Pictures from this part of the trip can be found in the gallery.

Wednesday, April 18 — fly to Kathmandu

We got up at 4:30am, packed our bags, and were ready for the hotel breakfast by 5:30am. It turned out to be the most substantial breakfast we got anywhere on the trail, so it was a good way to start our early morning.

After eating, we walked 10 minutes to the airport, arriving around 6am. As expected, the airport was rather crazy, fully of a mob of people who were all trying to get out on an early flight just like us.

The hotel proprietor was also an airline agent, so he did the check-in process for us, then we dropped our bags at the "baggage inspection" which consisted of being asked some questions and throwing the bag on a pile. We then went through the security screening, where Mark was asked about his hand sanitizer but not the giant battery charger in his pocket and no one noticed Ken's knife. After that, we sat down in the little lounge with the rest of the mob and waited for the plane.

The first few planes came in, and Ken and Mark were distracted taking pictures of them. Suddenly, Mahesh got up and went towards the gate, so we quickly followed. We were on the first Sita Air flight of the day, only the second flight out of the airport. To board, we walked behind the plane, which was exciting -- they leave one engine running while boarding!

The takeoff was quite exciting - they taxied to the very start of the runway, applied the brakes, fired the engines full throttle, then lifted the brakes. The drop-off at the end of the runway came awfully fast, and we lifted off the ground with only a couple of plane lengths to spare. The flight back to Kathmandu took a little longer than before, but we got back safely. Unfortunately, Ken's ears were quite clogged, so the final descent was quite unpleasant.

We arrived back at Hotel Thamel around 8am, and fortunately they had rooms available for us. We all showered then decided to wander around the Thamel area for a while. We had lunch at the Yin Yang Thai restaurant, which was excellent. In the evening (after all of us took a nap), we had a celebration dinner with Kumar and Mahesh at the Gaia restaurant. It was nice to be warm again.

Mahesh noticed that Mark was markedly thinner at the end of the trip vs. before, and Ken had also lost a few pounds. We've heard that bigger people tend to burn fat when exposed to cold weather. Julie, no change. Oh well.

Thursday, April 19 - touristing in Kathmandu

The morning started out in an interesting way. The hotel was mostly full of a huge group of Indian teenagers, who were apparently a trekking group sponsored by the Indian government. They pretty much took over the dining room and common area, and we dealt with them off and on for the rest of our time at the hotel. They weren't exactly obnoxious, but they were fairly clueless. We got the sense most of them had never traveled before. Many of them were clearly wearing gear that they'd never even seen before (the hallway was full of shoeboxes).

Kumar arranged for us to make a day trip to the Bhaktapur area, the 3rd royal palace area in the Kathmandu valley. It's 13 km from Thamel but almost an hour drive, because the traffic was bad (i.e. normal). The Bhaktapur area was not particularly memorable, but it was a good excuse to get out of the main area for the day. We wandered around the town area, had lunch at the Peaceful Café, then visited the main sights in the area.

For dinner, we went to the Third Eye Indian restaurant back in Thamel, next door to the Ying Yang Thai restaurant. After dinner, we thought about talking a walk, but it started to rain, so we headed back to the hotel.

Friday, April 20 - touristing in Kathmandu then fly to Abu Dhabi

This was another easy day for us. Ken and Julie had to leave for the airport at 6pm, so the whole day was free. We had a relatively late breakfast and watched the big Indian group prep their gear to be picked up in the parking lot. Each had a really big daypack and a really big duffel bag. We felt kind of sorry for them.

After breakfast, we decided to take a walk south of the main Durbar Square. At some point, we lost our orientation to the Lonely Planet city walk and just started wandering around ourselves. We marveled at all the small shops and how the Nepali economy didn't encourage consolidation of the small businesses like the American economy would.

After ending up on a really busy street, we found the section for auto repair / power tools, and later the section for home remodeling. We stopped at a small city park for some rest and water, then continued through the city to Ratna Park. Ratna Park had a lot of beautiful flowers and benches to sit on and relax.

We then went back to the Ying Yang Thai restaurant for a late lunch, which was our big meal for the day. After lunch, we wandered around Thamel for a while looking at souvenir shops. We also bought some snacks for the flight home. Back at the hotel, Ken and Julie showered in Mark's room and changed into fresh clothes, and then we killed some time together by playing cards out on the patio.

Ken and Julie were waiting to be picked up at 6pm. Unfortunately, our driver was 20 minutes late (the same person as yesterday who was also late then). After finally arriving, he drove like a maniac to get to the airport. It was sunset, and due to the dust, the darkness came quickly. It took about 20 minutes to drive the first few blocks, and then we took a new route to avoid the traffic. We arrived at the airport about 2 hours prior to the flight instead of the 2.5 hours we had expected, so we basically just jumped out of the car and ran.

We spent almost an hour getting through the check-in and bag drop process, then another 40 minutes in security and immigration. When we arrived at the gate, it said they were boarding, so we went in without going to the bathroom or getting additional food or water. Then the flight was delayed so we spent a bunch of time in the stuffy waiting room. Fortunately, we had those snacks with us. (Mark said later that he spent an hour in immigration, and planes are often delayed because passengers are stuck in immigration. In a normal airport, they would just figure out how to speed up immigration, but this is Nepal.)

We finally boarded the plane around the time we were supposed to leave (around 9:10pm), by walking across the tarmac and up the steps. Once on the plane, we were further delayed and ended up taking off around 10:30pm. (Both Ken and Julie fell asleep before takeoff.) On the plus side, the A320 that we flew from Kathmandu to Abu Dhabi was the nicest of all the planes we flew the entire trip. We got a light meal and a small beverage on the flight, but still felt pretty hungry and thirsty at the end. It was the middle of the night and we never really got anything resembling dinner.

Saturday, April 21 — fly home

We landed in Abu Dhabi about 90 minutes late, so our 2.5 hour layover turned out to be a very quick one. We got off the plane, rushed through the airport, bought 2 liters of bottled water at a vendor at the way ($6 each!), guzzled them before entering the US security clearance area, entered the US customs area 2 minutes before the official closure time, went through US customs, made a quick stop at the bathroom, and walked to the gate a few minutes before they started boarding. It's a good thing we weren't starving, because we didn't have time to get a meal in the airport like we originally planned. Chocolate to the rescue, again.

We spent most of the 14.5 hour flight from Abu Dhabi to Chicago sleeping/resting, watching movies, or eating. We agreed that it was a better flight than on the way here. We sat next to an older Indian woman who we guessed was traveling to Chicago to visit family. Julie was surprised at how she could curl up in one seat with her feet on the window. She invaded Julie's personal space a bit but she was pretty nice, so it was OK.

We arrived in Chicago with about a 4 hour layover before our Delta flight to Minneapolis. We collected our luggage in the International terminal, then took the shuttle to the domestic terminal and checked in at Delta and went through security. We looked around for a place to eat and got a burger at the Chicago Blackhawks pub (not worth going back), then spent the next few hours walking through most of the domestic terminal inside security, so we wouldn't fall asleep. We also got some excellent ice cream!

Finally, it was time to board for Minneapolis. Julie was asleep most of the flight — awake just long enough to confirm that she could help in the exit row in case of an emergency, and to drink her bottled water and eat cookies.

We caught a Lyft at the airport and made it back home around 5:00pm Minneapolis time. It was good to be home!