Planet Bhaktapur Hotel

... and yet I failed so impressively to get a single decent photo. Defeated we headed to Bhaktapur via another beautiful but hair-raising country road.<br><br>This small town of 75,000 has about 1100 years of history and has several very old and ornate temples and monuments. As well as this the place has many local artisans showing their trade and a very calm and pleasant atmosphere. A ...

... cool.<br><br>Mike's Entry.<br><br>Katmandu was fast noisy and the craziest traffic I have ever seen and I've been some places with crazy traffic. I know a couple of my friends who hate stupid drivers would have hoarse throats from screaming at thes idiots. I'd like to go on about the the traffic, like cars playing pedestrian dodgeball and I will later but I'm in Bhaktapur ...

... quite convincing so I went along with it. To be perfectly honest I would never have seen half the sights if I had ignored him so he was worth the fee I eventually paid him, which was less than £6 for more than 2 hours. However, I drew the line when he told me he was a qualified massage therapist and would be happy to ease my aches and pains from trekking!!<br><br>I bade him farewell and retreated to my room. Eventually I decided I should venture ...

... to catch the tourist bus.... I arrived 5 hour later. However, while I was on the bus journey I met Rose from Ireland who is travelling alone for the summer doing much of the same path that I am and she had some amazing advice about going to Tibet to see Everest instead of going from the Nepal side. We hit it off and had a great chat on the bus. We decided we were going to do a different trek altogether the Jomson trek....<br><br>to be continued....

... people of Nepal's Kathmandu Valley, they are a linguistic community with Tibeto-Burman and Indo race, bound together by a common language.<br><br>Bhaktapur is a place of vibrant culture and centuries-old traditions are still in action as people were busy making their simple livelihoods, very fascinating to observe. Also, it was a welcome relief to find that traffic has been kept out of the main part of town making for a pleasant atmosphere. Bhaktapur's Durbar ...

... everything dry. However, they were oblivious to their living conditions, and it was sweet to see how proud they were of their neatly made beds, wall posters, and of each other. At one point I found myself surrounded by several of the middle school-aged youngins and they were telling me how they were one big family - when a little one falls down everyone rushes to help him. There's even a system where the older girls are assigned to take care of a couple of ...

It has been two weeks since I've been home, and I still think that the past three and a half months were the best of my life. I am not only incredibly proud of myself for getting out there and doing something that genuinely terrified me, but I&#8217;m ecstatic to have had the experiences that I have had. It was by no means easy, but I had the support of thirty six fantastic, funny, diverse, kind, caring and wonderful people to help me through it. I genuinely felt like part of a community ...

... one of the largest in the world and on first sighting your eyes are immediately drawn to the whitewashed dome and it's top on which there is a harmika, a gold-coloured square block sparkling in the sun that depict the watchful eyes of the Buddha. the eyes gaze out in four directions. The question mark like symbol underneath them that looks like a nose is actually the Nepali number ek (one) and is a symbol of unity of all life. There are thousands of ...

This is Kathman Two: the part when Kelley joins me. And you'll notice that the photos are a lot nicer; that's because Kelley took them with her fancy camera. <br><br>Kelley and I might have overdone it on her first day. It started out very mellow, having a late lunch with my friend Neil (from the slideshows). We then walked and walked and walked to Swayambhunath, also known as the Monkey Temple. My nonsense guidebook describes it as a 'pleasant walk ...

... of the people from the Sherpa tribe have the last name Sherpa. <br><br>I'm not sure what Limbu does for a job; he used to work at a school, and he has lots of connections with Westerns who hire him as a guide or translator. Limbu has a particular expertise in butterflies and birds. Limbu also takes in a lot of children who live with him and go to one of the local schools. Many of the kids come from towns that are far away and don't have ...