Ordered chaos is the name we can give for Nepal. People are living the life of no borders, like in a good way.
That chaotic system on the roads is so interesting for us. We spent 3 days walking, driving by cab or a bus and every time it makes us wonder - why there are no accidents? :) Probably, because they have to be very careful on the road and today we understood that there is a connected TRUST and EXPERIENCE between the drivers. Love it!
Everything began in the airport, we bought visa for 35 euros per each. The airport is not really big so it's easy to find everything. After we took our baggage, we went to catch a cab. The drivers wanted to take about 800 rupees to our hotel in Thamel (about 5 kilometers) but Yan told that 500 rupees is the top, so they agreed.
We stayed at Hotel Nepalaya with very lovely service, delicious breakfast on the terrace and very kind staff. The price for 3 nights was 5800 rupees. It was about 8 pm and we were starving, we needed to find something really fast. The staff recommended us the hotel with a restaurant nearby. Decided to try it.
Guys, the kitchen was very good. I think pictures will show it. 1700 rupees for lunch (2 mains and one dessert)
This place got very close to our hearts, because we met a couple from Russia, so we started to talk and hours went by. They had experience in Kathmandu already, so they shared with us and it really helped. After that we accidentally met each other in other restaurants every single time and even on the street. Is that a sign? :) So that was day 1, absolutely new, interesting and exciting.
It was like the business day for us. We needed to get permits for trekking the Annapurna circuit and to buy some missing stuff for trekking. So here is the price for everything we bought.
Our Friday started with a lovely breakfast and a taxi ride to a famous Monkey temple, then to a Boudhanath Stupa. Actually, we even lost the counting of the days and it is such a good feeling to feel free and a bit careless at the same time.
So we had a luxury taxi ride to a Swayambhunath Stupa (means lord Buddha temple) known as a Monkey temple. Some club music playing on the loudest, opened windows with wind in our hair and a sunny weather of course :D And this all only for 400 rupees for more than 5 kilometers.
We arrived around 11:30 am and saw a lot of stairs in front of us... to be correct 365 stairs. This time of the day was really crowded I would say, shouldn't even be like that during the working days. As a driver said, it was some kind of a holiday today.
The entry of this place was 200 rupees for one person, but if you are smart enough you can use another entry (not the central one) to get in for free.
We were going up and up and with every step there were more and more monkeys and market shops. I guess that is why they call it a monkey temple..dozens of monkeys are living there and being not really friendly, but very cute at the same time.
365 stairs were done and then the big stupa of Buddha appeared. Let me describe you what did it look like.
It has Buddha's eyes on each of the four sides and eyebrows painted on. Between the eyes there is a painted nose. The main stupa represents Wisdom and Compassion. Despite the main stupa, there are a lot of small statues of Buddha. You can also find a lot of shops there, where they sell a lot of local souvenirs, you can find restaurants and hostels as well. Very important thing is that you need to go clockwise, otherwise everyone will be looking at you like at weirdo :D
The second sightseeing place we went to was the Boudhanath Stupa which is one of the largest spherical stupas in Nepal, about 36m.
We went there by cab with our friends and the cab's price was 500 rupees for 5 kilometers from Thamel (center of Kathmandu). Luckily we didn't have to pay for entry because there were like 4 other ways how to get there for free.
Need to mention that this place was crowded at 4 pm in the afternoon because of holiday, as I said before. If you want to go there, you better choose the morning time.
If you go to any stupa in Nepal, you will see a lot of prayer wheels and prayer flags, quite interesting things. Apparently, Buddhism is about a lot of colors.
It was so beautiful to get there by sunset. I called it the golden hour, these colors were so inspirational. The purpose of visiting this place was a lot of good quality photos. Decided to try myself in portraits, need to admit, I truly got into it.
What about you? Are you a city or nature lover? :)
Extreme hugs to you.
