After our three weeks of mountain climbing, we headed for Mike's, a really good breakfast spot on the shores of Phewa Lake. Pokhara has sprung up around the shores of the lake and consists largely of restaurants and backpacker hotels. Mike's has a great location, and good pancakes too. We then walked around town for a bit, which could use a bit of sprucing up. We then headed back to Kathmandu Airport the following day, then drove a few hours east over incredibly poor roads to our final destination, Dhulikhel.

Pokhara is the jumping off point for trekking in the Annapurna range, Nepal's most popular trekking destination. The full trekking circuit for this range takes three weeks, so that's what we did. Unfortunately, we left the camera at the Fulbari so we don't have any photos to show us scaling the mountains. I guess you'll just have to take our word for it.

This is the Seti Gorge, something like the Grand Canyon of Pokhara. The hotel is built at the edge of the gorge, which probably means it will end up in the gorge sometime in the near future. But while the hotel is still in its original position, the gorge makes a very dramatic backdrop. Our side of the gorge was pretty much a cliff, so there wasn't much exploring to be done, but we could watch the goings on at the village across the gorge. The other side was less steep, and you can see a temple built into the side of the gorge with paths leading to it. We could watch the villagers make their way slowly down the path past the temple, usually leading their livestock to the river below for a drink. The whole process took about three hours, after which I assume the animals were thirsty again so they'd have to return.

42. Pokhara

We stayed at by far the most luxurious hotel in Pokhara, the Fulbari Lodge, which was a really odd place. Pokhara is Nepal's second tourist city, a short flight west of Nepal. Since the country is in the Himalayas, most of it is not connected to anywhere by road, and most of the part that is is controlled by the rebels. Pokhara has morphed into a tourist center by virtue of it being connected by Nepal's only main road to Kathmandu, and remaining an island of government control. But the overwhelming reason people come here is to begin treks of the Annapurna range. So before or after treks, people are stocking up on provisions or relaxing after a tough slog, and the town is basically a mountain version of Kathmandu's packpacker haven of Thamel. Since we had no intention of climbing mountains, we figured we'd hang at a nice hotel. And it is admittedly a nice hotel, superficially resembling any number of mid-range resort hotels. It had a pool, great mountain views, a dozen restaurants, huge marble lobbies and even a little golf course. What is lacked, most, however, was guests, as we were the only ones for the couple of days we stayed there. But every day all the restaurants would fire up and a full contingent of waiters would staff each one, hoping that maybe this would be the day they'd finally have a customer. The extensive marbling helped to echo our loneliness everytime we walked down around the white elephant. I'm glad we stayed there since everywhere else was a backpacker hotel and I couldn't really handle that, but the hotel's target niche of luxury seeking travelers in Pokhara is extremely narrow. Fulbari Lodge (5): Room-5, Facilities-5, Service-6, Wow-3 (great views and location next to a scenic gorge)