| Nepal 1 | |||
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Let's cycle to Kathmandu (07. - 23 April) |
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| Sadhu smokes special plants | We cycle through the Terai | ||
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| The eye of the Buddha | We meet another tandem!!! | ||
Speed to the borderOn the last morning in India we take it easy: Only 30 Kilometers to the border to go. The friendly Tibetan family prepares Tsampa for us. We quite like this traditional Tibetan food. After departure, we quickly lose 1300 Meters in altitude into the hot plains of India. But we go down too steep and our disc brakes are starting to smoke so we have to make several brakes. Unfortunately the -supposed to be- shortcut to the Nepalese border does not lead us where we want, therefore we have to go back and take a detour over the dreadful Indian highway. As we do not know when the border would be closing we race the remaining 40 kilometers nearly without a stop to the and we reach it in time! The border would have been opened even to 7 pm. We get a stamp by the custom officer, then we cross a long bridge and we finally arrive in Nepal :-) |
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| whether the two also go soon on world trip? | Man in the mountains | ||
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| Mandy with our hostess Nirjala | Roadworks in Nepal | ||
Welcomel to Nepal!To get a visa for Nepal is so wonderfully simple: You need 30 dollar (well THAT was not completely so easy, see report India 8), a passport photo, you fill out the form on arrival, and after 20 minutes you get the visa into your passport. Also we change some money in the border town Khakarbittah and invest part of it straight away in some tasty Chowmein Noodles. We hardly trust our eyes and ears, when we cycle on the one and only Highway through Nepal: The horns are actually quieter and drivers seem to notice even bicycles! Travelers who arrive straight from Europe to Nepal normally think the traffic is here is terrible, but for us it is almost like heaven. In a village a young woman smiles friendly to us, so we just go there and ask her if we can camp on the school next to her small shop which is no problem! On the next morning they even bring a tee to our tent, and we pack everything together under the curious eyes of the children, who want to help us eagerly.And the next invitation of a sixteen-year-old girl already : We get offered tea and cookies in her house, and we talk her father and uncle, while she and her mother remain predominantly outside. She is like as many young girls in Nepal a big fan of the singer Avril Lavigne, and an enormous poster hangs in the living room beside various family photos. In the morning then we cycle next to forest areas, and spend our lunch time in a small pretty road restaurant in the company of the likewise 16 year old Sophia and her sister. We laugh much together and extend our Nepalese vocabulary. She even offers Mandy to rest herself in their room because Mandy does not feels very good. In the evening we ask the owner of a house whether we may set up our tents on its property and we are spontaneously invited into their house. After many years in the service of the British army the Nepalese owner is now retired. He speaks English with a britsh accent and accepts us as guest, although he does not really want to understand why we travel such a long time. We are in any case very gratefully for his hospitality! "I want to be back in Nepal!"Compared to the day before we notice now some changes: The beautiful forest now has been chopped down, there are no more flowers in front of the houses, and friendly smiling locals are also not there any more. Also the climate is different, and it appears to be much warmer than the day before. From one day to the other everything seems to be completely different. Also the locals again stare at us, hardly someone greets us and we feel again to be back in India. Before approx. 50 years Indian refugees moved to Nepal and settled large parts of the plains in the southeast of Nepal. We try to camp at night in "India" at a local school. There are still many pupils and teachers there, who let us set up our tents on the lawn. The Indian headmaster invites us also directly into his room to drink a tea. But however the things he says is not very nice. He is an English teacher and “regards it as the duty being an Arianperson to teach the stupid Nepalis”. To redundantly say that we finish our tea quick and hope to soon return to the areas with the friendly Nepali people. |
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| Beggar at Buddhatempel | Buddhastatue at Buddhatempel | ||
Going to OkaldungaThe morning of Easter sunday we spend in a natural reserve and we spoil ourselves with a nice breakfast. But first of all we are making plans to escape “India”. One possibility seems to be doing a shortcut to Kathmandu by taking some trekking paths from Okaldunga. It might be that we also have to use some horses to do this way, but that sounds far more interesting than cycling on the warm, crowded and boring highway. Let’s go! So we leave the road direction north and go at first over some little mountains to the small town Katari Bazar, which looks like one you know of wild west movies- only balls of straw are not flying around. There we rest for one day, because we feel still a little bit exhausted after our cycling marathon in India. We find out that the road from Okaldunga to Kathmandu is not paved, but that is not the problem. The night before we want to start there is one of the most heaviest storms we ever had experienced in our life. Every second flashes enlighten the sky accompanied with a restless roll of thunder. The little river from the day before is swollen now five times big and we change our plans, because it would cost to many time to wait until the tracks are dry. So we go back to the highway and cycle again through warm climate and destroyed landscape. The jungle next to the road is destroyed by fire and we travel next to dry fields without trees, that could give us some shade. It is so hot by now, maybe we better think not of how the climate will be in june! But fortunately we can escape in the shade of some mango trees and stay there and sleep until the air cooles down. |
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| Dinner with the family | Festival: The rain God is called! | ||
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| Prayer flags | The goat is being carried! | ||
Into the mountains!And already soon we come into a nicer area: To both sides of the road, which is meanwhile quite bumpy, a large hardwood forest spreads. In the evening we set up our tents in the forest together with Jean Philippe. What a long time it has been since we camped "wild" the last time! But this forest is still a little bit, because the trees are still standing, but the bushes seem to having been burned down. But we have a peaceful, although a quite warm night, until we get on our bicycles early in the morning. Today we must go into the mountains, because we have to cross some passes to the valley of Kathmandu. Slowly it begins to go uphill, and in the snail speed we torment ourselves on the rise.We are very glad, when we reach the city Hetauda and enter a good restaurant at noon. We are extremely hungy and order nearly the whole menu from A to Z: Soup, then Pizza, fries, Spaghetti, salad, ice cream and coffee. Great, that did well, and without feeling too full, the cycling up the mountain goes much better! In addition the scenery becomes more beautiful, and slowly it goes further uphill in a river valley. On the right and left the mountain-slopes rise steeply. But the road is not too steeply built, and it can be cycled well. That we have hardly any traffic makes the ride even more pleasant. In the zig-zag bends children run beside us for several minutes, and call "give me a pen" or "money, money". Otherwise the inhabitants here are very friendly to us, and everything here seems to works somehow more calmly than in the plains near the more hectic main highway. In a nice clearing on half height we can set up our tent. From Bennys diary: Wednesday, 14.04.07 At half past 6 we rise, pack and continue to ride uphill. But I feel totally weak! What is only the matter with me? Otherwise I like to cycle in the early morning without having had breakfast, but now I have no power at! When a spoke breaks, I have at least the possibility to sit and rest for a while. But sometime we must ride up the mountain anyway! Finally there appears a small shop, where only I eat three packs of cookies. Afterwards it goes better, and it gets even better and. At noon we reach finally the pass - after four hours cycling an an average of 6,9 km/h! Only we ride down a little bit on the other side, in order to settle in Daman. We sit down in a cozy Nepalese restaurant, and find at the wall a picture of - we can hardly trust our eyes – a winter hill scene with a VOLKSWAGEN and the "bergisch" railway in Winterberg near our home in Germany. A Nepalese girl starts talking to us, says, she saw our bicycle. We start chatting, and she is called Nirjala. She also likes riding Mountain bikes, and has even won some races in Nepal! With her family as well as an acquaintance from Pakistan who came for the weekend we spend a nice evening together, before we say good-bye - and Nirjala invites us to her familys home! We gladly accept the invitation! |
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| in Sofias restaurant | loaded bicycle | ||
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| evening sky over Nepal | chicken dances on the table | ||
Agony and mountain idylOnly a daily ride separates us now from Kathmandu. So that we will not lack the power, we have a big breakfast in the beautiful mountain viewpoint restaurant. Unfortunately it is a little bit cloudy, so that we cannot see Mount Everest today. But later the sight into the surrounding valleys is gigantic during the downhill. The hills are terraced to fields, and idyllic villages lie on our way through the next valleys. First we have to go 10 kilometers downhill, then 10 km uphill, then 30 km downhill again, before we must climb again 8 kilometers to the last pass before the valley of Kathmandu. On the long downhill we hardly trust our eyes: Another tandem comes up the hill! Antoine and Stefanie from France tell us that they rode since August 2006 from Moscow toward central Asia, Iran, Pakistan, India and Nepal. Since it is not allowed to enter from Kathmandu individually to China/Tibet, they take a Jeep to Lhasa and hope to be able to cycle back with the tandem. Many photos are on their Internet side under: biketrip2.aliceblogs.frAfter the long departure the peace is unfortunately gone, because traffic increases strongly. In the Diesel soot of the trucks and buses we push our bike up the slope. The last pass we reach only in the dawn and therefore must enter Kathmandu in the dark. But compared with Indian city traffic here it is still nearly pleasant. Thus we are pleased much, to reach at eight o'clock the house of Nirjala and her family, where we are welcomed wonderfully! |
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| Claude and Nathalie try the pino | View on agonies and joys of a cyclist | ||
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| French beside Nepalese Rasta man | in the mountain restaurant is a picture of: Winterberg - with a VOLKSWAGEN and the bergisch railway! |
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Family TamrakarIt is always beautiful to be welcomed so much in a strange city, especially like the nice family of Nirjala does it with us. We even receive an own room for the time of our stay. And constantly they give us tea or some food to eat. The local food they eat lots is mostly Dal Bhaat, the Nepalese national dish: Rice with lenses, in addition vegetables and sometimes hot Chill’s. Proudly Nirjala shows us the photos of her successful Mountainbike races. Already 40 cups she won! But also her father shows us not less proudly his cash note and coin collection from all of world. He has even a 2-Rupien coin from the German colonial age in German East Africa (today Tanzania) of 1893! So we have the possibility to rest with this family and get a bit of Nepalese culture, while we organize everything here for our further journey.KathmanduWhat a modern city – is our first impression, coming from India. Many shops struggle for the money of the inhabitants and tourists. But everything is exceeded still by Kathmandu Thamel, the quarter where most of the tourists take accommodation. Equipment shops, restaurants, favorable hotels, Internet cafes, travel agencies and Souvenir shops are all over the place. But it is quite a good place for us to organize our equipment for possible cold days and our tandem for bad runways in Tibet. Also we have to organize the visas for our journey back to India and Pakistan. In addition we meet many new cyclist friends, and with the two dutchmen Peter and Karin we spend some beautiful hours. They are already for 5 years on the road with their bicycle, and they just came from Tibet to Kathmandu. Altogether we no less than 10 world cyclists, with which we chat for hours and gather valuable information. We will probably need at least 4 months on advice of the other cyclists, in order to master those approx. 5500 kilometers of gravel and corrugated roads in Tibet. Thus we must hurry a little bit in order not to be in Tibet in winter. Therefore we have May left for India, and June remains for Pakistan, until we then hopefully can enter China on 1 July. But first we are in Nepal. In Kathmandu still some stuff has to be organized before we will then continue to the beautiful city Pokhara and the Bardia national park in the plains. From there we will also send our next report. Up to then all the best for you at home or on the road! |
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| Lights for the rain goddess | world cyclists meeting | ||
P.S.: Why continue from Nepal to India and Pakistan, if we want to go to Tibet?Well, Nepal has a border to China, but from Nepal it is not allowed to individually enter China/Tibet, but only in a group and with a travel agency. First of all that would be expensive, and secondly we would have to take a jeep or an airplane to Lhasa. We do not want both. Thus we must cycle back to India. India however does not have a border open for tourists to China (the north) or Myanmar (the east). Thus only the way back to Pakistan remains for us, because over the Karakorum Highway one can enter relatively problem-free individually with the bicycle to west China into the Xingjiang province. And in addition our route leads us past Dharamsala in northern India, the seat of the Dalai Lama. Moreover we see the impressing Kharakorum Highway, and a dream might come true when we will cross Tibet from west to east. |
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| < back to India, part 8 | continue with Nepal, Part 2 -> | ||