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2003-09-15 - Pokhara (Day 153)

As the downpour had interrupted last night's ride, I head out on the same road again determined to see where it leads. I make it past the little village I had stopped in and just beyond am facing a deep river crossing. No worries, I am actually starting to like water and I plow right across and up the other side. It is followed by a couple more river crossings but hey, they are all in a morning's fun. However, another river soon turns up and this one is way beyond what I want to do this morning. There is however, a footbridge and we walk across to find that this little village was the end of the line anyway. It is a small village and again I get those questioning looks like "how did you get so lost way out here?"

We head back but this time on the way through, I hit a rock, the current took the bike and I quickly find myself swimming. The water felt wonderful and I come up with a smile. Being already soaked we drove back to the village bought a couple of cakes of detergent and rags and drive the bike back into the river to give her the first good cleaning since Leh.

Just about 9:00am, school kids wading across the river who are amused watching this foreigner sitting in the river with his bike are constantly passing me. However, like Tom Sawyer I soon put them too work cleaning the bike and they got half of it finished for me before one of them found he could blow soap bubbles through his hands that distracted all my little helpers and ended in a general strike.

From there I ride up to Sarangkot which is the viewpoint to see the whole Himalayan range spread out before you, where the jagged snowcapped peaks rise one after another in a string all the way to Everest...or so the pictures all over Pokhara promise. For me I just saw line after line of uninspiring fluffy clouds.

Driving back down from Sarangkot I had some more fun. My friend Pete had sent me on the trip with a great Arterix shirt which I've worn for the past six month. It had some unexpected properties though when on the way down from Sarangkot on a one lane very tough mountain track, I passed an Ox who apparently thought he was in the bullfighting arena and my red shirt was the toreador's cape! He bowed his horns and swung them at the bike and ran along side of me almost skewering my leg a couple of times. It was not the road to floor it on but between the road and the mad Ox, I took the road and gunned the Enfield which even on that road leapt away from the bull, with me trying to hang on and scream at the same time!

Living though my first bull fight, I was off to the Tibetan refugee camp where as opposed to being a moving target for the extremely persistent Tibetan women selling their handicrafts, I'd become a captured moth inside the camp. Actually all of the women were very nice though they are extremely persistent and I get the feeling that their persistence is a direct result of times being so bad. I would not have been surprised to find that I was the only customer that day at the 10 or so stalls.

With the clouds darkening it was back to Pokhara before I get drenched yet again.

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