Seeing the Sights

Since we've gotten to Kathmandu, we've gone out almost every single afternoon/evening to explore around the sights and get a feel for Nepali culture.

Our first stops were to the Kathmandu Durbar Square and the Patan Durbar Square. Nepal used to consist of many small kingdoms, with the kingdoms of Kathmandu, Patan, and Bhaktapur being the most prominent and each has a grand durbar square, which is located across a palace in that city. They're similar to large open courtyards filled with temples and courtyards. We walked around the squares to look at the beautiful pagoda style temples and the historical artifacts they had in a museum in one of the courtyards.

The pigeons seemed to find Kathmandu durbar square
as pretty as we did

Kal Bhairav statue

Next up is everyone's favorite: monkey temple! Known actually as Swayambunath, it is a temple located at the top of a hill in Kathmandu. A stairway of 365 steps leads you to the top where there is a stupa painted with the buddha eyes looking out onto the city in four directions. True to its name, there are hoards of monkey located around the steps and at the top. As with almost everywhere in Nepal, the monkey temple is also thickly decorated with prayer flags to give the temple an extra element of grandeur.

Buddha eyes looking upon you from the  stupa

Monkey at monkey temple

To make the most of the gorgeous weather in Nepal, the six of us decided to spend our Saturday hiking outside. With a consultation from the travel desk in the hotel, we arbitrarily chose Nagarkot as our destination. Though the travel agent told us the hike was going to be 5 hours long, we severely underestimated what this actually meant and found ourselves exhausted by the end of our 15 mile trek. But views along the way and the little villages we passed through kept our spirits up and helped reach the peak at Nagarkot Tower.

A field of mustard plants on the trek up

View of the himalayas from between a gap in the hill