Day 20: Kathmandu

Today was a lazy, mostly uneventful day.  We didn’t have anywhere we were supposed to go, no destinations, projects, or necessary activities.  I’d build this extra day into our schedule to ensure that we were safely in Kathmandu, in case the bus broke down from Pokhara or some other disaster befell and delayed us: I didn’t want to miss our flight home!  Happily, our travels met no such calamity – except for a brief scare when we heard that all the taxi drivers were going on strike today, as well as a great many businesses in the area: after further inquiry, my informant, a smiling and chatty English-speaking Nepali, said the strike should only last today and we shouldn’t have any difficulties getting to the airport in the morning.

This spare day wasn’t as enjoyable as our rest day in Tatopani, because there was no comparing that lush, tropical vacation destination to the noisy, congested, smog saturated city of Kathmandu.  We decided to go for a walk to find breakfast and we found a quiet, plant decorated place called Revolution Café and enjoyed our last Set breakfast as we sat under their awning-covered patio/alleyway and watched trekkers and motorbikes navigate the narrow street.  Since we didn’t have anywhere to go after breakfast, we window shopped to waste time and wandered up and down every street in Thamel.  I decided I must own a pair of the flowing harlequin pants I saw on every third female trekker that passed us, so, with a mission now, we stopped to shop every single clothing vendor – there were dozens upon dozens of them.  Lunchtime arrived and we returned to our hotel to spend a lazy lunch on the roof balcony, eating fries, drinking hot cocoa, and watching the flow of pedestrians and bikes and carts on the street below us.  Our food was edible, though I believed we would get sick, because I was sure they were not properly boiling the water used in our drinks and to cook our meals.

These birds were everywhere and have a horrendously annoying caw.

Photo fail: my camera took a self-timed photo and started to fall off the table. Yes, totally eating fries with toothpicks.

The water tanks breed confidence, right?

After reading and napping in our room we hit the even more congested streets to shop and find dinner.  I eventually gave up my pants mission, finding nothing long enough to fit my body, so we navigated back through the twisting, branching streets to the popular Roadhouse Café to try their famous woodoven cooked pizza.  The place was packed full of people, but we managed to score a table on their back patio and within eyesight of the ovens.  It was an entertaining place to people watch and listen to all the different languages represented, but the service was lousy and the food, while tasty, was expensive.  We finished our meal, lingered, waited for our bill, asked for our bill, and waited some more.  Hoping to draw our not-that-busy waiter’s attention, we stacked our dishes like the leaning tower of Pisa: it did not have the desired effect.  Finally we stood up and pretended to leave, which immediately garnered his service.  We made our way back to our hotel just as darkness was falling over the still bustling city, climbed the three flights of poorly lit stairs to our room, and prepared for bed.  Earplugs were a must.