Nepal and Bhutan- December 22, 2010

A group of us decided to visit Nepal and Bhutan for the short Christmas holiday- Evelyn, Chip, Tim, Lee, Kathy and myself. We've all traveled a bit so we're a pretty laid back group :)

We arrived in Kathmandhu last night- just a 4 hour flight from Dubai. Having been sick last week, the first thing I did was konk out on the flight over. Great nap! :)

We were met by a driver at the airport and walked outside- masses of people and a cacophony of noises greeted us. We piled in a van and 4 more joined us- a total of 10 in a van built for about 6. We made small talk with a couple in the van who were also from Dubai. They'd just moved to Dubai from Eastern Europe a few months ago and they sure thought they were superior to us! The man got really rude with one of our group when they said they didn't recognize the name and location of where they worked- he began snapping at us, "Don't you know Dubai?" and became quite rude to us. Tempted to respond with, "If we don't recognize where you work it can't be that good, can it?" but bit my tongue- he seemed to be looking to pick an argument, so we just stopped talking to them.

We checked in to the Kathmandhu Guest House, plain but clean- then headed out for dinner. Walking on the road in Kathmandhu is quite an experience (no sidewalks in a lot of places, so you have to walk on the road out of necessity)- trying to avoid cars racing up behind you or towards you, motorbikes doing the same, huge bunches of electrical wires hanging so low that you have to duck to walk under them (and I'm only 5'5"!), etc. We walked down a few stores to the Roadside Cafe for a great dinner of pizza and such and so cheap, especially compared to Dubai! it was here that I learned of a common event in Kathmandhu - load shedding. There isn't enough capability for electricity there all the time, so different parts of Kathmandhu go without power at different times of the day. Wow, lucky we don't need to do that!

After dinner, we walked back to the guest house and sat in their courtyard next to a fabulous outdoor chiminea/ fireplace and drank hot chocolate and chatted until the cold drove us inside for the night.