23rd September:- Chitwan - A weekend away.

Chitwan was a marvellous experience. The bus journey from Kathmandu is around five hours. Bhupi has an arrangement with a travel agent and on our induction course had advised that he could get 'discount' tickets for most things, including a 3 day 2 night trip to Chitwan national park. I was reluctant to go on the first trip as I had only just started teaching and I thought it would be a bit rich just buffeting off 3 days after arriving. I decided I would take the trip while the kids were taking exams, there was a short holiday for them and it would get me away from the hustle and bustle of KTM for a few days. I paid $100 for the trip, it turned out that the going rate was more like $50!
The day before leaving for Chitwan VIN had a meeting, it was hopelessly disorganised and a complete waste of time. After the meeting they had planned go out for dinner, I was up early the next day I decided that I would give it a miss.

I was up early on the day of departure. Most buses leave Kandipath at 7:00 to 7:30 in the morning. It is a long road and there are literally 100's of tourist bused heading to Pokhara, Chitwan and more obscure locations. The buses are of various quality, some look as though they would struggle to make it out of town. Mine, fortunately looked in semi decent shape. As I was walking down the line I asked a hawker where my bus was and he pointed me I. The direction,then offered to show me. I am now savvy enough to know he would no doubt want money. As I got by bus I offered to buy one of the bottles of water he was selling. "How much?" I asked. "100NRP was the answer." " I'll give you 50, I said, you could buy it for 15 in the shop!" with a bit of moaning he agreed to this.

The main highway out of Kathmandu is probably similar to a country road in the UK, but in worse condition. It takes a good hour to get out of the city. The road then snakes up the valley and then down again. It is quite hairy with some spectacularly high drops into the gorges and river below. Apparently about one bus a month tries to take a short cut with disastrous consequences!


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Location:Chitwan National Park- Nepal.