We all See More Of Kathmandu

Previous page - Sacred Valley Inn, Kathmandu

 

Jeremy’s cold is worse

Jeremy reckons he woke up more than 20 times in the night. His head, chest and throat felt awful. I dug around in our luggage and found our cold and flu tablets and he took a couple. After a while he nodded off to sleep. We all had a late breakfast up on the hotel roof garden. Jeremy said he could only handle fruit salad. Ian and I opted for poached eggs and they were perfect.

 

Jeremy gets a private escorted tour of Katmandu

I mentioned earlier how well we all got along with the young staff at Hotel Vajra. There is a receptionist there who spent a lot of her day at work looking as if she was bored silly. Jeremy had spoken to her several times in the lobby and had been trying to help her with her limited English. They had exchanged email addresses with a promise from Jeremy that he would help her with the language when he was back in Australia too.

 

This lovely girl contacted Jeremy at breakfast to say she had to come into Kathmandu for something or other and would he like her to show him around for a few hours. Sick as he was, Jeremy decided he would go. Ian and I thought he would have been better off taking the day quietly but he assured us he would buy some cough mixture and a big box of tissues on the way somewhere and off he went. Later on he told us he was actually craving for the company of someone his own age. I guess in Bhutan he associated with Kinga our guide who was close to his age but here in Kathmandu all he had for company were us two oldies.

 

 

 

 

The photograph to the right

Over a period of two days we watched this building being painted. There is a large bamboo framework which is being held in place, by hand, by the man up on the roof. He is secured to the steps by a rope. The painter appeared to have no safety harness whatsoever. It also appeared the bottom of the framework was not attached to anything either. The painter used a roller which he dipped into a large pail of paint. We never saw how he ascended or descended the framework but each step up (or down) was chest high. Imagine moving around within the framework with your large pail of paint! It would seem near impossible but he somehow managed it.

 

Ian and I head back to Durbar Square

We thought we had better have another look at Durbar Square seeing as we had to disappear from there quickly last time when the guards got a bit nasty with us. It was a fair old walk back down to Durbar Square but we had to go pretty much in a straight line so we didn’t get too far off the beaten track the second time around. We made sure we paid our 300 Rs (about $3.50) to the man at the gate. We won’t ever make the mistake of not seeing or paying the ticket man again!

Despite the heat we had a pleasant wander around and got more photos. It would be wonderful if someone thought to put some benches in Durbar Square. There is a lot of leg-work involved in seeing the place and many of the folks there are quite old. Just having a seat to rest on for a while would give a  person energy to walk that little bit further. Walking there and back we were constantly approached by sellers of everything under the sun

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lunch on the roof at Sacred Valley Inn

Ian and I lunched up on the roof garden back at the hotel. Lots of places here have roof gardens. They are such a wonderful idea. I wonder why we don’t have them here in Australia?

If we had flat roofs we could all have solar panels up there too. The roofs would have a dual purpose. We both had refreshing salads for lunch. From up high we thought the sky in one direction was clearing a little. We really had wanted to see mountain peaks and not hazy pollution day after day.

 

 

 

 

Next page - The Garden of Dreams

 

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