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NEPAL
December 2000
The Kingdom of Nepal is a tourist paradise. It has the Himalayan
trekking, river rafting, historic places and friendly people. Good
food, beer and handmade crafts are available.
In the forests of Royal Bardia National Park we followed
tiger tracks, on foot this time. No luck! Also found no one-horned
rhino but saw the funny gharial crocodile with bulging eyes and
long narrow snout.
It was mid winter (December) but warm in the Terai valley
parallel to the Himalayan foothills. The road was built up high
above the rice fields. Suddenly Jan swerved violently to the left,
nearly off the high embankment. A cyclist had shot out of a side
road without looking. Evasive action was of no avail. He hit our
vehicle on the side and tumbled off the bicycle. We stopped at the
next police barrier, where we three had to remain, behind locked
gates, for 25 hours. He was taken to hospital. Family members came
and village councillors and other policemen. Eventually they
signed a statement that he was completely to blame, but we could
still not leave.. After a visit to the hospital where he was
recovering from concussion, cuts and bruises, we settled on an
amount of money to cover medical costs. This was to avoid being
detained for maybe weeks until a court case could be heard.
We continued north and soon saw the magnificent Himalayan mountain
panorama. Pokhara is the centre for trekking in the western
region. The Anapurna range is the great attraction. Walks and
views and lakeside camping with Swiss friends were sheer bliss. So
was Jan’s first steak in 2 months. Fillet steak from the
supermarket was a very reasonable US$2.00/kg (R15.00/kg). Cattle
are not allowed to be slaughtered at all in Nepal, so beef is
imported from India where it may be slaughtered for export only!
The views and breathing in Kathmandu was not so good.
However there was much to enjoy, like Buddhist and Hindu temples,
pagodas and palaces, buildings decorated with woodcarving, Ghurkha
soldier traditions and knives, cheap Internet and a variety of
good restaurants. When we got away from the city air pollution, Mt
Everest was still not visible.
We returned to the Terai valley towards the east of Nepal. We
entered India where the tea plantations of Nepal and the famous
ones of Darjeeling meet.
BHUTAN
Tourist visas are restrictive and very expensive. (For 2 persons:
US$460/day). As the immigration post at the one border town,
Phuentsholing, is 5km inland, one can walk into this small
Buddhist country for a day. We saw intricately decorated buildings
and watched people in hand-woven traditional dress. India almost
surrounds it but high Himalayan peaks in the north divide Bhutan
and Tibet. Unlike in Tibet, the Buddhist culture is actively
promoted. Traditional Bhutanese artistry is supported by all; also
by the King who, we read, had married 4 sisters in 1988!
BANGLADESH
We had obtained our visa for this Muslim country in Delhi. We
lined up at the border with hundreds of trucks loaded with rocks,
from India. (This flat, flood plain country has no stone. Rocks
and bricks are hammered into gravel by hand, for road and building
construction)
The main roads were surprisingly good for such a poor country. The
many buses travelled at great speed and we and the many rickshaws
speedily made way when the hooting missiles approached. Road signs
were in Bangla squiggles only, but some individual could always
point us in the right direction (though we would only set off if
at least 2 people pointed in the same direction!). Tourists are a
rare sight and people crowded around us, sometimes for most of the
night, where we were parked at a filling station.
In spite of the population density (3 times more populated per
square km than India, which has 1 000 000 000), the air was clear
and the countryside green. Large rivers provide irrigation for
rice, sugar cane, jute and palm oil, but also cause disastrous
flooding.
INDIA (cont.)
We went into India again and travelled from the tea estates in the
north to Konark, south of Calcutta. An interesting ancient
temple and a nice beach there was our Christmas treat. Orissa
state is famous for textiles and bags decorated with small
mirrors. In Andrah Pradesh there were many roadside temples and
large painted deities like the popular elephant and monkey gods.
The 2000km from Calcutta to Madras, once again was ‘running
the gauntlet’ of Indian traffic. We saw several human bodies by
the roadside; apparently killed in accidents but ignored by the
passing throngs!
By New Year we had reached Chennai/ Madras. Very few
Overlanders seem to come here, so no company or revelry for us. By
then we had learned to avoid the “poisonous” Indian beers with
names like “Godfather”, “Bullet” and “Black (K) night”!
“Kingfisher” standard, was drinkable. We had pleasant parking in
the garden of the Youth Hostel. We could not find the usual
willing hands, so had to use the laundry facility provided, a
concrete slab next to a tap. At a small shack on the street corner
we could have ironing done for a few rupees.. But the biggest
bonus was Indian classical music in the YH grounds, next to us,
for 6 evenings.It
took Jan more than two weeks and much commuting by auto rickshaw
to arrange the shipping to Malaysia. (while Leoné took in some
more temples). We flew ahead to Kuala Lumpur. Then there was a
dock strike in India and what should have been a 4-day voyage
turned into a three-week wait…
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