It's the night before we're due to leave for our trek and we we've restless with anticipation and excitement. To distract ourselves, we decided to visit Swayambhu, also known as The Monkey Temple. Still wary of Kathmandu and our ability to find our way around, we haggled with a taxi drivers and off we went.
We arrived at the base of a large hill where there were many armed guards and people milling about. We were told by our taxi driver to "Go up."... We got closer and saw that this large hill was faced by hundreds of steps with colourful statues lining each side, and to our delight, monkeys were everywhere! Distracted by the monkeys, we took off up the stairs, taking millions of pictures as we went.
We approached the top and a huge stupa (a type of Buddhist shrine) came into view.
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| Matt in front of the stupa. |
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| The eyes of God (or the faded sign of Doctor T. J. Eckleburg). |
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| A close up of the stupa and prayer flags. |
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The large stupa was surrounded by much smaller ones and
many shrines and offerings. |
The courtyard at the top was centered by the stupa with buildings, shrines and statues scattered all over. If we went to the edge of the courtyard, we could see a beautiful 360° view of Kathmandu and the surrounding mountains.
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| Kathmandu as seen from the Monkey Temple |
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| The hills surrounding Kathmandu |
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A monastery of sorts tucked in on of the hills around
Kathmandu. |
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| Prayer flags are everywhere in Nepal. |
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| Beautiful scenery around the temple. |
We navigated our way around the small village that the temple backed on to, taking a thousand more pictures of the monkeys that played around the grounds. This village was an amalgamation of tourists, locals and monks, it was a nice change from Kathmandu.
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| Dinner time! The babies weren't shy around us at all. |
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Matt's favourite monkey who only walked
on his hands. |
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| From the safety of mum, we were being watched. |
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Deep in thought about who to jump on next. Hint: the answer
rhymes with "hat". |
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| A king at rest. |
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| The wild is watching you. |
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| Looking old beyond his years. |
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| Family portrait. |
Once we had been monkeyed-out, we climbed back down the stairs and decided to test our memory and walk back into town.Arriving back to Thamel safe and sound, we sought out another attraction we had read about. Crossing a perilously busy four lane road (though here, lanes are mostly a suggestion), we went through an inconspicuous gate way, and as the sound of the chaotic traffic faded behind us, we entered the Garden of Dreams.
Originally the private garden of a Nepalese noble, it fell into disrepair after his death in 1964. However, it has been restored thanks to assistance from the Austrian government. The garden draws inspiration from its European counterparts, but with a Nepalese twist: the garden originally had 6 sections inspired by Nepal's 6 seasons, though only 3 remain today. In the garden, we found a quiet serenity we had not thought possible mere steps from a Nepalese thoroughfare.
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| Looking a dream in the Garden of Dreams! |
Our batteries recharged, we set out for a quick bite (more momos!) before meeting with our outfitter for a final briefing.
Our tour operator gave us the run down and our flight tickets to Lukla then gave us a go at the equipment he loaned us for our trek. We grabbed poles and a down jacket, got our free group t-shirt and then he handed us the worlds LARGEST sleeping bag. We took it gratefully, as it was free, and headed upstairs to pack. Before we left, we had been strategic, we knew what we wanted to bring and were comfortable with the weight. Well, all that went out the window when we tried to pack everything around the mammoth sleeping bag we'd been given! Holly had no way to attach it to the outside of her back so she had to put it inside, yet it took up the majority of her bag. Matt could attach it to the outside, but it still added weight to his bag. Rather cross, we began whittling down our belongs until we got completely fed up and took out almost everything (something we'd come to half-regret later). All packed away at long last we set our 5am alarms and tried to fall asleep through the excitement of what was to come.
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