After some early morning stress to ensure all the group had the right money to tip our guide (in yuan), get a Nepalese visa (USD) and buy a bus ticket and snacks for the trip to Kathmandu (Nepalese rupee) we were soon in the border queue.
Thankfully our guide introduced us to a 'fixer', who helped us navigate the border formalities before stuffing us (almost literally) into a taxi for the trip to the Nepalese capital.
As well as the beautiful scenery, the trip also gave us an insight into rural village life:
Boys being boys...
A wedding band...
And school children finished for the day (by now in Kathmandu)...
Having dumped our stuff in our hotel, a frantic rush round town eventually led us to somebody who could do our laundry (the man that collected from most of the advertised shops was away at a wedding for a couple of days). A quick shopping trip led to some amusing bartering with some good humoured shop-keepers (who called Sam his sister, but this didn't stop her being adamant that anything starting with a 1 was too high). And then we had a second farewell dinner with a couple of friends we'd made on the tour at a good curry house, followed by a couple of drinks at the aptly named Sam's bar and an aborted mission to find somewhere to continue the evening (the two places we were taken to by locals both felt distinctly average).
A quick breakfast and some last minute shopping was all there was time for in the morning before we headed to the airport for an epic 36 hour trip via Kuala Lumpur, Heathrow (yes your geography is right - KL is in completely the wrong direction but that was the only way we could get back on our RTW ticket), Milan and finally the tiny village of Dascio at the northern tip of Lake Como.
Whilst we'd have preferred not to have put foot in Blighty, we decided that as we weren't leaving the airport it didn't really count and allowed us to do a much needed kit change with Sam's parents (thanks heaps!) to set us up for the last leg of our adventure...
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