Everest Flight (sans Everest)

Took a prop plane over the Himalayas to get a closer look at Mt. Everest. It was raining a bit when we took off, and the rain steadily increased. When we were 20 or so minutes into the flight, along side Everest (although you couldn't see anything but clouds), they called back that the storm was too bad and they needed to turn back, but the Kathmandu airport closed due to the weather so they were going to try to do an emergency landing at an airstrip in the Himalayas. They tried a couple times and failed to pull of the landing, so headed back to Kathmandu where they let them land. It was a very hard landing. Now, some of that story is not from my direct observation, as after they told us that we couldn't see Everest and they were going to try an emergency landing I thought to myself "good Lord, this is going to take a while" and proceeded to take a nap. I was rudely awoken by the collision like landing in the storm at Kathmandu, and the ensuing uproarious applause from the 6 or so other people on board. The pilot and co-pilot were grinning like Cheshire cats with a patina of sweat on their brow so it must have been pretty hairy.
Anyway, didn't get to see Everest up close like I wanted to, but the little prop plane was fun, and it turned out to be free as I got a refund for the flight.

Bhaktapur

Bhaktapur is an 11th century city in the Kathmandu valley about 35km from Kathmandu city.

Nagarkot

Took an old toyota up the side of one of the mountains that surround the Kathmandu valley, up into the cloud cover. The journey up the mountain is a bit perilous, a single lane, very twisty road with no guard rails that winds up the side of the mountain. Big Tata trucks and motorcycles screaming down while you are going up, several close calls that were always avoided by veering the Toyota off the non cliff side of the road. The road goes through several villages, a make shift unofficial tollbooth where they stop you and demand 20 rupees, and higher up through families of mountain goats with adorable mountain goat babies (billies? whatever) wandering around and making funny goat noises. At the top of the Nagarkot mountain (about 3,500 meters above sea level, so a comparatively small mountain for here) are a couple secluded resorts with views of the whole Himalayan mountain range. Water is brought up to them on trucks. Its tiger country, but our guide said don't worry, tigers are loud and make a "huff, huff, huff" sound so you don't get surprised. So we asked, "what do you do if you hear a tiger" and his response was "well, tigers can go anywhere, so, nothing really". Hmmm...

Swayambhunath

A hilltop temple in the Kathmandu valley, one of the most sacred Buddhist temples.

Kathmandu, the people

The people, ethnically speaking, look like a blend of India people and Chinese people. Or, said another way, Indian people with asian features. The women are very pretty. There are lots of monks. Nepal is a mix of Hindus and Buddhists.