Nepal

Excerpt from my travel journal, September 6, 2006:

My first experience in Nepal was driving down to the border on the Friendship Highway from Tibet. Although I knew better, I held the image that Nepal was entirely mountainous like Tibet. I was completely surprised by the dramatic change in scenery and climate as we dropped off the Tibetan plateau and down towards Nepal's northern border. Immediately reminded that this is a tropical country, I sat awestruck in the back of our Land Cruiser as rough brown hills devoid of any shrubbery for the grazing goats and yaks quietly transformed into a thick and lush jungle with steep cliffs and powerful cascading waterfalls that washed the Tibetan dust off our windows. I though out loud that this is how I expected much of South America to look, but not what I thought to be a strictly Himalayan country.

By the time we had reached the border, monsoon rains pelted the windshield with heavy, unrelenting drops. Passing through customs and obtaining a visa completed, we piled into a tiny truck to drive a short distance to reach the cab we agreed to hire. The steep road downhill was full of mud and we drove quickly over the large bumps and holes with our car often bouncing high off the road and throwing us in the back around like the untethered passengers we were as if we were traveling over a flood of bowling balls. I very much enjoyed this adventurous drive, stuck in the back seat next to and as often on top of my Spanish friends. That is, however, until we got into our propper cab for the 4 hour drive south to Kathmandu and I found out that the bone-shattering bumps we endured work just as well at shattering LCD screens on digital cameras...

Driving into Kathmandu after dark on Saturday is madness. When empty, I imagine the main highwas into town would appear to have 6 lanes, 3 in each direction. However, as we drove in, I discovered bicycles, scooters, motorbikes, taxis, SUV's and buses shared the road and the presence of lanes, indeed even coherent general directions of traffic, vanished into pure exhaust-filled chaos. I'm glad I wasn't driving.

We got dropped off at an ATM to withdraw money with which to pay our driver, and then awkwardly ran through the re-energized monsoon for a few minutes to our hotel. Arriving soaked to the bone, I was led up 5 flights of stairs and offered a single room with shared bathroom for 150 rupees (2 $US). Exhausted and drenched, I layed out all my damp belongings and lay myself on the 1 inch-thick foam mattress relieved to be finished with this leg of the journey, but so far unimpressed with the capitol city.

[My impression did improve in the daylight]