In the Name of the King". I had never heard of it so I went to an Internet cafe to investigate. Turns out "In the Name of the King" was directed by Uwe Bol, commonly thought to be one of the worst directors who manages to get big name actors and studio backing...I had to see it. It wasn't quite as bad as I was hoping but it was pretty bad. After the movie I went to fetch Jim so he could stumble off to dinner. Dinner was actually one of the Darjeeling highlights. We ate in a little restaurant called Sonam's Kitchen. It was only Sonam cooking so you had to place your order early in the day. The food and the service turned out to be so stellar we went back the next night.

The next day was pretty uneventful. I returned to the market to to pick up our tea, and when I got back Jim was doing a little better so he decided to venture out. We went to the bookstore where Jim had a bunch of books shipped back to the states (he does it everywhere these days), and I bought some post cards. I spent the rest of the afternoon writing postcards and reading in a pleasant cafe while Jim updated our blog (good thing somebody does). The next morning Jim was feeling a little better which was a good thing because it was time for us to head down the hill.

Darjeeling Part 1

Adam 12/25/2008

Darjeeling, a little bit of background first. Darjeeling was a British Hill station (where they went when it got too hot in the low lands) which became popular for its proximity to Calcutta, and its potential to grow amazing tea. Due to its elevation and its cold winters Darjeeling is well suited to growing tea. Our stay in Darjeeling was pretty quite (which isn't a bad thing), December is a part of Darjeeling off season due to a hiatus in tea growing and cool weather. The day after we arrived we went out for breakfast only to discover that the town really doesn't wake up until 9am. We did end up finding a place to have breakfast but it wasn't where we originally intended. Following breakfast we proceeded to explore around the town. After lunch we made a visit to one of the local tea plantations only to discover that it was shut down for the winter. A couple had set up shop near the factory inviting tourist in for tea and giving them and explanation of the tea growing and processing in Darjeeling. After an animated explanation they proceeded to sell us black market tea smuggled out of the factory. We of course couldn't pass up the opportunity to obtain some black market goods so we purchase we did. The next day our tea buying juices had started flowing and we went in search of Radhika & Son a reputable local tea merchant who operated in the heart of the local market. This was no easy task since any local Indian market consist of a labyrinth of stalls buildings and anything else you can think of. Eventually we did find Radhika & Son only to discover that they were closed on Thursdays, well something to do on Friday then. After our trip to the market we visited the Botanical Gardens. The gardens started during late 1800s was actually quite impressive. They had a pretty good garden of medicinal plants which were well labeled (Including one labeled Cannabis which had no leaves on it???). The garden also had several closed green house which contained an impressive array of plants. All in all it was an enjoyable visit. After the gardens we trekked back in to town and decided that we would leave the next day. We had done all we wanted in Darjeeling, but our train wasn't leaving until Sunday so we decided to visit a near by town called Kalimpong. There was a cinema near our guesthouse and they happened to be showing one Hollywood movie...The Transporter 3, not exactly my top choice but for less than $2 I decided a movie would be enjoyable. Jim and I went to an early dinner and he went home while I went to the movies. Alright that's going to be all for now since I'm about to call the family. Merry Christmas everyone. Hope everyone will join us next time to learn why we didn't leave Darjeeling the next day...or the day after.

Last Days in Nepal - Jim 12/23/08

Since we might not get back to the Internet in the next few days we want to wish everyone reading our blog Happy Holidays. We will be spending most of Christmas in Bodhgaya, a small town in Bihar State in India which Buddhists believe was the site of the Buddha's Enlightenment. Late in the day we will be moving on to the nearby railway station to board an overnight train to our next stop, Varanassi.

Now back to Katmandu and our last two days there. Sunday. This was the day that we had arranged to go out and see some sights with the two monks we had met a few days earlier. As usual we got up fairly early and went to Saturday Cafe for breakfast, then back to our guest house to grab a backpack and call our monk friends to acknowledge that we were heading off for the prearranged meeting point. We met them at the main gate to the Stupa circle, they negotiated a cab for the four of us, they can get a better price than foreigners can, and off we went to our first stop, the Buddhist temple of Swayambhunath, if you can pronounce that your better than I. The temple is located on top of a hill just west of Katmandu and is approached by what seems, at the start anyway, and endless stairway which is dominated by troops of monkeys. After many rest stops we made it to the top and walked around the Stupa there a few times and visited the many other temple building there. In Nepal Buddhism and Hinduism coexist pretty comfortably and there were Hindu as well as Buddhist Temples on the temple platform on top, though the big round Buddhist stupa dominated. (More info on Swayambhunath click here) As usual with our monk friends English lessons were always in session since it was our only language of communication. Slowly we learned a bit more about them, they had both been sent to Katmandu by their monestary, the famous Sera Monastery,now located in southern India, to run a small prayer center. They were both originally from the Kham area of Eastern Tibet but had been in India or Nepal most of their lives, one was a Geshe, the Tibetan name for those who have their Doctors degree in Buddhist Studies and they were both in their late thirties or early forties. Before we left the top of the hill we stopped in a little tea shop for a cup and then it was back down the stairs and a cab back to Boudanath. There we separated for lunch, they had an appointment they couldn't change, and agreed to meet in mid afternoon for our next exploration.

At about 2 PM we met again and began a hike to the nearby, about 3 or 4 K, monastery of Kopan, a site I had read about in a number of books as the place where many foreign travellers of the late 60's and 70's first began to take lessons in Buddhism from a friendly Lama who spoke a little English. It was always described as a simple place on a hill way out in the country surrounded by rice fields. Well things have changed, there are still a few rice fields but the urban sprawl is surrounding the hill and as for simple, the monastery has done very well, possibly due to its many early foreign students, and is now a mecca for foreign students wanting to study Buddhism on the subcontinent. It was a very pleasant walk and visit and when we got back our friends came to our room to talk a bit more and trade addresses. A good day, we ended it with a good meal in one of the local restaurants and a good nights sleep.

Our next day, Monday was to be our last in the Katmandu Valley and we decided to spend it touring the nearby town of Patan, formally as separate town and Kingdom but now just a continuation of the Katmandu sprawl. I am not going to spend to much time on Patan both because of the quantity of ancient sites there and my need to get this finished to meet Adam for lunch. You can read a lot more about the details of the buildings in Patan by clicking on the Link above and elsewhere on the web, but what impressed me the most was the way the town was broken up into interlinking squares. Every group of houses and shrines and temples had their own home square around which their life mostly revolved, probably more so in the old days than now, it seemed to me an ideal way to give the sense of village life to a fairly large urban center. Patan, of course, had its main square, where the Kings and nobles lived which was beautiful. The craftsmanship that went into the stone and wood buildings was amazing and they must have taken a long time or a huge number of craftsmen to build. It was a very pleasant city to wander around in and we ended up having lunch there, getting back to Boudanath by mid afternoon. We wanted to get back early so we had a chance to pack and get ready for our trip the next day, it was time to travel back to India and our first stop would the British Raj summer retreat and tea center of Darjeeling.

Tuesday morning we were up early for breakfast, paid our bill at the guest house and grabbed our packs to head for the airport and what was to be our first domestic flight since arriving on the subcontinent. The day started lucky we didn't have to walk all the way to the main road to find a cab to the airport and we got a fair price without to much haggling. The airport, like all airports was a lot of hurry up and wait, but finally we were ready to board our Yeti Airlines flight to the city of Bhadrapur in eastern Nepal. The main reason we were flying was that a key bridge to eastern Nepal was out and there were also rumors of a transport strike in the region. The flight was more than pleasant, we were treated to an amazing view of the Himalayas, Everest was probably among the mountains we saw. During the flight we got to talking to another American on the plane who was from Oregon, it turned out he was a former Peace Corps Volunteer from Nepal and had married a Nepali woman. He, his wife and teen age son were on their way back to visit her family in Eastern Nepal, they were very nice and ended up helping us get reasonable transportation to the border, a rented jeep. The border crossing was pretty easy, once again the Nepali check point didn't have electricity. After leaving Nepal a sign said it was 100 m to the Indian entry point, I don't know how they measured but both of us think it was more like 2 K. We got our passports stamped to reenter India and went in search of a jeep that would take us to Siliguri, a three or four hour ride, where we would catch our last shared jeep to Darjeeling. Soon we had filled up the jeep and were off through a rural part of India that was, more and more covered with tea plantations. A couple hours into the ride the jeep blew a tire, not surprising given the condition of most of the tires on these jeeps. The driver didn't have a good jack to change the tire and eventually got a pile of stones stacked under the jeep to sort of hold it up while he changed the time - spare wasn't much better than the original, but it got us to Siliguri. There we were able, after a bit of searching, to find the share jeep stand for jeeps going to Darjeeling, a ride that was variously reported to take anywhere from 3 to 5 hours. We still had light for the first hour or so and the countryside was beautiful, especially as we began to climb into the mountains, Darjeeling sits at just over 7100 feet. Somehow our jeep got there in just over 2 1/2 hours and dropped us in the market part of the town. It was cold in Darjeeling at 7PM, dark and cold. After several false starts and a lot of help from locals we found our hotel among the streets and paths that wind up the mountain. We checked and after a long day of travelling eagerly went to bed.

A few days in the Kathmandu Valley

Picking up in Bouddhanath....the guest house was quite nice especially after our small basement cell, and they had true honest to god hot showers always a pleasant experience. Anyways after both showering and getting settled in we decided to go check out the stupa (See Picture), now the tradition is to make clockwise circuits around the stupa mainly in the mornings and evenings since we were there in the evening and countless other people were doing it we decided to join in. On our first or second round one of the many Tibetan monks circling the Stupa turned around and asked us where we were from. His English was pretty good but a little spotty, after a little conversation we found out that his name was Sonam Tashi and he was trying to learn English so he wanted to practice with us. We were up to the challenge so according to him we became his teachers. After about half an hour of rounding the Stupa we parted ways and agreed to meet the next night. Done with our Stupa rounds for the evening we proceeded to dinner and then back to the room for bed.

The next morning we had our first breakfast at what would become the legendary Saturday Cafe. The Saturday Cafe is a pretty simple cafe with a simple breakfast menu, but unlike just about anywhere else in the country they bake good whole wheat bread, desserts and tasty pastries (I sampled almost everyone they make). After breakfast it was into the big city of Kathmandu to go and explore. We got there without much trouble or fan fare and went to the usual sights. It was all very impressive but a lot of it was falling apart due to neglect, we would find stone work shoved in a corner that many museums would love to have. Other than that Kathmandu was pretty standard, it had its tourist district which we looked around and so forth. On our way back to the bus park we stumbled across the US Embasy which resembled a maximum security prison...

We returned to our guesthouse where Jim took a nap since he wasn't feeling too well. After his nap he went to try to find Tashi while I went to catch up on some Internet stuff. I should mention that using the internet was often rather complicated. Power outages are the norm rather than the exception in Kathmandu, usually right around dark the power will go out..but not always everywhere and for a seemingly random amount of time. This meant that you had to guess where the power would be on and if it wasn't on hope that the cafe had battery backup. Anyways after this I found Jim and Tashi circling the Stupa. We learned that the day before we had a little communication problem and Tashi thought he was coming with us into the city. So we made plans to go visit another stupa with him in two days.

This is now Jim, Adam had a few errands to run. By the time we left the Stupa Circle to find a place for dinner I was feeling a little punk, runny sinus' etc, but was more than game to try to find a restaurant that sounded good in the guide book. At this point I need to explain a little about Nepali towns and the maps of them. There are usually a few honest to goodness paved roads but much of every town is made up or semi paved paths that wander between shops, houses and empty lots, some of these are usually on the map as roads but not all of them and since they are essentially paths they wander this way and that and no map captures them anywhere near accurately. Some of the larger of these semi paths are large enough for a very small car going one way, which happens frequently, all of them are trafficked by lots of pedestrians and the ubiquitous motorcycles. So back to the story of going off to find our dinner destination; with guide book in hand we headed down the path we thought went to the restaurant, it was dark so stumbling down the path might say it better. Along the way we came to several places where the path divided and made guesses as to which way, sometimes doubling back to try the other one. After about a half hour, a lot of walking and not perceptibly closer to our destination we finally gave up and went to another place we had seen earlier in the day and had a fine meal. Afterward we went back to our room had a good nights sleep.

The next day was Saturday, the Sunday of Nepal, when all offices and some shops to close up. I was still feeling a bit under the weather so we decided to visit some of the Tibetan monasteries in Buddahnath and generally have a laid back day. This of course happened after our mandatory breakfast at Saturday Cafe. The first monastery we visited was right next door to our guest house and, in fact, our guest house was owned by the monastery. It was interesting to see how the monks lived, simply but nicely, and to see the very ornately decorated meditation and teaching halls. When we arrived at the third monastery on our list for the day it was obvious that it wasn't a laid back Saturday, lots of monks and westerners were milling around as we approached the meditation hall. Curious, we took off our shoes and went in to find the place packed, a friendly monk put out a pad for us to sit on and we waited to see what would happen. Soon, the head teacher of the monastery, and a teacher with an international reputation, Chokyi Nyima Rinpoche, entered and took his place at the front of the hall and proceeded to give a half hour to 45 min. talk on the basics of Buddhism complete with english translation. It turned out that the monastery was sponsoring, later that day, a seminar at a nearby hotel on translating Buddhist teachings for non traditionally Buddhist countries and the talk we heard was a preliminary to the conference. Afterwards we went back to our room, where I rested a bit, still fighting my sinus', while Adam read in the sun on the piece of lawn we had at the guest house. Lawns at hotels or guest houses give you bragging rights. By late afternoon we went out again to walk around town and shop a bit. Later we decided to pay the minimal fee to go inside the outer area of the big round stupa that dominates the town, it was interesting to see the small shrines inside and the area where people did full prostrations, some of them for hours. We then went outside and walked around the Stupa with the crowd for a while. This is an interesting practice because it seems to be both spiritual and at the same time social. You will see some people repeating mantras as they walk, others offer incense at shrines and many pay to light butter lamps, in fact on a chill night it's nice to stand by the butter lamp area for the warmth they give off, but it is also very social with both monks and lay people catching up with each other as they make the circuit and greeting acquaintances as they go. It gives the town circle a quality and quantity of civility and pleasantness twice a day that it might not otherwise have. After a while I decided to go back to the room, without dinner, because of my cold and Adam tried a new restaurant our. All in all a very pleasant day.

On to Katmandu - Jim -12/18/08

Once again we are a week behind on this blog, so I'll take a stab at catching up as much as I can before we head off for dinner. I'm sure you have read Adam's blog about his trip to Annapurna Base Camp, I don't know about you but it makes me jealous. I guess I'll just have to work a little bit harder to get this old body working better. On with the story. After I wrote my last entry I walked back to our hotel and went around the side where our room was and to my surprise, and shock, the door was open. My first thought was, "how could I be so stupid as to forget to lock the door when I left." I hurried to the room to see what was missing only to find Adam already back and showered, it was about 3PM. Not only did he make the trek in the four days that people said was impossible but he was back early, he had gotten back about 2 PM. We had fun talking about his trip and my adventures while he was gone and then I went up to the bathroom to take a shower. On my way, as usual, I greeted the family that ran the lodge especially the 6 or 7 year old daughter. While I was attempting to communicate with her, her father came over and told me that it was her birthday and that Adam and I were invited to the party. We weren't entirely sure what this meant but around 5:30 we went up to the terrace where the restaurant was located and sat down, nothing happening yet. We had some tea and over the next half hour or so dozens of people, adults and kids, arrived, they had closed down the restaurant for the evening. We weren't always sure what was going on, except that they played the same recording about 50 times, maybe more. Some gifts were given to the birthday girl which was followed by placing more and more red dot paste on her forehead, by the end of the evening most of her forehead was covered with paste. We were given pieces of cake and then group by group we were given a very good Nepali dinner. After the food the dancing began and everyone including Adam and I were pulled into it, lots of fun and pretty wild. The men danced together and then the women danced together. Slowly the party wound down with some of the guests and hosts a bit tipsy, one of the tipsy ones was the owner who we still had to settle our bill with, we were leaving early in the morning. It took a while to get the bill straight, all in good spirit, and we were off for a short nights sleep.

We had to be at the bus stand to catch our bus to Katmandu by 7 AM and we made it with the help of a taxi that just happened to be going by, rare at 6:30 AM, the owner had forgotten to call us a taxi. While we were waiting to board the bus we saw the best morning view of the mountains that we had seen our entire stay in Pokhara. The bus ride to Katmandu was fairly uneventful, we had opted for the tourist bus which wasn't particularly fancier than the regular bus, but didn't make stops along the road to pick up customers. Most of the riders were Nepali's who wanted to get to Katmandu in six or seven hours instead of 10 or 11 hours. Adam and I had a plan to handle the taxi drivers and touts who we knew would besiege us when we got off the bus, I would round up our luggage from the top of the bus while he tried out his bargaining skills on the taxi drivers who we needed to get to our guest house. He was very successful and had a bargaining war going on when I got there. We got a rate a little below what we were aiming for and piled our luggage and ourselves into the cab, which pretty much filled it up. As we started up the taxi driver told us that he couldn't do it for what he said and raised the price, we bailed out, not so much because of the price, but because he had lied to get our business. We easily got another cab for the new price and were on our way.

We had made a reservation for our time in the Katmandu Valley at a guest house, run by a local Tibetan Buddhist Monastery, in the town of Buddhanath, a bit NE of Katmandu, but not really separate from it. We made the reservation on the recommendation of another backpacker we had met in Pokhara who spoke very highly of it. The town of Buddhanath was largely populated by Tibetan refugees and had at its center a large Stupa, Shrine, which is famous in the area.

That's it for now, it's dinner time but I may have time to get back later and get a little more done. jim

Reports from Annapurna

Hope everyone reading this is doing well and enjoying the holiday seasons back state side. I also hope that everyone enjoyed Jim's post to be honest I haven't worked up the energy to read all of them yet but I'm sure they are good. Alright well semi quick report on my time hiking on my own.

First off to give people an idea of what hiking or trekking as they call it around here is all about. Its not what people think of in the states. There is very little "wilderness" here, for one people have been living in the mountains for centuries and no one came and kicked them all out which happened in other places (no need to name names). So while hiking you encounter frequent houses lodges and villages. On even the more minor routes lodges and shops have sprung up to accommodate the massive number of western hikers who visit each year. This means you have to carry a minimal amount of food and no shelter. Which I guess is a good thing since I didn't have a tent with me. All in all it made for an interesting and very different experience from hiking in the United States.

For the actual report I left Pokhara at about 5:45 on a bus headed to Nayapul. My objective was the Annapurna Base Camp(ABC), and I had four days to do it...which I had been told was impossible. I got to Nayapul and began my hike I quickly came to a checkpoint. ABC is within the Annapurna Conservation Protection Area, this means a lot of things but as far a hikers are concerned it mostly means you need a permit. The checkpoint is where they check your permit...funny how that works. The gentleman at the checkpoint ask me where I was going and for how long I told him, he said it was impossible and wrote six days down in his book. Ohh well. I started off not too much of interest, lots of asking people which way to go since there are no signs and often many side trails. The first part was essentially a dirt road with a decent amount of trash around. The further into the mountains the better things got. People were much less pushy then people in towns. In towns you avoid asking directions or anything because it seems like everyone wants something. Here Lodge owners would ask you if you wanted to rest or a snack once or twice and then leave it at that.

Since the area sees so many western tourist they cater to the taste of western tourist and when I saw some chocolate cake late in the afternoon I couldn't resist. My mistake it wasn't very good. I ended my first day at around four in a summer settlement called Sinuwa. Dinner was Dal Bhatt (traditional Nepali dish of rice, lentil soup, and curried veggies) not only was it the cheapest but Dal Bhatt always involves refills. Desert was a snickers roll...a snickers bar wrapped and dough and deep fried. After dinner I had my first hot shower(solar) since leaving the states.

The next day was the push to ABC I started bright and early with a meal of Hot Cereal and Bananas. The whole day was cloudy so there wasn't much to see. I arrived at the camp about an hour below ABC at 12. It was here that I met two polish guys also hiking to ABC. We talked for awhile over lunch and decided that we'd head up together. Off we went to make the final climb in a cloud. Part way up we looked behind us to see that we had hiked above the clouds and could see some of the worlds highest mountains all around us. It was pretty amazing. We continued our hike and reached ABC about 2. I decided to spend the night there instead of starting the trip down figuring I'd be able to make the two day trip down since I made it up in a little over a day and a half. The night was enjoyable if cold. A little later a Chinese woman and her guide showed up we all enjoyed dinner and conversation before retreating to the warmth of our sleeping bags.

The next day I started early and skipped breakfast since I wasn't feeling well. Things didn't get better though out the day and by the end I felt pretty horrible and was hiking for about ten minutes then resting for five. I got into a lodge and started throwing up (just to cover all the details). Luckily I got better though out the night and by morn was able to hold down a little water. I started hiking and took a shorter route back since I wasn't in the best of condition. I made it back to Nayapul by 11:30 and was back in Pokhara by 1:30. Well that about wraps up my journey so until next time.

Adam McCurdy

A Week in Pokhara - Jim 12/10/08

Back again after only a day - this could be habit forming. I was thinking last night that some of you might be wondering why, if travel is as difficult as i describe, we would travel by train and bus and not just fly everywhere, which for the most part would be possible. The number one reason, which you might have already guessed, is money, it is much cheaper to travel by train and bus, and when you are travelling for two or three months the plane flight expenses can add up. But the other reason is that it is one of the few times that you can come into contact with ordinary Indians or Nepali's who are not part of the tourist industry. I find that it gives me a little glimpse of how the people of the countries I'm visiting live their everyday life, how their lives are similar and how they are different from the life that I live. It's easy to see the sights but not so easy to get to know the people and for me the effort has always been worth the trouble.
We slept really well Wednesday night, our first night in Pokhara, it had been a tiring day and sleep was much appreciated. The next morning though we were ready to go. After breakfast at our Lodge we decided to hike up one of the surrounding hills, which had at its top a Peace Pagoda, from which the view were said to be great. As our place was a bit out of town we first had to walk through the tourist district of Pokhara, called Lakeside - did I mention that in addition be being surrounded by mountains, the tourist part of Pokhara is also located on beautiful Lake Fewa. This was our first view of Lakeside in the daylight and it was packed full of boarding houses, hotels, lodges and shops selling all sorts of local crafts. At one point during our walk through Lakeside I turned around to look at something and realized that towering over the hill behind us was a beautiful alpine view of a portion of the Annapurna range, a great discovery with which to start the day. Our walk continued around the bottom of the lake and around to the other side where the trail, which we found with some trouble, went up the hill on a number of switchbacks. I was pleased with my ability to get to the top without slowing down to an absolute crawl though I sure my speed felt like a crawl to Adam. The Pagoda was a beautiful white monument at the top with statues of the Buddha and what on clear days was said to be a beautiful view, unfortunately by the time we reached the top the haze and clouds had obscured the view of the high mountains of the Annapurna Range. We walked back down, got some food at a little local restaurant outside of the tourist area and walked back to our Lodge, the View Point Lodge. After a little bit of rest we went up the the View Point's restaurant, drank some tea and read for a while. Around 7PM we ordered dinner and had a good meal, during the meal we struck up a conversation with another traveller who was staying there, she had been in Nepal longer than us and gave us some good information about places to stay in Katmandu and about treks in the Pokhara area.
The Mountaineering Museum was on our schedule for Friday, but finding it was a bit more challenging than we had expected, it is secreted away in an obscure part of town. What we finally found was a modern, large museum with quite a few interesting displays, including some of the equipment climbers had used on the initial assents of Nepal's 8000m peaks. This increased my respect for these climbers, compared to today's equipment it looked antique. At one point suffering from museum fatigue Adam and I found a place to sit and talk and get some relief from museum learning. During the conversation, I reiterated what I thought I had told Adam before, that if he wanted to go on a trek that I wasn't able to do he should just do it, that in fact I would be more upset if he didn't do it. At that, Adam said that indeed he would do just that and take a trek to Annapurna Base Camp. We left the museum in a bit of a hurry since it was Friday and if he was going to do this we had to get the permits that afternoon, everything official is closed Saturdays in Nepal. By the end of the afternoon all the permits had been acquired and we headed back to View Point Lodge for dinner and the night. The next day Adam would be stocking up on supplies for the trek and both of us needed to catch up on emails etc. It was a fairly uneventful day but we got done everything we needed to do and by night Adam was packed and ready to leave "early" the next morning. He would be taking a 5:30 AM cab to the bus station to get the first bus to the jump off place for his trek.
I got up to see Adam off and then fell back asleep for an hour, had breakfast, put a pack on and headed off on a walk with no real plan of where I was headed, though I knew I wanted to go away from town to see something new. As I walked I saw signs for a town about 6 K away called Pame Bazaar and decided that this was today's destination. It was a beautiful walk just above the lake and the wetlands around its far end, Pame was a very small and nondescript town but a friendly place. When I got there I bought some oranges, ate a few and started back. The walk back was a bit warmer and I was happy to get back to View Point and have a Mango Lassi, read a bit and take a nap before dinner.
Monday my plan was to rent a bike and ride up to the town, called Sarankot, at the top of the hill on our side of the lake. The first bike I rented wasn't up to the stress I put on it, I could go into the size of the average Nepali, but I think you get the idea. So after an uphill stretch I had to coast back down and trade the bike in on one of a newer and stronger vintage. As I approached the turnoff for Sarankot I realized that what I had thought was morning fog had turned into heavy cloud cover and any views from Sarankot would be mostly grey. So I pulled out my guide book and put together a new plan. First I visited a nearby Hindu temple, the south half of Nepal is mostly Hindu, the northern half mostly Buddhist. This wasn't a tourist temple, it was full of Nepali's praying, ringing bells and sacrificing chickens and, because of that, was more interesting that similar places I had seen. Next, I bicycled 5 or 6 more K out of Pokhara to what was marked in the guidebook as a Tibetan refugee town. As I approached it I saw a large monastery on the hillside and decided to see if I could visit. As I approached the gate I realized that most of the monks were in a field to my right playing soccer and cricket, I stopped to watch and after a while a monk, probably in his late teens approached me and asked if I would like a tour of the monastery. We walked around and he explained, in pretty good English, what went on where and how many monks there were. They were a monastery of the Sakya School of Tibetan Buddhism and the monastery was primarily for children from the remote Nepali area of Mustang, which is ethnically Tibetan. It was an informative and interesting hour that I spent there and then the monk showed me the short cut to the Tibetan village and I was on my way again, pushing my bike down the cow path. Shortly I reached the village and walked down its lanes toward the biggest building in town which turned out to be another monastery, much older than the previous one and of the Kagu School, I had a tour and enjoyed some Tibetan milk tea and conversation with one of the monks, who was within a year of graduation. As I was leaving the town I saw a crafts workshop where they were making and selling beautiful, hand knotted Tibetan rugs. I would have bought one but rugs don't exactly fit in a backpack or on a bicycle. Then it was about an hour ride back to Lakeside, all downhill, to turn in the bike and a pleasant late afternoon walk back to the View Point Lodge.
The next two days, including today, were declared, by me, rest days and am spending them catching up on email and blogs and doing a little bit of shopping, no major purchases to report. Well that's it for now; Adam is due to return late today and we have a bus to catch to Katmandu at 7AM tomorrow.

On to Nepal - Jim, 12/9/08

I'm just beginning to realize how far behind we've fallen with this blog, so I'm going to try to catch up today, if not I'll try to finish tomorrow, since Thursday we will leave Pokhara for Katmandu and that will take us away from computer access for a day or two.
Monday night about 7PM we headed over to the New Delhi train station to catch our overnight train to the city of Goraksphur which was the first leg of our trip to the town of Pokhara in Nepal. As we waited on the platform with thousands of others we started hearing announcements of delays to various trains, some of 2 to 3 hours and our spirits started to drop, but when they announced our train it was only 20 minutes late, which suddenly didn't seem so bad. It turned out it was about 40 minutes late but that still was OK. We boarded in a crush of people, found our assigned 2nd Class sleeping location and settled in. Each sleeping section on the train car had bunks three high on two sides an aisle that went through to the next section and two bunks on the far side of the aisle. Adam and I had been assigned a top bunk and a middle bunk, when people weren't sleeping the middle bunk was folded down to become a seat back for the lowest bunk. Adam was tired so he climbed into the top bunk and was quickly asleep, I wasn't so sleepy so I took up a seat on the bottom bunk along with our companions in that section. Our companions turned out to be a Nepali family from Katmandu, the parents and two grown sons probably in their twenties. They were on their way back from Delhi where the father had just had a checkup following a July kidney transplant, which he had somehow had done at a charity hospital in Delhi with a little help for medications from family in the states. It turned out the father was a high school English teacher and spoke quite good English as did most of the rest of the family. We had a pleasant conversation and at one point I offered them one of the oranges I had with me. This started them offering me food which ended up being part of the supper they had brought with them, it was really good, a whole lot better than the usual train vendor food. Just as we were finishing up Adam awoke and was also treated to dinner. After a while we set up the middle beds for sleeping and I crawled in for a good nights sleep. In the morning we began to realize that the train wasn't making as much progress as scheduled - we were two to three hours behind and ended up over four hours late into Goraksphur, which threw a wrench into our carefully laid plan to get to the border before dark. It's always a lot easier to deal with the touts and bureaucrats at transition points like this in the light of day, also we didn't have any way of knowing how long the Indian exit office and the Nepali Immigration office would be opened. We bid goodbye to the family we had spent the night with and with the help of another Nepali we had met on the train, went out to find a bus to the border, several hours ride away. We ended up after endless negotiations in a jeep like vehicle with 9 other people on our way to the border. It ended up, as most things do in India, taking longer than advertised and it way full dark by the time we got to the border. Luckily the Indian office that gave out the exit stamps was still open and we went through there very quickly, crossed the border, which amounted to simply walking a few feet down the busy commercial road, and after a few false starts found the Nepal Immigration Office. Either they hadn't paid their electric bill or there was a power failure going on, a common occurrence, because when we walked into the office area it was lit by a few tiny candles, a little bigger than the ones that are used on birthday cakes. This slowed things down a bit, but at least they were still opened and we would be able to cross the border. After we had filled out the forms, given them the required pictures and paid the fee we were given our visas and were officially in Nepal. Now all we had to do was choose from the hundreds of rickshaws drivers begging for our business and ride the 3 K to the hotel that we had picked out from the guide book. We accomplished this, but not without having to pay more than we were told we could get the ride for, but we were tired and really thankful when we got to the hotel, which wasn't a disappointment. All that was left for the day was dinner, in the hotel, and sleep.
We were up early the next morning and after a quick breakfast off to find the bus to Pokhara. Again we had some problems, the first bus that said they would get us to Pokhara was actually going to Katmandu and we finally figured out was going to drop us at a town way out of our way where we could transfer to a bus to Pokhara. We bailed that bus at the first stop and found a bus going straight to Pokhara which also charged us the correct price. At first we were riding inside the bus, it was old, the seats were broken and the back seats where we were sitting smelled of urine. Not a great situation. As more people got on we noticed that some of the riders were going up top and we quickly followed them there, it wasn't exactly plush or comfortable but it was a lot better than inside and the view were great. We stayed up top until the last half hour into Pokhara when it got to chilly to stay up top.
We arrived in Pokhara after dark to the usual, not having any idea what part of town we were in and not knowing exactly how to get to the lodge we had picked from the guidebook, and we soon attracted a crowd of touts all of whom wanted to take us where we didn't want to go. We finally settled on a cab and actually got delivered to our lodge at not much over the going rate. Only one problem, the Lodge was full or so they said. Actually it turned out they had one small room with one small bed in it which didn't have access to the bathroom after the restaurant at the lodge closed. We finally figured out that we could put an extra mattress that the Lodge had on the floor and make due, so we took the room and have spent the week there at the rate of approx. 65 cents per night each, which tickled our cheap bones.
Well I'm going to do another to be continued here, I'll try to finish this off after lunch or tomorrow.

Jim 12/7 - Last Day in Delhi

I'm not going to get very far with the story on this post, I'm tired and am on my way back to our $1.33 a night room in Pokhara, Nepal, but I thought I'd update things a bit and hopefully fill in a lot more tomorrow.

Our last day in Delhi was somewhat uneventful, one of the items on our list was to get some passport size pictures for Adam, we were going to need them when we got to the Nepal border, and that would most likely happen in the evening when such things might not be available. We went into central Delhi, near Connaught Place, where we spotted a passport photo spot, a tiny little shop across from some of the fancier stores of Connaught Place. We went in and the photographer was anxious to take the picture but his power had just gone out, a not unusual thing in Delhi, he could take the picture but couldn't print them so we decided to walk around a little and come back, still no power, so we waited for about an hour and still no power so we gave up and went on the search for another store. We found one not to far away but it was housed in a upscale camera store that sold Nikon and Canon cameras, needless to say we paid about four times more for the photos than we would of in the first store. As we were leaving the camera store we spotted a bookstore that looked interesting, reminded me of an old time NYC book store, pre Borders, but on a smaller scale. An hour later we left the bookstore our backpacks considerably heavier. It was lunchtime and we had read about a old time restaurant, Kirim's in the bazaar of Old Delhi that was highly rated on some list of great Asian restaurants, highly rated but not very expensive, so we headed there. We found it down a back alley in the Bazaar went in and got our table. It was crowded and they practiced family seating so soon an Indian couple sat down with us. We struck up a conversation with them, in English, as our Hindi is still nonexistent, and it turned out that they had been headed for the restaurant, where they had last eaten about 20 years ago, and had been somewhat lost until they saw us and figured that we were also headed there and looked like we knew where we were going, so they followed us in. Nice people, they are involved in a hotel in Mysore where we might stay later in the trip if we have enough money left. After lunch we went by the train station to check on our train that evening but nothing was posted yet so we went back to our hotel, hung out, had a little food and waited till time to get to the train station. That's all for now, much more to report but it will have to wait until tomorrow.