Nepal

As the travelogue says"Nepal is a land of snow clad peaks, lush green valleys, jungles and forests" to which I would add dusty towns, temples and many small abodes of mud brick, stone and wood scattered throughout the countryside.
It is quite different to Rajasthan and Kathmandu is a quieter (relatively), cleaner (relatively) and with less obvious poverty than Delhi. We travelled on roads for most journeys where ancient buses and trucks ruled rather than cows; their exhausts contributing to the pollution especially in Kathmandu itself. Progress is slow especially on the hills where landslides and flash floods have damaged the roads (road signs with pictures of trucks falling over the edge are frequent!) In rural areas overloaded carts, animals and people provide further hazards as do school children who seem to be on their way to or from school at all times of the day. The fact that they are wearing new uniforms suggests that the country is placing more importance on education. Although the President is a Maoist some sort of coalition seems to exist and there is a general attitude of 'wait and see' politically. Hedges and walls are less evident than in India but where walls exist they are unsurprisingly made of river-boulders. These general impressions of Nepal have been dictated by Iain..I am now going to briefly tell you what we've actually been doing.
We were only forty minutes late with the train from Varanasi so we were in plenty of time to catch the Kathmandu flight. We met our guide Arjun at the airport and he took us under his wing and was extremely helpful throughout, as was our main driver. We stayed at the Yak and Yeti - very plush and expensive by Nepalese standards but comparable to an ordinary hotel price wise in the UK. We visited the main Durbar square of Kathmandu which contains many temples with wonderful wooden carvings around doors, windows and roofs. We collapsed back at the hotel and after a bowl of soup (too tired to eat!) we were asleep before 9pm.
We then visited a couple of famous sites around Kathmandu - one Buddhist temple site and monastery on the top of a hill and one Hindu with many stupas and temples which also had burning ghats on the river banks where they were cremating their dead. We also visited a lived in mediaeval town where many of the original buildings and temples remain or have been restored - very atmospheric and interesting.
The following day we had an amazing drive through spectacular scenery to Pokara where we stayed at the Fishtail Lodge on the edge of the lake. Very beautiful and great views of mountains when it's clear. Unfortunately we hit a cloudy day when we got up at 4.30am to go and climb for half an hour to a viewpoint where we should have seen the sun rise over the mountains so we didn't! It even rained a few drops in the afternoon!
Our next drive was equally fascinating (the last 7 Km by landrover through 3 rivers!) - to Chitwan National Park where we stayed in a jungle lodge - rooms okay but no electricity, although we did have showers which sometimes ran warm. It was a friendly place in a beautiful situation.
We did 2 elephant safaris but didn't see any rhinos although others had seen two the day before. Surprising lack of animal life (and insects, thankfully). The canoe ride down the river was great but not long enough! Walks with the Rangers were good but again we didn't see anything apart from birds, deer, wild boar and a crocodile.
We flew back to Kathmandu yesterday on a 20 seater plane and had another early start this morning to fly to Everest and back at 6.30am. We didn't get as close as I thought we were going to but Iain took some good pictures of the really spectacular mountain range as we flew past.
Apart from a 24 hour bout of the runs we've been reasonably lucky so far but Iain has now got a cold and a cough (which he thinks he caught from me) and is irritating him somewhat (he says a lot!). We hope you are all well and we'll update you all when we next get access to Broadband!
Lots of love Ann & Iain