International Guest House Kathmandu

Arrived at Varanasi airport real early and spent the time "eating" the remainder of our Indian currency as its illegal to take it out of the country. The plane was booked with tourist groups mainly from Europe all going to KTM for aobut 4 days then returning to Delhi. There were signs around the airport (which is tiny) advising that if you are approached for bribes please report it. We then spent the next couple of hours watching the group leaders of the tour groups pay off everyman and his d...

The next 4 days relaxing and eating in Pokhara... Arriving back late afternoon we took Rame out for a thank you dinner. He'd been the perfect porter guide and we hope he has a good future doing what he loves. He'd told us that he'd wanted to do this work since he was a boy when he'd read of Hillary and Everest. I think that's why he's so good at it. Many of the locals are doing it purely for the money and have no love of it. Rame sees it as a profession and takes all aspects of it seriously. ...

We returned to the International Guest House for 2 nights and luckily met up with Kimberly (who was with us on the Intrepid tour of India. We knew she planned to stay at IGH too but as she was doing the Annapurna Circuit trek it was uncertain if we would end up at the hotel at the same time. Arranged to meet Kimberly and her friend Blair for dinner at 7pm. Good night with great Thai food. (although cost a bomb by Nepal standards) They'd had a ball in Nepal but like us they had not been able t...

Caught the "local express bus" back to Kathmandu which meant it only involved picking up at 'proper bus stops" but did drop off at any requested spot and did involve fitting about 50 people into the bus AFTER it was already full - quite fascinating to watch actually. Everytime you think 'yep thats it they cant possibly take any more people"..... 10 more get on plus bags, food, cargo keeps squeezing on... amazing really. Its especially amazing when Ive got a protected position in a seat but no...

Who would want to spend 6 hrs on a bus on their birthday? I suppose it beats spending the whole day on your own by a pool in Marrakesh in 40 degree heat.

We had to go via Chitwan town so that someone could collect money from the bank that has been transferred. The strike seems to be over as there are plenty of vehicles on the roads. I read in the paper this morning that around 9 vehicles had been burnt on sunday by Maoist activists during the strike and one of those was an ambulance. Kathmandu, Nepal tiggerbird

After spending 5 weeks in Indi*, we felt th*t we needed to give out *w*rds for some of our unique experiences of Indi*. So we welcome you to the Roome F*mily Choice Aw*rds! These *w*rds *re, in our opinions, the bests, the worsts, the weirdest *nd the funniest memories th*t we needed to record *nd sh*re with YOU! Th*nk you for re*ding, we hope you enjoy... Nicest Hotel room: Mr. Butts Cl*irmont Housebo*ts, Sri****r, K*shmire Worst Hotel room: Am*r Y*tri Niw*s, Agr* Cr*ziest drive: Dh*r*ms*l* ...

The plane left Kolkata on time. The plane arrived in Kathmandu, Nepal on time. The excrutiating long time it took to get through immigration with the visas where they only deal in American dollars was a bit of a nightmare... but whatever, we got through and it was great to be here. Visibility was poor on the flight so we were unable to see the Himalayas to the right as we landed. As we left the airport it all of a sudden struck me that it wasn't 40 degrees anymore but a more comfortable 24. A...