Today, I am off to Lhasa and Tibet.
The night before, I had hauled all my recent purchases - which were substantial - and all of my extra clothes down the dark back streets of Bhaktapour to Shree's home. At least I could walk home up the hill unloaded versus carrying 50 pounds of gifts and mementos up the hill. That would come later after my return.
Later that evening, I loaded my backpack and everything I thought I needed for the trip. Andy at ItrekNepal provided me with a goose down sleeping bag and a Goosedown jacket.
I met Bijou and Shree at the tea house just across the street from the Itrek office and the pashnina store/office office.
After tea and picking up some tangerines for the trip, I put on my backpack and crawled on the back of Bijou's motorcycle with my full daypack crammed between our bodies. We wound our way through the back streets of the old Bhaktapur streets in the dim light of the early morning. The Nepali women were out in front of their homes and shops sweeping the streets and we dodged piles of trash, chickens, children walking to school in identical uniforms, and of course other motorcycles as we traveled through the brick and stone back streets of Bhaktapour to the main highway.
We left the brick streets of historic Bhaktapour and crossed over a bridge that separates the Work Heritage Site region of Bhaktapour from main Bhaktapour. We arrived at the main highway - it was a big road compared to the narrow, shop and home lined streets of old Bhaktapour. There were six lanes of traffic - three lanes of traffic in either direction.
We stood together for 30 minutes at the intersection. I watched as the traffic policeman stopped traffic on the side streets and directed the massive chaos of trucks, buses, cars and motorcycles through the 6 lanes of highway. As traffic backed up on the side streets, the policeman would stop - and gradually stop the flow of traffic through the 6 lanes. Once the traffic on the main street came to a low level of semi-control, the side street traffic was allowed to enter the chaos of the intersection. I was transfixed with the chaos. With no traffic lights - or real rules for any sized vehicle for that matter - and no real rules of the road except "I am going to squeeze my vehicle through HERE". Every vehicle darts and dashes, creeps and squeezes through the chaos to their destination - often only a distance of several dozens of meters - to the next impediment. I saw few traffic lights in Nepal despite the congestion. It was a free for all.
We waited on the corner. I watched.
I began to wonder if the van would appear. Bijou had said that I would travel to Tibet in van. I had asked Bijou to book me a preferred seat when i paid and he made arrangements for the trip.
Bijou got on his phone several times to ask somebody about the status of the van. He told me that they would talk to somebody - who - would call somebody who in turn would call somebody on the bus and someone would then call us back. Bijou left his phone number. Bijou did not have the phone number of anyone on the bus. This communication process felt so Nepali. I waited and watched the chaos from the chaos of the early morning rush hour.
After about five minutes, Bijou's phone rang and he was told that the van would be arriving in about five minutes. When it finally pulled up I found out that it was a bus and not a van. The bus was more like an airport or hotel transport bus - about enough room to carry 12 to 15 people comfortably.
Everyone on board already gone through greetings with each other - when the all got on the bus together in Kathmandu. They had already placed their backpacks in the last row of the van and they were piled almost to the ceiling. I was able to sit in a seat behind the driver. I actually had two seats so I had plenty of room for my day sack and all of my electronics and audio gear. And i was close to the door - which might have been a several hours later.
There were about a dozen people in the van who had boarded in Kathmandu. We set out on the main road of Bhaktapour which was the only road up into Tibet.
Over the Himalaya and into Tibet for the next 7 days.
We headed through the Nepali countryside. after leaving the environs of the city, the country was similar that on the 8 hour bus ride west to Pokhara. Poor. Rural. Small farms. Manual work farming.
About two hours later, the bus slowed and the driver and his onboard helper started speaking rapidly in Nepali. Both became animated. We had come to a giant landslide. The landslide had occurred about 6 months earlier in April or May 2014. The landslide was gigantic.
It covered approximately 1/2 mile of hillside. Originally the road to Tibet traveled along the river at the bottom of the valley. When the landslide occurred millions of tons of debris rolled down into the valley over the road and even over the river. The debris pile at the bottom was in places 50 feet deep. Much of the lade had been drained. It was one of the few places in rural Nepal where I saw multiple pieces of heavy equipment. There was a distinct waterline up 15 meters in places, into the forest on the other side. Everything below us had been buried - villages, farm fields, the road. Dozens of Nepais were buried.
But the Nepail's had somehow managed to the cut the absolute crudest of a road through the rock, dust and knocked down trees. And we were headed up that road and through this enormous landslide into Tibet for the next 7 days......
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