Friday, 05 December 2008
Today is shopping day for Scott. So we wandered through Thamel and he bought a scarf, North Face Goretex Jacket, Mammut reversible fleece and some Oakley sunglasses. The two jackets were only AUD$70 for both, not sure if they are real (probably not) but they are made well and exactly what he wanted for the trip. I bought nothing (yes I know shock). I will be doing my shopping when we return to Kathmandu.
We had lunch at one of the rooftop restaurants in Thamel taking in the warm sun which is lovely. Amazing that it is so warm here.
After lunch we caught a cycle rickshaw from Kathmandu Durbar Square to Patan which is an old Buddhist town originally on the trade route from Lhasa to Kathmandu, although now it is a part of Kathmandu which is a huge sprawling city. Patan was one of three independent kingdomes in the kathmandu valley, but now is a suburb of Kathmandu. The Durbar Square is made up of temples, palaces and golden gates and massive scultpures. As Nepal was never colonized there are no western influences. The temples are not for show and are actively used by locals.
To get there we had to cross the Bagmati River which just seems to be a total swamp these days, with the slums only being divided from the river by small community gardens. The river levels have dropped to such a low level that the hydroelectricity plant can’t make enough electricity so power here is only available for about 45 hours per week and that is at random intervals.
The cycle rickshaw driver dropped us close to Patan at the bottom of a hill, obviously thought it was too hard to push two lardy ass Australians up to the top.
On arriving at the Patan gate we had to pay a tourist fee to visit the city – very strange. Anyway it connected with a walk in the lonely planet, so we headed off in the usual wrong direction, however, stumbled across a golden temple (Kwa Bahal) which was beautiful. Although to get in, that was additional – start to get the idea about Patan, everything costs entry fees.
We continued wandering through Patan which has a lot of beautiful Newari architecture, something has has gradually been demolished in Kathmandu except in the older parts. Patan itself is a world heritage site, so there are extensive works continually keeping everything maintained.
We wandered into Durbar Square which also contains the Royal Palace. This square is stunning, it is full of temples, stompas and shrines. It was built at the start of the 14th century and yet again it required an entry fee, but we managed to avoid it. Kathmandu’s Durbar Square is very touristy, but Patan’s Durber Square is a working square and is the main commercial district for the area so it makes a change to see it as a working square full of local people.
We finally finished wandering around as the light started to fade so we caught a taxi (given up on cycle rickshaws) back to Kathmandu and then wandered back to the hotel where we got organised and headed back into Thamel for a lovely dinner of thukpa and momo’s (Tibetan food).