Greetings from Nepal!

So it's been a while since I last sat my ass down and wrote a post! We're currently in Kathmandu, Nepal after completing our stay in India and our tour of Rajasthan. To get you up to speed I'll give you a whirlwind tour of what we've been up to.

My last entry was the day of our journey to Udaipur on the sleeper coach. Sleeper is an optimistic way of looking at it, as the ride is so bumpy and the cabins so cramped and uncomfortable that the only way you're getting sleep is if you're off your face or a local. In the 8 hours we were on the bus I managed 2 sweaty hours of fitful sleep at the very end and woke up disoriented on an empty bus, save for Adam sound asleep next to me. We quickly grabbed our gear, disembarked and grabbed an autorickshaw to the Hotel Krishna Niwas. The hotel was beautifully decorated by the owner, a miniature painter by trade and you can read a little about him here http://www.hotelkrishnaniwas.com/biodata.htm.

I won't go into detail about what we did on a day to basis in Udaipur, but I'll summarise a few of the places we visited; The City Palace and its amazing views across the city and its adjoining lake, the cities temples which as with the others we've seen were beautifully crafted and the local markets. A couple of days into our stay there we hired a taxi in the evening to take us up to the Monsoon Palace which overlooked Udaipur. We took in some amazing views and watched the sun set across the hills, probably our 5th such spectacular sunset but still as wonderful!
We took a late afternoon boat trip on the lake where you could look at the temple from the James Bond film 'Octopussy' however its a 5-star hotel, so looking is as close as we got. As we were in the famous setting for 'Octopussy' we decided to watch it at a local restaurant over dinner. The food was wonderful as it had been across much of India, but the film sucked!
Our final activity in Udaipur was a day excursion to Kumbalgar Fort which was quite an experience! Our taxi driver was 5 times as mental as the guy who'd taken us up the hill to the Monsoon Palace and the 2 hour journey there felt like a death ride to hell! The chap had no regard for the price of life, be it human or livestock and on many occasions almost ended up with a bumper souvenir! As the wides became narrower and windier and the ride more intense I retreated further into the comfort of my MP3 and the perfect soundtrack 'Auberge' by Chris Rea. Despite this most harrowing of journeys, I was still able to appreciate the beauty of the countryside we were traversing. Between vast areas of dry, arid semi-desert were pockets of lush green flood plains, fed by almost dried up rivers or buffalo powered wells. The fort was amazing as are all the forts in India! Again we were treated to splendid views across the surrounding hills after which we had a light lunch and prepared ourselves to get back in the taxi.

Lets just say that the rest of the day was spent thundering along narrow, twisting country roads, dodging construction traffic, livestock and locals. In between this, we stopped at a famous temple somewhere outside of Udaipur, which was again exquisitely carved. The only real notable experience I took away from there however, was a brief fight I had with a female monkey who wasn't too keen on being photographed! I say that was the only notable experience because after a while, the temple's all taken on a distinct similarity and without the signage you come to expect as in English tourist locations, their meaning and significance is greatly reduced. We could fork out for guides but half the time they're full of shit and cost the equivalent of half a nights stay at a hotel! Perhaps India's ideas on orchestrating a more structured, informative approach will develop as the 2010 commonwealth games approach but who knows. Across nearly all of the places of interest we've visited since arriving in India there has been reconstruction work of some form, obviously in light of the impending games. I sincerely hope this redevelopment continues and the sites maintained after the games, as many of the places we visited were merely empty shells in a very poor state of repair.

Anyway, during our last couple of days in Udaipur we booked our flights to Nepal and booked ourselves onto a sleeper coach to Jaisalmer, right out on the edge of Rajasthan in the desert. It goes without saying that we were hugely excited to be heading to Nepal a couple of weeks down the line and it helped us swallow the bitter pill of another upcoming bus ride. We set off at about 20:00 after meeting up with half a dozen other westerners also huddled at the bus stand. The cabins were the same as before and instead of trying to sleep, I contented myself with watching the city slowly being replaced by a beautiful starry sky as we thundered through the mountain roads and out towards Jodhpur. At one point as I stuck my head out of the window, I could see the other buses and lorries snaking their way through the windy roads, which was a simply amazing sight. Needless to say I didn't get much sleep and after a bus change at Jodhpur and 6 more hours on the road we arrived in hot, sunny Jaisalmer.

As with any arrival, anywhere in India, we were swamped with blokes wanting to drive us to their designated hotel of choice to collect their little bit of commission. However I was so tired I ignored all of them, collected our bags and stumbled to an autorickshaw of my own choice! Me and Ad crammed our gear into the back, tearing the strap on my bag (later fixed with the eternally awesome duck-tape) and squeezed in. We arrived 2 minutes later at the Hotel Golden City where we stayed for the duration of our visit to Jaisalmer. Ad went in and haggled for the room while I sat and spaced out with the bags whilst the auto driver fired off the standard questions (what country, how long you stay, have you already booked your room) to a few grunted responses. After dumping our bags we had hot showers, which by now had become a hugely welcome luxury! We discovered that a couple of American girls we'd met on the bus were also staying at the hotel and a couple of days later we headed out into the desert together on a camel safari. Had it not been for Ashley and Kris, Jaisalmer would simply have been hot, sandy and the camel safari just a little more than bearable. As it was we had a hilarious time in Jaisalmer and the camel safari although thoroughly uncomfortable and at times a little difficult, turned out to be a very enjoyable experience.

We opted for the 2 day safari, which for your information is plenty! The first day we jeeped to a couple of temples, then met up with Bilal our camel guide and his mate Banoj. After mounting with surprising ease, we headed off into the blazing sun. After a relatively short period on our camels, say an hour of so we stopped for lunch beneath a tree. Here Bilal cooked and sang while we chilled with the local livestock which was more than a little eager to get its share of our food! Once we'd finished our delicious vegetable curry we set off in the slightly more pleasant afternoon sun through a couple of villages and into the dunes where we stayed the night. Before falling asleep beneath the most brilliantly clear blanket of stars I have ever witnessed (shooting stars included) we were treated to a half hearted performance from local musicians, the highlight of which was the guy playing the castanets wearing a special forces combat vest along with traditional gear haha. We spent the night chewing on our fair share of insects and awoke the next morning to sunrise over the dunes!

Day 2 started pleasantly in the early morning cool and then as we progressed through both time and distance things began hotting up. Bilal started us trotting for the first time, which was a much more comfortable ride but only possible across a few stretches. After a while as comfort levels dropped along with the conversation as people began focusing their attentions to blocking out the pain, we turned to our various mp3 for distraction. It was a pretty surreal stretch of the safari, bumping across barren terrain to the sounds of The Beastie Boys and Rage Against the Machine, but it certainly kept my mind off my sore posterior. At lunchtime we arrived just next to a small fresh water lake, where we ate another vegetable curry and snoozed for a little while. After that Banoj took us to the lake for a swim. The water was lovely and cool, but we couldn't help wondering whether we were due to be struck down by some awful ailment some days later! The lake bed felt like 2 day old custard and after a while a group of locals turned up on tractors to extract some water, politely telling us to get out of their drinking water! haha. Needless to say the thought of defreshening ourselves on another ride didn't at all appeal to us so Bilal simply got on his mobile phone (yes, there's signal everywhere here) and phoned for the jeep.

The next few days were spent, eating, sleeping, drinking, swimming (hotel had a pool!) and organising our exit from Jaisalmer and India as a whole. We headed out from Jaisalmer at 17
:00 on the sleeper train to Delhi, billeted in 3rd class sleeper. The girls however had managed to obtain 2nd class sleeper so after a few games of cards in our more spacious little 3rd class area, we upgraded to 2nd and slept like babies until 07:00 the following morning. Our bed time was dictated by several fat, grumpy old local chaps who got on at Jodhpur and convinced me and Adam that 3rd class really wasn't the place to be!

Our arrival and subsequent hotel search in Delhi was quite a fiasco. The drivers at Old Delhi train station were a royal pain in the ass and after watching two rickshaw drivers almost club each other to death with a brick and plank of wood, we decided to get going asap. We managed to grab 2 pre-booked autorickshaws and I rode in the 2nd with the baggage. If you want to visualise our journey, think something from The Bourne Identity. Weaving in and out of traffic at high speed whilst trying to keep track of the others in the first autorickshaw was no mean feet and after almost loosing, then rejoining group 1 with an almost CIA-like skill and eagle-eye vision we made it to the hotel.

As Ashley and Kris were departing for Dharamasala that evening we dropped off our gear and headed to a surreal little American Diner in the grounds of Delhi's Habitat Centre, which looked something like the London Barbican Centre. After good food and drinking games, we crammed into an autorickshaw, me sitting across all 3 and sped of to Old Delhi station. After farewells we headed back to the Hotel Bright for the night. Now the only way this place can legally say it was bright was because it was lined with flourescent lights, besides that the place was a dirty, overpriced shithole! Our last day in India was spent posting off goods back home, exploring the very westernised Connaught area of Delhi and buying various bits and peices for our travels. After one final fitful night sleep at the hotel, we jumped in our 03:3 taxi to the airport.

Now I have to say our exit from India was pretty uncool. We arrived at the airport around 04:00 for our 06:30 flight to Kathmandu and by the time we'd finished being fucked around by pretty much everyone 'working' there we only just got on the plane 10 minutes prior to take off. Check-in was populated by fat, smelly people with huge bags and 1 brain cell to share, then the x-ray staff took a dislike to doing their job with any speed whatsoever, following this we had to queue for half an hour to get through passport control, manned by 5 semi-functioning people and finally we were treated to the gormless nut-scratchers at the final security search before the departure lounge. Total time to endure the severe retardation that swept Delhi's International Airport that morning was 2 hours! That said the flight was most pleasant and I reclined with my breakfast whilst watching 2 hilarious episodes of Spongebob Squarepants followed by the soothing voice of Sir David Attenborough and 20 minutes of BBC Planet Earth. Our arrival in Kathmandu therefore, was a nice little counteraction for the stresses of our departure!

So now I find myself here in Nepal, writing this post after what has been pretty much a week of just pure bliss. I can't impress on you how wonderful this country is, from the people to the scenery. Besides the 3 day trek we did just outside Kathmandu, which was amazing, we've been residing in the Thamel district of Kathmandu, enjoying both the day and night life and have decided our stay until early next month. We've done alot here already but I feel this post is already far too long. Fear not for you shall be informed of the delights of Nepal before our departure but for now you can enjoy the photos I've been taking along the way. Below you'll find a list of links to my facebook photo albums to date which you can access even if you're not signed up. That's all for now. Oh and if by chance you have read this post, please drop a little hello!

India.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=18675&l=a9624&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=19285&l=2d096&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=19287&l=1a13e&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=19289&l=bf52e&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=19289&l=bf52e&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=20402&l=1971c&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=20405&l=26bac&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=20407&l=41be6&id=507573769

Nepal.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=20888&l=5643d&id=507573769
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=20890&l=33976&id=507573769