Pokara – tourist place in Nepal
MORE ABOUT OUR ENTIRE ROUTE AND THE WALKS WE MADE IN NEPAL – see HERE.
To the previous travelogue for Nepal – TRUE ADVENTURE WITH BUS AND TREKKING THROUGH THE HIMALAYAS
After the incredible experience with the small plane, which you can read about in the previous travelogue, we found ourselves at the airport in Pokhara, from where we set off to look for the hotel we had previously booked. However, our hotel room turned out to be quite miserable by my standards and very dirty. We talked to the host to cancel the reservation, but Booking.com had charged an $8 cancellation fee, which we agreed to pay rather than sleep under such conditions. Well, the price of this accommodation was 13 BGN/night. After that, for 20 BGN/night, we found a much more decent hotel, Fewa Holiday INN. We were accommodated on the fifth floor in a room with a balcony and a view of Annapurna and the three eight-thousanders. The room also had a huge double bed and air conditioning. Unfortunately, the water in the bathroom was not hot; we even had to take a bath in another room once, where there was hot water…
BE CAREFUL when choosing a hotel in NEPAL!
A little later that day, we gathered with the other two girls from the company, who had rented another sleeping place with a view of the lake. However, it turned out that both for them and for us, the hotels lie a lot about the photos. For example, they were supposed to have a nice green yard with ryegrass, and it turned out to be concreted and have an amusement park, and their hotel has no yard at all.
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Pokhara is the second largest city in Nepal and is more tourist-oriented than Kathmandu. It is also the place from which the largest number of treks start. The city also offers activities such as rafting, paragliding, a micro-flight, kayaking, and many other things.
On our first evening, we took a walk along the central street, which was lined with numerous shops, tour agencies, and restaurants. Then we headed towards the lake, where a concert by some local band was about to start very soon.
We learned that the very same night, some festival of Lord Shiva was going to take place, and therefore in many places around the city, large pyres of wood and branches were set up, which the locals would light later after sunset. This festival is Hindu and is the only one that takes place at night. That day, the 13th of February, was declared a national holiday and a day off in Nepal. Along Fewa Lake, an alley had been built with many very pleasant little restaurants along it. We sat in one of them and waited to see what would happen with these fire pyres. In the end, we didn't see anything particularly special and ritualistic, but the thing that all Nepalese did was to take bamboo sticks, then heat them up in the fire and hit them on the ground, and in this way the bamboo stick breaks and a specific sound is produced. The belief says that Lord Shiva has fallen asleep, and therefore they pop the sticks so they can wake him up… Later we learned that on this holiday marijuana is allowed. That is why everywhere on the streets it smelled of… and we could see many placed bundles of bamboo sticks.
In the evening, as I wrote above, we had a bite in a small restaurant by the lake. Prices there were typically touristic and, for example, for four people the bill was $18. By comparison, for lunch we ate at a small grocery-type establishment deep inside the city, where more locals than tourists lived, and then the four of us ate for five dollars!
The next day, the program included the main sights of Pokhara – World Peace Stupa, Devi’s Falls, and Mahadev Cave. In the morning, we took a boat, as the rate for One way to Stupa was 550 rupees including life jackets. The options to get to the Stupa are two – either to cross the lake by boat, as we did, or to catch a bus there. I exclude any organized excursions because it is so close and easily accessible that there is no need for such.
-> Browse and book with a discount a budget hotel in Pokhara. Face TUK!
The boatman took us to the other end of the lake at the foot of the hill on whose peak the Stupa was located. The climb takes 40 minutes. Access to the Stupa is free, and, as with any temple, you need to take off your shoes. The Stupa was an exceptionally beautiful snow-white building, and from the top, an incredible view of the entire lake and Pokhara opened up. Only then did we realize how big the city actually is. The weather was more than gorgeous.
We couldn't figure out how in the same country and at the same time of the year in one place you're freezing in a sweater and jacket at minus 2-3 degrees, while in another place in the same country you're in short sleeves and still sweating...
From there we started walking to look for Mahadev Cave and Davi’s Falls. Our path took us out of the forest and mountains and into the city. We began to wonder where this cave and waterfall could be. And as we walked along the main thoroughfare in the city, we saw the entrance to the cave. It cost 100 rupees per person. It turned out that the cave was very frequented by locals and there were quite a few school groups there. I personally wasn't impressed because it lacked stalagmites and stalactites, and what this cave is most famous for is that when you reach its bottom and end, you see the profile of a Buddhist-Hindu god. It is said that this is a naturally formed rock shape of a Hindu god. Also, this cave is the deepest cave in Southeast Asia. From there we crossed the boulevard again and on the other side were the Davi’s Falls. The entrance was 30 rupees, but that was money literally thrown to the wind, because these waterfalls didn't impress us with absolutely anything… Despite this, locals were bending over backwards to take selfies with them…
After that, on the way back, we were caught by an unexpected rain according to the forecast and had to have an unexpected dinner in a rundown eatery.
Everywhere in the menus of restaurants in Nepal, besides standard burgers, noodles, and rice dishes, the typical Nepali dish MOMO is also offered. The dish can be vegetarian, with chicken, with beef, or with eggs. It consists of dough with the filling of your choice inside. If you have watched the episode of Masha and the Bear with the panda, you will remember what I am talking about. You can also choose whether the dish is baked or fried, with us preferring fried 100 times more – it tastes better, while the baked one sits somehow indifferently...
The day was February 14th – St. Valentine's or Trifon Zarezan? Everywhere the locals had made an effort and in the shops and restaurants there were offers for Valentine's Day. Right next to our hotel we found a nice little restaurant with live music, where upon entering they handed out a free rose to the ladies.
A LITTLE USEFUL INFORMATION 🙂
To get from one place to another in Nepal you can use one of three ways: by plane, by bus, or by car. There are no trains in Nepal. Renting a car as a foreigner is tantamount to suicide, considering the crazy traffic, terrible roads and lack of road signs. Still, the same distance, if you go by car you traverse it in 6 hours, then by bus it will take you 8 hours, and by plane – 20-30 minutes. Such is the example of the route from Kathmandu to Pokhara. Usually the choice of the average tourist with limited funds falls on transport by bus. It is important to know that there are two types of buses – ordinary and tourist, and both types can take you to the main cities in the country – Kathmandu, Pokhara, Lumbini, Chitwan and do not differ particularly in their exterior and interior appearance. The main difference is that with tourist buses it is necessary to pre-purchase tickets, which in turn means that the people inside the bus will be as many as the number of seats. While on ordinary buses you can board at any time by waving your hand and there are as many people inside as the bus can hold. We had heard that on one such ordinary bus from Kathmandu to Pokhara, besides the seated passengers, there were also a terribly large number of standing ones. In addition, chickens had been brought inside and there were people on the roof of the bus. We didn't see such a sight ourselves, but it happened to us on a short distance to travel in ordinary buses and it's really a big hassle.
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The next morning we went to Tibetian Refugee Camp, which was located at the other end of the city. On the way we stopped to check out the current brand of smartphones for these geographic latitudes – OPPO. The prices were a bit cheaper than their Western European competitors.
On the way back, by some huge coincidence, we passed by a Nepali Pentecostal church. It was called Emmanuil Light Church with Pastor Bedu Lopchan. Christians in Nepal are barely between 2 and 3 percent of the total population, with most of them located in Pokhara. We entered the church yard, where we were greeted by the pastor's wife, and shortly after that the pastor also came. We met and chatted, learning that the church there had about 100 members and services were held every Sunday and Friday. We exchanged contacts and FB profiles and agreed to stay in touch. The church building was a single-story structure with fans and dimensions of about 7 by 20 meters. We took pictures with the pastor's family, who in the meantime also have four children.
After that on the way back we sat in a humble so-called „eatery“ in the non-tourist part of the city, which consisted of only two tables and a kitchen. Interestingly for the whole of Nepal is that whatever the customer orders from the big menu, it is usually prepared from scratch by just one person within 30-40 minutes on a small gas burner.
In the evening we met a Bulgarian who works as a paragliding pilot and trains other pilots. And he told us interesting things about Nepal. For example, that Internet has only existed in Nepal for a few years. He also told us about the big earthquake in 2015, that when it happened, about 200,000 tourists were stranded because the runway of the airport in Kathmandu was cracked and it was impossible for planes to either land or take off. The only international airport in Nepal is located precisely in Kathmandu, while the other airports in the country are small and suitable only for domestic flights with small airplanes. The earthquake was felt most strongly in Kathmandu and east of the capital, while in Pokhara, where he lived, there was almost no damage. When we asked him why he decided to stay in Nepal, he shared that until 8-9 years ago in Pokhara there were only two agencies offering paragliding and this was a good opportunity to make more money given the low competition at that time. The prices before were 120 dollars per flight, while now people compete, there are many more agencies and they purposely lower the price, now you can easily find offers from 50 dollars for a 30-minute flight including photo and video shooting. Also, you could even find one for 30 dollars, but with a pilot with one month of experience. It was full of such.
The next morning we woke up early to catch the bus to Chitwan, where we were going to go on a jungle safari. If you hadn't heard about safari in Nepal yet, now you will know that you can do this too.
For more about the safari in Chitwan, read the following TRAVELOGUE FOR NEPAL: SAFARI IN CHITWAN
