Descending 4,000 meters off the Tibetan plateau, the scenery begins to change dramatically. Gone are the dulcet earth tones, glaciers, dust, and stone—replaced by lush greens, tropical reds and oranges, and brilliant yellows. Not sublime like the Tibetan landscape, but warm and sweet and welcoming. This is where the subcontinent continues to crash into the rest of Asia. The smell of curry and incense mix, flowers spill over the sides of rooftops, and woman wrap themselves in vibrant saris.

Down from the border

But lets go back to the beginning; how did we get here? Our last night in Tibet was spent in Zhangmu, a small border town clinging to the side of a hill (a mountain really, but in comparison…). The town is not so much at the border, as on top of it, looking out over a vast gorge, Tibet on the left and Nepal on the right. For us, it was reminiscent of Sapa and its easy to imagine how the H’mong people we met in Vietnam and Northern Thailand originally called this place home.

In the morning we hopped into our Land Cruiser and descended the final few hundred meters to the Friendship bridge-the official border crossing between China and Nepal. While we handed over the last of our US dollars in cash for our last Visa ( we already had one for India) we said goodbye to Tashi and hello to Raj, who was going to take us to Kathmandu.

From Kodari (in Nepal) it was another four hour drive into the Kathmandu valley. I found myself plastered to the window while we drove up and down green hills with the ghostly white peaks of the HImalayas floating in the distance. In Tibet, it was difficult to comprehend just how big these mountains are; as humbling as it was staring Everest in the face, when you are already 5,000m high an 8,000m mountain hardly looks like a record-breaker. But down here these peaks reveal their true selves: epic, colossal,monstrous, magnificent.

Kathmandu

Upon arriving in Kathmandu, we checked into a lovely hotel in the busy Thamel district and then we were out for the night. This has become a routine for us on the last leg of the trip: check-in and crash. The next morning, perhaps because we slept so much the day before—or maybe because of the 2 hour and 15 minute (?!) time difference with Tibet—we were up bright and early. We ate our breakfast in the hotel’s garden which provided a quiet respite from the chaos already swirling around us. While clogged alleyways, swerving motorcycles, and traffic pollution were largely absent from our lives in Tibet, down in Kathmandu the kamikaze motorists were back with a vengeance. All we could do was hug the closest wall and try to stay out of the way.

Despite the traffic, Kathmandu is a remarkable city. Whatever you might think it is or expect it to be, it’s not that. Instead it reveals itself as a nonsensical potpourri of disparate geographies and time periods: sometimes we imagined it like 1930s New York, and sometimes like Elizabethan England with the brick townhouses and wooden beams. At other times it felt purely Indian: all rose petals and marigold garlands, saffron and turmeric, ritual and chaos. There is a shrine, stupa, or statue to Buddha, Ganesh or Vishnu in every courtyard. Cows wander everywhere like they know they’re holy. Orange clad sadhus—devotees of Shiva—squat in narrow doorways, from which the throbbing rhythms of tabla drift and reverberate someplace between your gut and your heart.

But then there is the cool Himalayan wind that scatters the prayers of Buddhist flags in every direction. And those looming mountains again. And you remember that this is Nepal—like no place else on earth. We may have arrived with no idea what to expect, but when we left Nepal after only a few days it certainly left us with a strong impression.

Nepal

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