Had a very early start this morning. Had to leave the hotel in Kathmandu by 7 am. We were off to do White water rafting.

To reach the starting point we had to undergo again, the tedious journey on the same dangerous road we took to go to Pokhara.

Finally we were all set to get started – my first White Water Rafting experience. We were told by our particular instructor that the river could in places get to a grade 3 or 4 level rapid and that our journey would be about 20 kms.

Again, as with the Para sailing in Pokhara, there was a gradual build up of excitement. Got the helmet and life jackets on; took on board some rowing and safety instructions being given to us and soon we were all set to go.

Turned out to be extremely enjoyable and particularly thrilling experience especially when we did encounter the grade 3 and 4 rapids. Another definite activity for me to do again in the future. The nearest I had got to doing this in the past was in one of the water rides in Disneyland Florida!
We also had some decent water fights with the other boats on our 20 km track. I was unable to take too many photos for obvious reasons, but did get some.

What a day.

All getting ready to go on our little adventure on our way!!

The motley crew on the river trip.

This the calm, before the storm.

Manvir, doing something or the other.

A selfy with wifey.

Kirit with Nalini.

The only part I intentionally allowed myself to get wet – I think the life jacket is too small for me:

A short video clip of our River Trip:

Click to watch the video of the river trip

Evening meal – Pizza at a local Restaurant in Kathmandu with friends and partners, some of whom had joined us for the next few days.

Went to Nagarcot which is 30 miles from Kathmandu with the hope of viewing the mountain range. Unfortunately due to the heat and pollution the range was hidden behind a cloud of smog, but the views of the valley were absolutely amazing.
On our return to Kathmandu we visited a Buddhist temple called the Monkey Temple. As it’s name suggests, quite a few monkeys here. Also great view of the city from the top.

Local, tribal Nepalese lady gathering dried grass.

Nice backdrop

The inevitable selfy:

On route to Nagarcot:

With Ragini.

What you looking at!

Photos from Nagarcot:
Managed to climb the tower, for an even better view from Nagarcot

Capturing our conquest of the tower.

View from the Buddhist Monkey Temple, near Kathmandu.

Some – monkey scenes. With a magnificent background views.

Not quite – Hear No Evil, See No Evil, Say No Evil.

Click to watch video of monkey mischief

Back to our hotel.

Bricks manufacturing.

Broken down, on the way to Nagarcot.

In the evening went to Ragini’s old school friend ‘s house for dinner – They had got in touch recently via Facebook after almost 35 years. Had a really good time, great hospitality and got a very informative and impressive insight of Rajni’s Royal connection with Nepal going back generations.

Ragini – finally gets to meet her friend Rajni, after 35 years.

We had a wonderful home cooked Nepalese dinner.

Spent the morning in Pokhara. The morning was superb, birds singing, clear blue sky- there is just an air of tranquility and calm about this place. Would love to come back to discover it more in the future.

Beautiful scenes of Lake Phewa in Pokhara.

Drove to a Lake ….. And spotted a lot of para – gliding activity up in the hills.

On seeing this – the dye was cast,we were going to do this.

 
One enquiry, followed another and we landed up ourselves high in the skies.

ParaSailing – Here we come!!

It was thrilling and exciting to drive to the top of the hill overseeing Lake …… There was an air of anticipation and nervous excitement when the harness was put on me. Instructions were given on what I and the instructor had to do to lift off into the skies i.e. basically run in tandem down the hill. It was as simple as that and within a matter of seconds I was nearly a mile up into the sky.

One way of travelling to the top of the hill.

Click to watch the video of travelling up the hill

The whole flight was being recorded, the views were superb of the lake and surrounding area. I knew it was going to be risky but I had to take a few video clips and photos with my iPhone. Thankfully I managed it without dropping it. My instructor was superb.

Just before take off.

Click to watch the video of take off

In the air – in the hands of the instructor, air currents and God!

Click to watch the video of in the air

Gliding smoothly through the sky. What a scene.

Safe landings for all – brilliant experience!

As soon as we had finished we got into the car and headed straight back to Kathmandu because we knew it was going to be, again a long and treacherous journey, managing the curves and bends of the mountain road. We would have to take on the lorries and have to contend with the heavy oncoming traffic.

Passenger on lorry, oblivious of the world around him. 

Some of the traffic we had to contend with on our journey back.

Sunset scenes:

We reached Kathmandu at about 7.30 pm and as expected after a very nervous drive.

On arrival it was great to see Ragini again after almost eight weeks of leaving London. She and Nalini (Kirit’s wife) will be joining us for the rest of the trip, into Gujarat in the car.

The whole group had a wonderful meal together at New Orleans restaurant. From previous visits to Kerala in South India I have really loved the flute and tabla played together, but this was the first time a guitarist was also involved. Absolutely brilliant – (video clips attached).

Click to watch music clip 1

Click to watch music clip 2

Click to watch music clip 3

Click to watch music clip 4

Had a really good day.

Left pretty early this morning to get to Pokhara. City of lots of lakes. About a four and a half hour drive. It is the second largest city of Nepal and a very popular tourist attraction because of trekking and mountain views.

The journey itself was fairly uneventful. We passed some interesting small villages. The Banyan tree seemed in all these towns to be a central talking/meeting place for the village elders. Lots of green, lush vegetation and hilly and overtaking, especially of lorries was quite difficult.

When we reached Pokhara in the late afternoon, it started to rain quite heavily with thunder and lightening. We couldn't make the mountain walk because of the weather. Remarkable how different the outskirts of Pokhara was to the inner tourist part. There was a sudden and dramatic transformation from disorderly, busy bustling streets to tranquil boutique like quaint shops, catering for tourists. For information - and we did pass it has the largest recruiting and training centre for Gurkhas in Nepal.

 

Our map for the journey.
  

City traffic.

 
Elegant flats on the outskirts of Kathmandu.

    

    

Some videos below:

Click to watch street video 1

Click to watch street video 2

Click to watch street video 3

COURT CASE:

We had an interesting discussion at breakfast this morning, it centered around an incident that occurred with my i pad a few days ago in which I almost lost it at a combined petrol station/police check point. As we were about to drive off, luckily the policeman ran across the forecourt to hand over the i pad. A serious situation and the perpetrator had to be brought to justice.
We set up a court room scenario in which the accused was Kirit, who was also defending himself. Manvir was the accuser and senior prosecutor i.e. that it was Kirit who took the i pad out of the vehicle, left it on the policeman’s desk and walked off, pre occupied with a phone call he had received at the same time. Peter was a witness and I was the judge (I was out of the picture since I was driving and had remained, during this entire time in the driving seat.)
The long and short of it, after all the facts had been considered during the court hearing, including positioning people relative to where the i pad had been left on the table. The verdict was announced. The judge (me) ruled at the start, as is normal protocol, that previous misdemeanours involving Mr Kirit Patel of forgetfulness/absentmindedness will not be considered by the court. The evidence had to be considered and the verdict was given, based on ‘beyond reasonable doubt’. All involved conducted themselves professionally, although on a couple of occasions I did have to call ‘order’ and gave a general warning I will not tolerate misconduct in my court under any circumstance -
In summing up, a verdict of ‘Not Guilty’ was returned based on two crucial points:
1) Importantly the prosecution agreed with the defense, that in the car, if at any time in the past Mr Kirit Patel used the i pad to take photos, he would immediately hand it back and so on this occasion the defense claims he did not have the i pad in the first instance, to take out of the car.
2) Crucially, another witness was missing from the cross examination, Mr Bing and without considering his side of this incident, an element of doubt becomes established. Additionally, since the defense had insisted, it was Mr Bing who could have removed the i pad from the car, together with all the other formal documentation he had to show the police official – this is an important, missing link, in giving my final judgement.
This Court is adjourned – Had a great laugh over the scenario acting.
After this exhausting secession we spent the day in Kathmandu, centre, just relaxing and walking around. Apart from this morning’s detailed discussions, we had had a pretty manic past week and so it was good to sit quietly somewhere – we chose a roof top cafe.

Click here to watch some of the streets

We also spent some time at a Holiday agency, booking activities and places to see in the next few days in Kathmandu. Tomorrow we are travelling to Pokhara, we have also planned a fly over Everest and Himalayas and Water Rafting – Should be fun.

With a holiday activity agency,booking activities for the next few days.
Typical streets of Kathmandu below:

Lots of bits and bobs on sale.

Cafe ,where we spent the afternoon – interesting to see the mangled up electricity cables.

Our hotel for two nights.

A new dimension is also going to be added to our travels. Some of our partners are joining us in a few days, for the Kathmandu part and some also continuing with us by road, to complete the final stretch in India. Then homeward bound.

Couldn’t stay in bed late, even if I wanted to – scene outside my hotel bedroom, work had already started at 7.30am.

Tight narrow street – just this one!

Our journey to Nepal begins.

When we woke up in the morning, we were full of expectation that we were going to leave Tibet/China and cross the border into Nepal. The first checkout point was a doodle, they had to check the vehicle papers, which had already been checked tons of times before. Then a query that the engine no’s in two documents do not marry up, false alarm, they had made the mistake themselves.

We drove to the next checking point, still on the same narrow single street which had now extended several miles. You can imagine the chaos, with stack of lorries queuing to get out of Tibet. One good thing was that it was a Sunday.

At the second checkpoint, we had to wait for some important documents to have been signed at the previous checkpoint (which we couldn’t bring with us, because the official who was meant to have signed it, was not at the building – probably because it’s a Sunday! I hope you are managing to follow this, just trying to illustrate something that can be quite straightforward but was made so complicated.

Bing was now starting to give us information that indicated we may have to stick around another day, because the official may not even turn up. We were quite a long way from any decent hotels, turning around was physically not an option, so the dread of spending the night possibly in the car was starting to slowly get us down.

This second checkpoint was a hub of activity, it’s funny how at any border we have visited on our trip, there is an overlap of nationalities and how they subtly but distinctly change. In this case the dress and facial appearance was more Nepalese and less of the rugged, country looking Tibetian, although we were still on the Tibetian/Chinese side.

From this second checkpoint you could see the Friendship Bridge, this is the bridge we have to cross over once we have finished the passport and customs formalities on the Chinese side.

Anyway good news thankfully soon prevailed with the news that the relevant papers have now been signed and were on their way. We cleared customs and further vehicle formalities and were on our way to the Friendship Bridge (fifty yards from the second check point). Crossing into Nepal was a pleasure, things just suddenly felt a lot more friendlier and relaxed.

The drive to Kathmandu was fairly torturous – with narrow, very bendy roads. Overtaking was risky and timing had to be right, I should know, I drove most of the way to Kathmandu. The additional minor complication was we have a LHD vehicle and from Nepal onwards we were now driving on the LHS – complicated, yes it was initially, because you had to get your head around it.

The route itself was very scenic.

Apparently there seems to be a lot of Bungy jumping activity in Kathamandu and we were lucky enough to witness a few. May be, I can be called a coward, but no thought on my part to attempt it!
Kathmandu is quite a big city, fairly clean and seems to be built around luscious hills. Can see lots of European tourists. After the restrictiveness of China, seem to feel as if we are back to some form of normality.

China was an excellent place with lots of friendly people, but you can see the prevalence of the iron fist ruling the country. With such high security in most towns and cities we visited and additionally all those check points we had to go through – nightmare!

Stayed in a good quality hotel, thanks to wifey (the hotel belongs to her friend, who she studied with over thirty years ago).

Picture of the 1st check point.

The long line of truck waiting for customs clearance – this is on a Sunday!

Official taxis for the town – the only efficient way to travel in this town.

The chaos.

Life continues – everything taken in their stride.

Distinctly new look, especially the nose piercings.

All below near border crossing with Nepal – but still on the Tibet/ China side.

Not an easy life.
Can be fun.

What are you looking at grandad?

This was an actual scene on the border. Chinese official with the gloves about to do do some examination.

More photos of Locals

Distinct difference in clothing now apparent.

 
Women having a cig. – no I didn’t go and counsel her on smoking cessation.

Scene before we had cleared customs,our LC would have to go through this inspection.

Scene after we had cleared customs – where you see the Guard on duty is the start of the Friendship Bridge.

Waiting for our vehicle to come through.

Saying goodbye to Bing – our guide for the last 3 weeks.
No way would we have been able to travel China without him – well done, such a nice guy.

Crossing Friendship Bridge – having cleared Chinese immigration.

Chaos on the Nepalese side – but a lot more relaxed .Hard to imagine how people live such contrasting lives, in the space of 200 yards.

Getting our Carnat sorted out – by some wheeler dealers. They did get the job done.

The bendy roads to Kathmandu. Get it wrong and quite a big drop.

Bungy jumping time – ( for others) .

Click to watch bungy jumping video 1

Click to watch bungy jumping video 2

You pay extra to ride on the top – scary.

A few photos, driving to the city – Kathamandu.

Local street scene on our way to Kathmandu, the temperature must have been over 30 degree C, that’s why the woolly blankets are at half price. Great to see fresh fruit and veg once again.

Map of border crossing into Nepal from Tibet/ China (Zhangmuzhen).
Have travelled a long distance – one more country to go!

Today by the morning, we needed to leave as soon as possible, because although spending time next to the the highest point in the world, was the greatest thing ever, our overnight Yurt accommodation, like all the others at base camp, was extremely basic. I think when we woke up at about six, the temperature inside must have been a numbing 2 to 3 degrees C. Outside with the chill factor with the wind must have been at least -5 degrees C. I did get up at about 5 am to use the outside loo – I had to go! Boy what an experience and best left at that. A mettle shed which from the outside looked ok, but from the inside, two rectangular shaped cut outs in the floor into which you do the business (sorry, trying not to be too descriptive), with a hole, which by no means was very deep – that’s it, about this topic.

We were out pretty sharply, on our way to Zhangmu – the border town from which we will be exiting China/Tibet into Nepal the next day.

On numerous occasions, I have mentioned how beautiful the scenery is, somehow maybe implying it is better than in previous places or areas. It would be unfair to suggest this is the case, because there is a uniqueness in the beauty we have encountered, whereever we have travelled to and whichever area. Today was no exception and again what we encountered, the further we travelled southwards was a complete contrast to, not only yesterday’s unique views but I think it contrasted with the scenes we had encountered during the past month. From desert barren lands and mountains with snow to today, a green valley full of vegetation.

Final morning photos of Mt Everest – well below zero.

The offending loo to the left of the above photo.

Off we go into the snow……

Click Here to Watch the Video of the Road

Even after leaving Base camp we encountered some beautiful mountain scenery.

A peril, thankfully we missed.

Click Here to Watch The Video of the Road

Tibetan colours tied at an auspicious place. Don’t know how they managed to tie these ones.

There’s a bit of monkey business that has been spotted in the vicinity.

Kirit posing in front of the greenery.

Monkey business in motion……

Click here to Watch Video of Monkey Business