Patan

Saturday 26h
Patan
8am had breakfast at the Third World Restaurant, strange name but nice sunny rooftop overlooking the Durbar Square.  Its good to be here early morning before its too busy, most tourists day trip here from Kathmandu so we've beaten the crowds by a few hours.  We try the walking tour of the city from our Lonely Planet guide book, we like to play a game of spotting other tourists who are doing the same which is normally quite easy, just look for westerners clutching a book and looking confused.  We take lots of wrong turnings from the map in the book but in Patan that only leads to new discoveries round every corner, there's a multitude of shrines and temples down every little side street and weird alleyways such as the one I accidentally led us down with an open air abattoir  and blood splattered butchers stalls displaying every known animal part including ghostly looking goats heads, intestines, trotters and big chunks of meat being hacked apart by cleaver wielding butchers.  If I wasn't already a veggie this would maybe tip the balance, we're probably a bit too fussy over hygiene in our country but when you see animals being slaughtered and skinned in a dusty alleyway next to the drains and stray dogs wandering into bloodstained butchers shops its a bit of an eye opener.  Anyway where was I?  Oh yes, there's a mixture of Buddhist and Hindu monuments which can be found everywhere, through every doorway, in every courtyard down every street, there must be more shrines and temples than there are people.  After a good day exploring we sit in Durbar Square for a while, it seems a very social place, lots of local people relaxing and chatting around the steps to the temples.  We chat to a boy who likes to collect foreign coins so we give him some loose change, he says he wants to visit London to see Big Ben.
Walked to an area called Pulchouk to find some cafes and restaurants we'd seen on our map, it seems a more affluent area with places serving European food, a popular place for expats apparantly.  We have a cup of tea and a snack in the most typically Nepali style place we could find, a place called 'New Orleans'.  The bill for snacks is more than any of our meals since we've been here.  We check out a couple of places to come back and eat at tonight but I complain to Bec that they are too nice and don't serve enough Nepalise food, I'm like a reverse snob, I'd rather eat in a dark little cafe where I cant understand the menu but with it being hard to find places to eat in Patan we end up at a place called Yala Layeku Kitchen overlooking Durbar Square, a bit of a Nepali themed tourist restaurant but a good compromise.  We had a Newari set meal which turns out is dal bhat on posh plates, its good food but doesn't beat the dal bhat we were eating up in the mountains.  I was going to say its pricey but Bec reminds me its about £15 for a meal for 2 including beers and quite rightly tells me not to get hung up about it on our last night.  By about 9pm nowhere is open and nothing is going on so there's not much else to do except go to bed.
Paws for thought
For all the stray dogs on the streets you'd think there would be canine chaos with barking, biting, chasing, fighting and pooing.  Infact the dogs just calmly mooch about or sleep on the roadside.  Tonight I watched 5 dogs casually strolling around together occasionally  stopping to chat, looked like they were whispering at times, maybe planning something.  A doggy revolution is brewing, the scabby dogs are plotting to take Kathmandu.....

Bhaktapur

Friday 25th
Bhaktapur and on to Patan
Up and out to explore Bhaktapur by 8am before all the day tripper tourists arrive in a few hours time.  We started off in Durbar Square and checked out the impressive buildings, temples and shrines whils having to repeatedly brush off the wannabe guides
"I can give you all the good information"
"No thankyou"
"I will guide you for only 200 rupees"
"We dont want a guide so tanks but no"
"Right now you are in Durbar Square and infront of you is the palace built in...."
"No! stop following us! We dont want a guide!" etc. etc. etc.
Anyway, moving on, most of these buildings are many hundreds of years old and they're certainly not just relics for tourists posing for a new profile pic, its all still living and very much in use.  The imposing grand size of everything is just as incredible as the fine detail of all the stone work and wood carvings that adorn the palace, the temples and all the statues and shrines.  As we walk away from the square and explore the city we find shrines and monuments dotted about everywhere.  a wrong turn down a dark and dirty side street is likely to be hiding an elaborately decorated Ganesh shrine.  There's the usual scabby stray dogs, chickens pecking about, the odd goat rooting through some rubbish and even a few buffalo being herded through the edge of town, it all adds to the ancient but lived in feel to the place.  Yes its old and dirty but it still feels grand and impressive.  We take a look at Potter's Square where there's thousands of clay pots laid out to dry in the streets and then go in search of some traditional yoghurt shops.  I try some proper local curd, its served in a little clay dish for only 30 rupees, tasty!

Late afternoon we collect our bags from the guesthouse (along with more hilariously confusing conversation with the genuinely nice but totally insane 'Robin Hood') and head off to the local bus station.  local bus for 25 rupees or taxi for 500 rupees? gotta be the bus with the locals, its easy to do and i like seeing a bi more of real everyday life.  Just like yesterday the bus is quite crammed but still a fella hangs out of the door shouting "Kathmandu, Kathmandu" and bang the side of the bus for the driver to stop so he can pull more and more people on, its amazing how many people you can actually fit in a bus if you try!  Patan is a short journey just south of central Kathmandu, its dark by the time we get there which makes the task of finding a guesthouse a bit more difficult, we find a place near the centre called Cafe de Patan, they show us a room by candlelight due to a powercut just as we arrived, it looks fine in the dark and we're not too fussy anyway, just glad to find a room.  Tomorrow is the last full day then we fly home on Sunday.

Exploring Kathmandu

Tuesday 15th. In the morning
Exploring Kathmandu
Currys eaten - 1,  momos eaten - 10,  yeti sightings - 0
Went to a rooftop cafe called Helenas for breakfast, Bec had pancakes and I asked for an Indian breakfast not knowing what I would get although correctly suspecting curry.  Yum, curry for breakfast with chapatis and roti bread, great way to start the day.
Went to find out how to get to Pokhara tomorrow which turned out to be easier than expected, bus tickets are 500 rupees which is about £4 and its a 7 hour journey starting at 7am.
Guided ourselves on a walking tour through the medieval looking streets of Kathmandu old town passing by rows and rows of little shops, temples and shrines with incense and butter lamps burning, holi men covered in red and yellow paint, scabby stray dogs chasing past, rickshaws rattling along and people carrying ridiculously large loads strapped to their heads.  It feels like there's too much stuff for my eyes to look at, its a visual feast and my brain is gorging itself.
Right now as I'm writing this we're sat on a rooftop overlooking Durbar square eating vegetable momos (a plate of stuffed dumpling type things) and I have to say this delicious taste sensation may start a new obsession.