Kathmandu

Well, today is our last day in Nepal. We are headed back to Bangkok this afternoon.

Yesterday, we were in a mountain resort near Kathmandu. We had a beautiful view of the snow capped mountains at sunrise. We then had a relatively uneventful drive back into Kathmandu because there was a transportation strike going on for the whole day. Only tourist vehicles were allowed on the roads. This made for a nice quiet day.

The purpose of the strike was a protest against the Maoist extremists who had killed a couple of sports players a couple of weeks ago and they finally found the bodies. We passed one road block where they had a bunch of tires burning in the street.

We went to a medieval portion of the city which had several pagodas and royal baths and palace. We weren't allowed into the palace as it was for Hindu people only. We then went to another area of the city where they perform public cremations along a holy river and then push the burnt remains into the river. There were several cremations going on when we were there. It was a bit disturbing for me and a couple of the other people in our group.

Unfortunately, I don't have my guide book here so I can't tell you the name of these places. I will update this post when I have more info.

We are staying in the Dwarika Hotel which is very nice and calming. There is an inner courtyard with a pool and places to sit outside and enjoy the gardens.

Last night, we had a nine course Nepalese dinner and we surprised Mike for his birthday. The hotel made a big production out of it so it was a lot of fun. The food was good.

We'll try to post again tomorrow evening after our tour to the Tiger Temple and the museum at The Bridge on the River Kwai. We will be quite busy tomorrow and hopefully there won't be any protests going on as they were on Thursday near our hotel.

Namaste,
Deb & Karel