The journey to Solukumbu Region

Half way through February and plans were in place to travel to Bishnu's home village so that i could spend some time with his family and help in the local school. Bishnu, Gabi and Ema were also making the journey (thank goodness!) so that his famliy could meet Ema for the first time. Because of all our 'stuff' he rented a jeep exclusively for us and we were able to take along the bolts of fabric and the whiteboards etc which we had bought (with other people's money!) for the school. We were supposed to leave at 5am, but of course found that loading took longer than expected and so we were finally passing Tribuvan airport at around 8am - but we were off! I won't bore you with too many details but here are the facts: we stopped three times; we arrived at 6.30pm; contrary to my worries we did find bathroom facilites along the way: there were many times when my heart was in my mouth and once when I even stated, to anyone who would listen, that "I really do have to get out of this car! RIGHT NOW!' I will let the pictures tell the story.

First washroom stop

I later saw one of these pigs 'washing' the dishes under the tap!

A common sight along the way

I think he must have misjudged one of the vicious bends

Passing the local shops

Sharing the road with animals, people and jeeps full of locals

Lunch

Cliff clinging roads became the norm as we travelled on

Yes he did manage to turn around - with the trailer hanging over the edge.

After hours on the 'main' roads we joined the local road for the final stretch

Let me just say that at one point we met a caterpillar rock crusher monster truck and had to reverse uphill towards a 140 degree bend on gravel - this is when I decided that I really wanted to GET OUT OF THE CAR!! I was ignored at first and then reassured as the gravel on which we were perched trickled over the edge and into the valley below. The caterpillar monstrosity eventually crawled past scraping the rock as it went. All the time i thought 'if he has not judged it right and nudges us off our tiny patch of gravel, we are finished'. Well of course these guys have done it before and we were fine ... but at the time my thoughts were far from happy ones!

By the time the jeep dropped us off, it was getting dark and so we decided to stay at a tea house for the night and walk to the village the following day. I slept quite well and only woke myself up once - yelling aloud after dreaming of that caterpillar truck!