Monday, February 18, 2013

Days 14 & 15 - Chitwan National Park

"In all things of nature there is something of the marvelous"
Aristotle


Today we departed Pohkara and took a taxi to Chitwan National Park. It was a 4 ½ hour 90 mile (145 Km) ride. Traveling on the roads in Nepal is always very interesting. They are not well maintained, and are very bumpy and crowed. You’ll see some of the most interesting sights traveling via the highway.



At about the half way mark we stopped for lunch at Marsyangdi Restaurant. This is the place where we all had our first plate of Dal Bhat.


We arrive late morning and check into our hotel. The hotel is nice and is next to the Rapti River. The weather in this part of Nepal is very tropical, hot and humid. We had some lunch then walked around to get the lay of the land. We were surprise to be able to see a baby rhino up close. The trainer was taking it out for a run and we were allowed to watch and take pictures.



 


 
 





To my surprise our porter Ram showed up on a bicycle. He lives in this area and invited us to his home. We agreed, rented bikes and headed out into the country side to visit his family. What a great treat this was as we biked through rural farmland and villages. Once at his home his mother offered us tea and we sat and talked. It was very interesting to visit and see how they live.



















Outside our hotel on the river bank you could, for a small fee, bath with an elephant. It looked like great fun for those that did it.








The next day we went on an elephant safari. It was pretty cool riding an elephant through the jungle. We did not see any wild animals just a lot of other tourist. Overall the park is nice, very touristy but, worth a visit.
 








Peace and Love, Tom and Donna
 

 

Monday, February 11, 2013

Day 13 - Pokhara

“How does one become a butterfly? You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.”
–Trina Paulus

Pokhara is a beautiful little town that has many cafĂ©‘s, shops and restaurants catering to tourist. If the sky is clear you get pretty nice views of the Annapurna mountain range. Some of the popular things to see are, Phewa Lake, World Peace Temple, Tibetan Market, Devi’s Falls and Gupteshwar Mahadev Cave. Paragliding is also very popular and sometimes we would see 25 people in the air. We did not paraglide as it was too expensive ($100 US/person) for us but, the people we talked to that did it, loved it. The Tibetan market is in the same area as the falls and cave. There are many types of food available from local food to western. You can get authentic Nepalese, Tibetan, India, as well as Italian and wood fire pizza. Clothing and souvenirs are plentiful and fairly cheap but, if you are going back to Kathmandu you can get things a little cheaper their. The advise from a lot of people is to buy hiking gear here or in Kathmandu before your trek because it’s cheaper. That’s true but, from my experience the quality is pretty poor and you’ll be lucky to get one trek worth of use out of anything you purchase. I still think it’s better to purchase items in your area and only get things that you forgot or did not bring here.


Our hotel in Pokhara
View from our hotel window
Kids playing in front of our hotel
We spend most of our time in Pokhara relaxing, drinking coffee and eating sweets.  We also did the tourist stuff and shopped a bit.  Overall it’s very relaxing here and well worth staying at least 2 days if you have time in your schedule.

Coffee time

Phewa Lake
Washing cloth in Phewa Lake
  
Down town Pokhara


Current exchange rates
We rented a boat and rowed across the lake stopping at the Hindu Temple Barahi half way.  Once on the other side we hiked up to the World Peace Temple.
 
Barahi Temple
Rowing across Phewa Lake
World Peace Temple
View from the World Peace Temple 
Our guide Govinda
There was a monastery near the Tibetan market that we were able to visit.  The monks were just about to begin their afternoon prayers so we were able to snap a few pictures.






Lunch at a Tibetan Restaurant


Wood fire pizza with our friend Dino








Peace and Love, Donna and Tom