The White temple on our way to the border between Thailand and Laos. This particular temple was covered in small mirrors and it had beautiful rounded shapes. The hands by the entrance represent the evil spirits trying to reach inside the temple. We cannot describe the beauty of this building... It even had a small pond by the entrance full of shiny white goldfishes! 

Closer shot of the hands and evil faces, there were also falic forms coming out of the evils as well as deformed feet etc...

Inside the slow boat from Thailand Chang Khon border to Luang Prabang in Lao(s). This boat takes 2 days en rout through the beautiful Mekong River (or 3 depending on the weather). On our first day we were overbooked (nothing very unusual here) so we had to sit for about 8 hours in a broken wooden bench while getting soaked by the heavy rain :) Thankfully we stopped for the night in a beautiful town in the mountains a very remote place (yes! without even Internet!) The next morning after a great sleep and a deliciously strong Lao coffee (with condensate milk, yummy!!) we got in a new boat and this picture was taken, as you can see the mood was much nicer!. After another 10 hours we finally arrived to the stunning town of Luang Pra Bang.

Lao's money (KIP)  One of the amazing things that we are finding in this trip is the different currencies and their values. In Lao for example, they go by thousands, which means you suddenly find yourself talking about buying a beer for  10.000 Kip. It gets even better when you get to Vietnam and you need the cash point. Here the value of the money is double than in Laos, so you are looking at getting Millions of Dongs at a time!!. (2 million Dong is about 65 British Pounds!!) 

Man at work cleaning rice and monk in a boat by the Melong river in Luang Pra Bang and

Ready for some Kayaking in the Nagh Tran river!

The Amazing cascade, first stop with the kayak. In one simple word... Beautifulllllllllllllllll :)

Eddie's Kayaking skills, we had a double Kayak and we proved our great team skills! ou yeah!!

Happy biker in Luang Pra Bang, as you can see we actually exercised a bit, is not all about eating!

Believe it or not, the background on this picture is actually real!. We found this paradisiac hotel in our disastrous search for a cascade (which by the way we never found) and we had to cycle for about 3 hours uphill through a rocky terrain with the 'lady bikes...' This particular hotel was like heaven on earth...  

Lao houses are basic, made of bamboo and palm leaves, however almost every house has a satellite disc attached to it!. Here are some of the great children :)

'The Organized Chaos' of India...

Roof terrace view, in UDAIPUR, MAGICAL CITY OF GURUS AND MONKEYS

AMANECER EN EL GANGES

COUCH SURFING ¿¿¿????

Our first Couch Surfing experience in Khatmandu. So! If you want a budget and insider travelling experience...you should join Couch Surffing. This website is a magnificent et of both hosts and people looking for a place to rest for free. This has been our first great host family, thanks to Menuka,the girl in the middle. Here we are all of us (Edu is taking the picture) having some Italian dinner. This opportunity of living with a Nepalee family for a few days has been absolutely fantastic not only the fact of saving a bit of money but making new friends and learning about their culture :)  

Brekfast in the kitchen. Running water / electricity here is not a privilege so we filled the buckets in the morning to be able to use water in the night :)

Welcome to a beautiful and clam Pokhara! This is a highly recommended destination to anyone visiting Nepal. There is a charming lake sourrounded by the Himalayan mountains, as well as many facilities for tourists (sometimes is actually nice to sit down in a nice and relaxing terrace to have a fresh western beer while listening to life music!).

 The old bazaar. This is a common image in both Indian and Nepalese markets. These colours powder are used between the eye browns (as kind of a Bindi) when entering a Hindu temple, or by any married women. Women have to wear a stripe of this colour on top of their forehead from the day they marry, instead of wearing a ring as we do in the West!.

Amazing experience!

While on our road trip with the motorbike, we saw a Buddhist Monastery and we decided to visit it. I asked a monk if we could have a quick look into the classes and he kindly agreed. As you can see here is a class with 7-8 years old doing some maths. I will write down the name of the place soon!. They are mainly orphans or sons of big families with low resources but their smiles and kindness can not be compared!

     This boy (sorry but his name was way to complicated for me to remember Tzanam... ) was super proud as he had 10/10 in his maths exercise!. Ah! and if you look on the table, he has some rolled paper... well, it is actually a poster of a famous Indian girl, he was very naughty!! :) .. - Look Miss, is a girl :)!!

  Here is a picture in the Tibetan refugee village, near Devi's fall. Nice little town :)

Panoramic view of Pokhara lake with some fisherman and the tranquility of its waters. 5 minutes later guess what happened... Yes! it started to rain... Again!

This is a very special picture. They guy is holding a couple of rings, hand made in Nepalese... You will be able to see them when we are back!

 Cooking rice and boiled eggs in our brand new mini boiler in the hotel room! Yummy!!

Anyone up for trying this lovely fresh looking toothpaste?? :\ We deliver special orders and affordable friendly prices!

Next stop....

Kathmandu, Nepal.

View from the Monkey temple, the city and a peace pagoda, panoramic.(by Edu.)

Pagoda from Buddagaya,beautiful and huge! Will update more details about it some other time...

Wool!!!!! After getting ripped of for a small bunch of hemp wool in touristic Pokhara we found this paradise of sheep wool in Khatmandu. We bought a MASSIVE bunch of the red, black and yellow one for about a pound.

So mum! thanks again for teaching me basic netting skills, it's a great pass times while waiting (something we do a lot around here!) :)

 The eyes of Buddha.

Every place has its goods and its worsts right? 

The city of smells....

We have been told that there is some kind of strike going on and therefore the city is somehow full of rubbish everywhere!! Not only is awful for the view but if you add the 30-35 degrees average temperature you get a very smelly combination ...all together!

¿Por dónde andan?

Busca los lugares que cuentan

Karma o ¿suerte?

Chitwan National Park

1st stop, catch the jeep, and went for as canoe trip through the calm waters of the river. The peace and tranquility of the ride was a superplus! :) Though we didn;t see any crocodiles, we got to see a Rhino! (apparently another sign of good luck)

Well, I guess I'll have to stop talking about good luck, as according to the Tibetan book of Life and Death, luck as such doesn't exist, is all about the Karma you accumulate that will result in good ir bad things happening to you so, from now on, Good and bad Karma!. 

Good Karma Rhino (one)

Our beloved elephant :) We went for a 2 hour ride in this  fantastic mini dionosaur!! Crossing the jungle while spotting more Rhinos, Deers, Caws and other wild animals. Amazing experience :)

Crossing a lake, view from the top! And if the elephant missbehave, the driver will hit her with that wooden stick.. but she was such a good girl she even picked up some glassess that a guy dropped from the floor. Impressive!

So we guess this is Triple Karma for a day :) The baby rhino is just a month old...

Bike ride in Pokara. We managed to rent this super cool looking bike (thouhgh with no horn and a bit falling apart) for 2.80 ponds a day!. Nice deal :)

Energizing by the river (of Babilon...) Beautiful spot, beautiful model :)

Our only glimpse of the Himalayas.... Now we can say we've seen them!!

BEBIENDO ¿¿ ????

Drinking, 'Tomb bah ' or 'Chang', which is the equivalent to Tibetan beer. It was a big challenge to find somewhere to drink it as it is regarded as a drink for the poor (only 15 ruppes which is like 20 pennies). It is made by boling some kind of small seeds (they looked like mustard seeds). You have to pour some hot water into the mix and leave it to cool for about 5-10 minutes and... ready to drink :) It was a nice experience although the bar lookes a bit dodgy or clandestino... But we got to meet a very nice bunch of Sikkim guys there and we have been invited to come back in the future and go to their villages : (not sure if it was the beer happines ..)   

Tsomgo Lake, Sikkim.

Here I am riding Michael the Yack!. A great experience visiting the holy Lake, close to the border with Tibet at about 3500m of altitude. The lake itself is quite nice, but the trip through the slippery hills, with the fog and the rain was something to remember...  Riding a Yack was very cool!!!

Panoramic view of the lake. One of Edu's expertees on panoramic pictures:)

This is the view from the car ride to and from Tsongo lake... quite scary.... but hey! we've survived!

DARJEELING Tea!

We have to admit that our first impression of Darjeeling was quite poor. We arrived in a packed jeep in whixh instead of the legal 9 people allowed we managed to fit 12 people... The constant rain and the awful hotels we saw as we arrived, added up to the heavy weight of the rucksacks and the frustation of people who did not understand a word of what we were asking.. Having said that, once we found a nice hotel and had a warm shower, we saw the beauty of the place :) We did a tour to a Japanese temple, a famous stone (though it was just a stone Tenzing Rock....) and Yes! Happy Valley Tea gardens where they grow the tea sold in Harrods! There is a fun video from a lady who 'invited us' (plus fifty ruppes per tea cup) to the best Darjeeling tea in the whole valley! This picture is a selection of 6 different qualities of tea which ou have to smell and guess.. Eduardo got it right, I couldn't smell much...

Drinking the tea at the lady's house. Don't miss the detail of the dog on the right hand side, it was key for the picture!

Crossing the border. So! The time came and our Indian experience got to an end when we reached this particular bridge which divides Nepal and India. The Border is called Karkavita, and to be very honest, there is not much difference bewteen both countries.. Well, we suppose the language, the currency, which is Nepaleese Rupees and.. nothing more! At least at this particular city, once you start going up towards the Himalayas, things change!

Can you guess which arm belongs to whom??

Even if we have not seen the sun as such for many days (remember we are in Monsson time and clouds and rain are our faithful travelling friends.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

We decided not to get a guide of Nepal (MISTAKE) and so we spend the first 2 or 3 days wandering around a couple of dodgy cities before we managed to get to Chitwan, an AMAZING natural park. Of course, no trip will be completed without certain difiiculties. As we got to Chitwan bus stop, as the bus was leaving the station I realized I had left my bag with every impotant item on it!! So!, we managed to get almost the whole town in a revolution to get my bag back!. And yes, remember my double line of luck, I got the bag back with everything and a huge smile from about 6 police men, very proud of the trustable Nepaleese people :)