Bandipur (Aug 6-7)

After negotiating with a local driver, we hitched a ride to the quaint village of Bandipur (about 2.5 hours from Pokhara) ‘ban-DI-pur’. The road was in good condition in most places, save a few pot holes and some landslides from the rains. Drivers here are quite daring though, and weaving in and out of cows, buffalos, chickens, dogs and people is not uncommon. Taking the main highway that leads from Pokhara to Kathmandu, we turned off and winded up and up and up to the preserved Newari village – a true living museum. Greeted by half a dozen Nepalese and Roman, a fiery young man from the Chitwan region, we were escorted to the Bandipur Inn (a current restoration by a team comprised of locals and a British entrepreneur – all tourism dollars are put back into restoring temples and houses through the Bandipur Social Development Committee.)

With Roman, we hiked and saw some amazing landscapes. He mentioned several of these places were his favorite “date spots,” we laughed. And he’s right, with slight views of the Himalayas from Tundikel (5 fig trees marked the place) and after meandering through fields of corn and millet up to Gadhi where we took a rest under the Tibetan flags – it was indeed a nice date!

Speaking of which, our inn included a traditional Nepali dinner of: daal (lentils), bhaat (rice), aloo tareko (fried potatoes with turmeric, cumin and chili powder), chatamari (rice-flour pancake topped with buffalo aka buff, egg), gundruk (traditional Nepali sour soup with veggies), chasi kho ledo (lamb curry), mis mas tarkari (vegetables), anchar (spicy pickle), dahi (curd) along with a nice cold, Tourborg (locally brewed). We happened to be the only people staying at the inn and sat by candle light (due to the power outage for the majority of the evening). The rain continued from late that evening ‘till early afternoon departure when we headed on yet another adventure in a 4x4 jeep on route to Bhaktapur.