Up Up and Away!

After meeting with my guide Genjin outside my hotel we catch a taxi to the bus station.  It turns out that this is merely a road where buses stop and tickets are brought.  After a short wait and seeing the sun come up over the horizon our bus arrives.  It is small rickety and has several people on the roof and even more jammed inside, I just about fit into my seat.  Our route takes us through the mountains. Winding narrow roads, steep drops and a Nepelese driver who looks about 17 do not fill me with confidence.  It is not long after I have been assured by Geljin that the driver knows these roads like the back of his hand that we smash head first into a minibus.  We have no choice but to wait for the police to arrive, this takes about an hour and a half and the road is completely blocked the entire time and there are lots of people milling about inspecting the damage.  The scenery is beautiful, there are worse places to get stuck.

Once the police arrive it is a matter of seconds for them to make a decision and everyone jumps back into there vehicles and continues on with their slow and bumpy journey.  All along the mountain sides giant steps have been dug out, these platforms are used for building on, growing crops and building pools for fish farms.  By the looks of the houses the fish farms seem to be the more lucrative than crops.  Nearly every house along the way is the same, large stone walling and a corrugated iron roof weighed down with large rocks.

W stop for lunch at Dhunche and I have the first of many Dhal Bhats.  This is a Nepelese dish of rice, black dhal and vegetable curry, it is very good indeed.  The same cannot be said of the rest of the journey, it takes hours and the bus seems to somehow just get more and more full at every stop, at one point the person I am sitting next to has a baby thrust at her, a crazy way to travel. We finally reach our hotel in Syabrubensi just after 18:00.  I order some momo's and curry for dinner, after eating I let it settle before heading to bed, I have an early start and a lot of walking ahead of me tomorrow.