We spent Christmas eve (our last day in Nepal) running last minute errands such as sending a bunch of stuff back home at the excruciatingly slow post office in Kathmandu, Thai Embassy run to pick up our approved 60day visas, Laundry and shopping for those essential last minute items. When everything was finally taken care of it was already quite late and time for our massive Christmas eve feast at one of our favourite restaurants 'Jatra' which served up the most amazing honey glazed pork ribs and spicy chicken wings.
We reach Thamel after the 5th walk there today. We had done this route so many times - today in particular because of all the errand running and I was feeling quite nostalgic it would be our last time. Sam was grateful as he always hated the 20minutes of walking in chaos.. So much traffic to dodge and the beeping in your ear gets very annoying.
The crazy walk to Thamel
We get to the ATM just passed Jatra and suddenly everything goes to shit. Sam does not have his bank card. He had used it earlier that day to withdraw and now it was missing. Someone either stole it or he left it in the ATM. So back we went to that particular machine as there are usually security guards at every one and we though we could at least check if they had picked it up. We get there and no luck, no security guard insight. So all the way back to the room we go where Sam cancel's his card online, then has a new one sent out. Thankfully there had been no activity so we knew it hadn't been stolen - most likely just left in the machine.
We head out again, this time we're not as much in the spirit for enjoying Christmas eve and our last night in Nepal. Still we have our amazing feast at Jatra by the wood burning fire, glass of red wine and realizing that this time tomorrow we'll no longer be freezing our arses off! woo hoo!
Christmas eve dinner by the fire
Crazy Christmas Eve Traffic Jam
We woke up bright and early Christmas Morning and headed to the airport ready for our awesome day of traveling to country number 2- Thailand.
It wasn't a bad day, we traveled with Jet Air who were very comfortable with great service. We did have a 2hr stopover in Delhi which was a massive airport btw - Sydney is nothing in comparison. The Indian customs staff were very confusing as we were going through bag checks. I didn't really understand what they wanted from me so I just ended up emptying my bag and they kept shaking their heads and saying no we need this, pointing to some card that someone was supposed to give me at the start.
Sam had used the last of his Nepalese Rupees to buy a 1litre bottle of vodka duty free at Kathmandu international airport but they had given it to him in an open cloth bag which did say duty free but was not sealed. I noted it at that time how strange that was and sure enough in baggage check when I was dealing with confusing Indians Sam was getting in trouble for his vodka. This big Indian guy made us follow him to some desk, fill in a form then watch as he poured the whole bottle of vodka out in a bin. It was devastating.
I could see Sam was pretty upset so I bought another bottle of vodka duty free, this time it was correctly sealed in one of those plastic duty free bags.
The last leg of the day was short & sweet and soon we were in Bangkok ready to spend the next 2hrs trying to get through customs there! God dammit Bangkok airport is hectic. Still it was a good feeling to have arrived in Thailand - the country of delicious Thai food, hot weather, beaches and parties!
We reach Thamel after the 5th walk there today. We had done this route so many times - today in particular because of all the errand running and I was feeling quite nostalgic it would be our last time. Sam was grateful as he always hated the 20minutes of walking in chaos.. So much traffic to dodge and the beeping in your ear gets very annoying.
We get to the ATM just passed Jatra and suddenly everything goes to shit. Sam does not have his bank card. He had used it earlier that day to withdraw and now it was missing. Someone either stole it or he left it in the ATM. So back we went to that particular machine as there are usually security guards at every one and we though we could at least check if they had picked it up. We get there and no luck, no security guard insight. So all the way back to the room we go where Sam cancel's his card online, then has a new one sent out. Thankfully there had been no activity so we knew it hadn't been stolen - most likely just left in the machine.
We head out again, this time we're not as much in the spirit for enjoying Christmas eve and our last night in Nepal. Still we have our amazing feast at Jatra by the wood burning fire, glass of red wine and realizing that this time tomorrow we'll no longer be freezing our arses off! woo hoo!
We woke up bright and early Christmas Morning and headed to the airport ready for our awesome day of traveling to country number 2- Thailand.
It wasn't a bad day, we traveled with Jet Air who were very comfortable with great service. We did have a 2hr stopover in Delhi which was a massive airport btw - Sydney is nothing in comparison. The Indian customs staff were very confusing as we were going through bag checks. I didn't really understand what they wanted from me so I just ended up emptying my bag and they kept shaking their heads and saying no we need this, pointing to some card that someone was supposed to give me at the start.
Sam had used the last of his Nepalese Rupees to buy a 1litre bottle of vodka duty free at Kathmandu international airport but they had given it to him in an open cloth bag which did say duty free but was not sealed. I noted it at that time how strange that was and sure enough in baggage check when I was dealing with confusing Indians Sam was getting in trouble for his vodka. This big Indian guy made us follow him to some desk, fill in a form then watch as he poured the whole bottle of vodka out in a bin. It was devastating.
I could see Sam was pretty upset so I bought another bottle of vodka duty free, this time it was correctly sealed in one of those plastic duty free bags.
The last leg of the day was short & sweet and soon we were in Bangkok ready to spend the next 2hrs trying to get through customs there! God dammit Bangkok airport is hectic. Still it was a good feeling to have arrived in Thailand - the country of delicious Thai food, hot weather, beaches and parties!
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