10-7-19 - Nepal is full of surprises
Day 113. Kyle & Leanne joint blog.
As the and Nepalese guides are not allowed to cross the border, we have to leave Bemba in Tibet and meet our new guide once we are on the Nepal size. I have texted our travel agent to ensure a smooth handoff. It was a little surreal walking over a bridge in a magnificent valley with stunning views. Justin checks off Nepal in his Been app as he’s stepping over the mid-point border on the bridge. Ashley jokes that she just time traveled 2 hours in the past with the time change.
Once we step off the bridge, it becomes chaotic. There are about 15 other people crossing with us and we are greeted by a large group of people yelling and waving their arms. I was told our guide would have a sign with our name but no signs in sight. A German couple we’ve befriended quickly finds their guide as does everyone else around us it seems. An official looking person stops us and asks for our passports so Kyle hands over the stack of seven. The official promptly walks into a building and disappears. “Great, now we have no guide and no passports,” Kyle points out. We proceed to go through the security check-point which is not an x-ray machine but a person who opens your bag and dumps everything out on the table to sort through it. Let’s just say, it’s not an easy feat getting our bags packed in the first place so we have now effectively shut down Nepal security while we repack and re-assemble all our bags.
Finally a Nepalese man taps me on the shoulder and points to a phone screen with our seven names on it. Finally, our guide has located us. Given that our group accounted for about half of the border crossing group, we’re not sure how he couldn’t locate us for the last thirty minutes but are glad he has now. We actually have two 4x4 jeeps and two drivers so we split up into four and three people and get the bags loaded in.
We are about to get in and take-off when Leanne shouts out, “WAIT! We don’t have our passports!” Kyle has completely forgotten about them and looks around in confusion. Justin has told us that a large number of people at the border waving their hands were drivers offing rides to Katmandu. Now Kyle’s look has turned to panic as he says, “I can’t remember who I gave the passports to but it could have been one of the “drivers” hawking rides.” If this is the case, our identify has already been sold on the dark web and we might never make it out of Nepal.
We enlist the help of our guide and after 10 minutes of hold-your-breath panic, the official emerges from the building with our seven passports. Waves of relief course through us and our passports are the single most indispensable item that we would be totally screwed.
We are in the Jeeps and set-off for Katmandu. “What happened to the road?” Kyle asks the driver. He looks quizzically at Kyle and says, “There is no road, sir.” No paved road but also the unpaved road is more of a mud pit from a Monster Truck Rally. Bemba told us it’s 120 kilometers from the border to our hotel so we’re figuring ~3 hour drive. “How long a drive to Katmandu?” Kyle asks. “7 – 8 hours plus breaks,” he responds. Taking one look at the road (or lack thereof), we know we are in for a long day.
Five minutes later, we pull up to the immigration shed. This is where all Kyle’s advanced preparation is supposed to pay off. Nepal requires a tourist visa but you can get a visa-on-arrival. Kyle has read it can be quite time consuming and with seven forms to complete, Kyle has spent hours filling in everything electronically in advanced. He figured out how to upload our pictures, submit the application, get the visa-on-arrival, have it printed out and everyone sign it. It prints with a bar code so you are supposed to just present it, they scan it, you pay your money and off you go. In theory anyway.
Our driver says that since we have the print outs for everyone, only I need to go up. There are three windows and a chaotic group of people. Kyle is waiting on what appears to be the main line for a while when the driver calls for him to go up to the window next to it. As he’s passing by, two women launch a tirade on him, “we already have our visas, we just need a stamp! We…just…need…A…STAMP! Get back, get back behind us or else!” “Ummm…my driver just called me over to him, I really have no idea what’s going on here,” he replies trying to defuse the situation. “Oh yeah, and when you’re not too busy screaming at innocent tourists, try taking your HAPPY PILLS next time!!!” Kyle roars out. Ok, actually he didn’t do that but in a way, it would have been funny if he had.
After said crazy visa stamp women have departed, Kyle ends up on a line with a computer. After 5 minutes of observing, Kyle determines these are people who have not done the visa-on-arrival in advance and they are filling out the forms from scratch at the terminal. Kyle calls the driver over and shows him the forms and says that he thinks that he’s on the wrong line since he already has the visa forms. The driver goes up and discusses with the window clerk, hands over the passports and visa forms and motions me up. Finally, progress.
Kyle settles into his position in front of the window and after about 15 minutes someone dumps the passports on the counter behind the window. Kyle watches as six people are running around behind the window, yelling, printing, stamping and our passports sit their abandoned. After several fruitless attempts at Kyle trying to tell someone behind the window that we just need to pay and be on our way and after watching an entire group of people who got there after us and have filled out their form on the computer terminal, Kyle gets the driver back over to figure out what’s going on. After waiting 30 minutes at the window, it is determined that the border crossing check-point does not have a scanner so my forms are useless and I’ll have to start all over and fill out everyone’s forms on the computer terminal.
When it is finally Kyle’s turn at the computer terminal, he scans his passport, fills out the visa form, has his picture taken by the computer and submits it. One down, six to go. Kyle is in the middle of processing Ashley’s form when the computer prompts her to stand and look at the camera for the picture which results in the dawning realization that he needs everyone there for the picture but they are all the way back in the parking lot. Kyle frantically sends the two drivers back to get everyone. Kyle is stuck waiting at Ashley’s camera screen for her to show up when he starts to hear mutterings and grumblings behind him. He sneaks a peak and sees about 10 people on line staring back looking none too happy.
The guy behind Kyle says “what’s the problem, just take the picture already.” Ut-oh. Just like the Incredible Hulk, Kyle turns from happy, go-lucky tourist skipping across the bridge border into super frustrated, out-of-patience, let’s see you travel with five kids green monster tourist (who not incidentally makes the visa stamp tourists look like the Dalai Lama). “Excuse me, I filled out 7 visa-on-arrival forms in advance so I wouldn’t have to go through this process. Did you complete your forms in advance? No, I don’t think so. Is it my fault, the border crossing doesn’t have a scanner? If I had known, I would have bought a $50 scanner and brought it with me. So if you have an issue, you should march right up to the window and tell them you’re tired of waiting because they couldn’t be bothered to get a $50 scanner in the 21st century after I wasted 5 hours filling out their damn forms!!!”
By now, Leanne shows up with the kids and marshals Kyle into the time-out corner to let him cool off. Having been sufficiently reprimanded by Leanne and with the mild-mannered Bruce Banner have replaced the Hulk, Kyle returns and flashes a smile to the couple and says, “sorry about that, I’m having a bit of a rough go with this overland border crossing thing today.” Meanwhile the couple has let another couple in front of them as a protective buffer just in case the green Kyle Hulk Tibetan monster decides to make an encore appearance.
Ok, so two hours into Nepal and we’ve gone 1 kilometer. Forget ten hours, Ashlynn surmises that this might take ten days to get to Katmandu.
As our drive beings in earnest, we are introduced to the less developed country of Nepal which experienced its own Civil War a bit more than a decade ago. It’s monarchy —the last Hindu monarchy— ended in just 2008 and its constitution was just ratified in 2015. The aftereffects of the devastating 2015 earthquake are immediately noticed in its infrastructure both from the lack of roads and undeveloped villages near the mountain border.
They two young drivers were true professionals carefully navigating rough dirt roads in up to 3 feet of mud in places as if they were on a 10 lane smooth freeway in California. We are bounced up and down on the seats for hours on end. We start at the top of mountains and traverse down to the valley floor to incredible green lush vistas that our cameras can’t even properly capture.
One thing that stood out were dozens of colorful mini-tracker trailers, Tatas, with huge wheels parked on the side of the dirt road. They are colorfully painted as if they were left over from the 1970s flower power children. Several trucks display a huge window sticker exclaiming “Buddha was born in Nepal,” an apparent source of contention with its neighbor India who counter that Buddha achieved enlightenment in India. Both countries are predominantly Hindu so we haven’t quite figured out why they are still arguing over the Buddha 2,000 years later.
The drive was so tough we try to remain silent as to not interfere with the driver’s concentration. We drink in the beauty of the valley that reminded us of Jurassic Park. Kyle is convinced that a T-Rex is right around the bend about to descend to the valley floor and have himself a nice midday tourist snack. We scoot through mountain villages that felt like we were driving through Nepalese living rooms as the local as are all near the street living, connecting and going about daily rituals. Some are playing, collecting water or showering in the many waterfalls we literally drive through. We see children swinging on bamboo swings that we learn made specifically for tomorrow’s big festival.
There’s a bit of fear on our faces. Sometimes when we get to a better part of the road, here comes another bouncing dozzy that reminds us that this road IS our adventure today. And we are living on a wing and a prayer as some song goes.
One Jeep stops to allow Corey, Justin and Kyle to hike out to a beautiful view of the river and valley below us. The mountains unveil countless rice terraces that help feed these villagers making them nearly self-sufficient. We see the beautiful Mountain Views the Nepalese mountain villagers drink in each day and understand immediately why they are so happy. Living so close to nature and loved ones.
After 10 hours and a quick lunch, we arrive in Kathmandu with its many colorful concrete buildings. It is obvious this city is challenged economically, infrastructure-wise and undeveloped by modern standards. The traffic is absolutely crazy with mopeds zipping through large trucks and vans with maybe a two inch clearance. Somehow the Nepalese have created a hidden driving etiquette rules between pedestrians, large vehicles and motorcyclists that allude us but work out somehow.
We arrive at our hotel that our tour company booked. It is absolutely gorgeous and a huge step up from some of our Tibetan hotels. We wanted to rename Hotel Shanker to Hotel Swanky!
We meet of Nepalese guide Deepak at the hotel and he walks us over to dinner which is a local Nepalese meal with a cultural show afterwards. We sit Indian style on cushions on the floor at the table and are treated to many rounds of small dishes of chicken, dumplings, fruit and rice. The cultural show entailed three people playing local instruments carved out of wood and two dancers who changed magnificently colored outfits every song.
Our first day in Nepal was hard to process. Like many countries, we were not sure what to expect upon arrival. On one hand you have this grand majestic natural beauty of lush green trees and mountainsides, rushing rivers, sheer cliffs and waterfalls. On the other hand, you have poverty, lack of infrastructure, overcrowding and the still visible effects of the destruction from the 2015 earthquake. To put it in context, there are 5 million people in the city of Katmandu which is more than the entire country of New Zealand or Croatia. Nepal is definitely not what we thought before we arrived but we are so glad we are here so we can see and show our kids a dichotomy we haven’t seen before.