Pure Bliss
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 Kathmandu 44600, Nepal  Kommentieren  World Tour  Abenteuer, Berge, Mountainbike, Nationalpark, Natur, Nepal, Schnee My new camera is already older than a month. A few test images:  true colors  false colors
 light  shadows
 firstling  darling
 orange-green  blue-orange
 colorful dog  colorful mirror
 blue  bluer
Unlike Greg, who is gone again (-;
How can you picture a day on the world tour?
(Frequently Asked Question) Right now I’m on a mountainbike, going around the Annapurna. Usually world tour days look something like this:
 only hanging around on the world tour?
This schedule is obtained automatically by
 reading as top priority
Other World Travellers, travel completely different, depending on preference. Greg for example sleeps very long and often shows an unbelievable lack of curiosity. But he gets in touch with people much more eagerly and likes hiking much more.
My preferences are in this order:
 light is important
Of course, no two days are the same, because always something unexpected happens. In addition, many days are scheduled in advance, eg by
 hiking is an exception
Right now, I’m on a mountainbike tour.
Greetings from the Annapurna circuit. In the “teahouses”, they really have internet access.
Dasain in Nepal is something like Christmas for us or Nadaam in Mongolia …
… only with sacrifices. There are parades. 
Temples are visited. 
Children build bamboo swings and eat icecream. 
Machines are decorated and sprinkled with blood. 
The blood comes from animal sacrifice. 
The sacrifices go on the whole night. 
Today is only the 10th of 15 days Dasain. All Nepalis are on vacation now and I need a vacation too:
The Annapurna circuit by mountain bike! Yay! Here in Thamel, Kathmandu you can’t walk 10 steps without one of these questions:
Or simply “Shhhh…”  You want something?
To be honest, I have been experimenting with the most dangerous mind-altering substances in the world since the beginning of this journey: books.
From all of my reading life, I can only remember about 100 books. There haven’t been many more anyway. This has to change, and us travelers have a lot of opportunity to read.  Books: Mind-altering substances
You shouldn’t believe everything you read. But we humans inevitably do. Understanding is believing. Descartes was wrong and Spinoza was right.
So you should be careful, what you read. I chose a list of 200 books for the world tour, the Reddit’s Favorite Books. This list contains almost all of my favorite books. Besides that, the voters were mostly nerds, like-minded people (-;
Here is the complete list with my comments
Also on the world tour, I’ve read these new releases and classic German titles:
Reading is in fact my top priority on this trip. I’m grateful for reading tips, especially by German authors.
Up to Nepal, we have only visited countries, which attempted communism.
Some communist Mo(nu)ments:  Bratislava - Slovakia  Bratislava - Slovakia
 Moscow - Russia  Moscow - Russia
 Ulan Ude - Russia  Ulan Ude - Russia
 Ulan Bator - Mongolia  Ulan Bator - Mongolia
 Beijing - China  Beijing - China
 Chengdu - China  Chengdu - China
 Lhasa - Tibet  Lhasa - Tibet
30
Sep 2011
On my business card it says “computer nerd”. Now a nerd is not a nerd without gadgets. I took 5 essential gadgets along on the world tour.
Numbers 1 and 2, laptop and camera, are almost self-evident among backpackers, these days. An equally important gadget for me is an eBook reader.  You don't have to be a bird to fly for eBook readers
It doesn’t have to be a Kindle or a Sony. I’ve got a cheap Hanvon device with these features:
 always with me
In an emergency, the eBook Reader can even take over tasks from my Pocket PC.
 eBook reader up close
The eBook reader also has some disadvantages.
 a perfect break
I won’t take a step without my eBook reader!
Kathmandu 44600, Nepal Kommentare sind geschlossen World Tour Chillen, Fortschritt, Gadget, Hack, Lesen, Wissen 28
Sep 2011
The Tibet Tour was extremely expensive. This time, 1000 EUR were good for only 20 days. Before it was 27 days, 36 days and 23 days.
The trend is not my friend.  travel costs
I came to Nepal with 4000 EUR – by a whisker. On the eve every cent saved counted:
Thank you Chinese guys! I spent exactly € 3999.50 EUR up to the Nepalese border. Juchui! 
Now the second half of the world tour has begun. Finally, we are saving money in comparison to Germany. In Kathmandu, you have to make an effort to spend more than 10 EUR per day.
Even our planned Annapurna circuit on mountain bike is cheaper than 2 days of Tibet …
Our Tibetan guide explains the Potala palace to us.  Potala palace in Lhasa
Our Tibetan guide can improve a lot on his English. Fortunately, we don’t care about Dalai Lama stories or historical names. We don’t even care about the guide himself, but he is obligatory in Tibet.
Since 2008, individual travel on the roof of the world is no longer possible. In response to the Tibetan protests at the Olympic games, there are military patrols, checkpoints, curfews and permits for each anthill.  Greg, our guide and me in front of our landcruiser
Greg and I thus necessarily book an organized Tibet tour with guide and driver. We begin the journey on the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, the highest in the world. On the “Road to Heaven” we roll along to Tibet for 45 hours.
Upon arrival at the railway station in Lhasa, we are greeted with a long white scarf, instead of a Hawaiian flower garland. Instead of a tanned, half-naked beauty, a tanned, friendly Tibetan welcomes us.  View of Lhasa from the hiking trail
While we don’t understand much of what our guide says, we consider ourselves very lucky with him. He dislikes baby-sitting as much as we do. So he leaves us alone in Lhasa. Only for 2-3 hours each day, he is showing us the obligatory attractions: Potala, Jokhang, Sera and Norbulingka.
But as we tell our guide about our hiking plans for one of the surrounding mountains, we really get his attention:
We finally manage to calm him down. As we are on our own again, we are going anyway. The hike above the Sera monastery is very beautiful and quite tiring at over 4000m. Instead of the police, a very friendly school class gives us a lot of attention.  Yak at the Yamdrok lake
After 3 days in the capital, Greg and I continue on to the Yamdrok lake and to the second largest city of Shigatse. A day later, we stay in a tent at the Everest Base Camp. Finally, we cross the Himalayas into Nepal’s lowlands.
Every day we visit pre-planned attractions, stop for pre-planned photo breaks and eat meals in pre-planned, way too expensive tourist restaurants. We feel as out of control, as we certainly are…  pre-planned photo break at the Everest
While we are sipping yak butter tea in our tourist restaurant, the guide and the driver eat downstairs or somewhere else, just not with us tourists. We feel more than ever like decadent imperialist pigs. We certainly appear so to Tibetans …
Nevertheless, we enjoy the tour in our Land Cruiser. While Tibetan pop music sounds from the radio, we admire the varied mountain landscapes of the Himalayas. Out of the window, we watch nomadic yak herders passing by and Tibetan peasants’ houses decorated with prayer flags.  Peasant with horse-drawn cart
In one of the few towns along the way, we are greeted by the village children on their BMX:
But most of the time, the kids come running up to the landcruiser with hands held open, as if their lives depend on it:
 Tibetan children expect gifts
Meanwhile, their penniless parents toil in the fields, during wind and weather, to earn their meager living as farmers. Most Tibetans live in a subsistence economy, from hand to mouth. It’s like in Germany a century ago.
On the 7th day at the border to Nepal, after all our time together, we have to leave our guide. We grew fond of him, after all and are saying goodbye with mixed feelings. We also have to say goodbye to our Loose guidebook for Tibet. The Chinese border officer is dissatisfied with a map display in the book.  Peasants in the fields
Our conclusion:
After the Trans-Siberian railway, Tibet is the second disappointment of the world tour. As with the Transsib, this was due to our high expectations after the excessive media hype about this trip. Thus droves of elderly European tourists are attracted, who want to fulfill their dream of Tibet. For us backpackers, Tibet is expensive and depriving of our freedom to decide on our own. Tibet isn’t a must-do either. Greg says, that the part of China bordering Tibet, looks just like the “real Tibet”. After all places like Litang in Sichuan and Shangri-La in Yunnan are located on the Tibetan plateau. And the Chinese food is much spicier! 
More information:
Kathmandu 44600, Nepal 3 Kommentare Travel Report, World Tour Bahn, Berge, Buddha, Tee, Tibet, Wandern
It’s official now:
floc is bitten by the wild monkey! It was a beautiful afternoon in the monkey temple in Kathmandu:  view to the left  view to the right
 view behind  view ahead
 bumm  bumm bumm
 Bumm Bumm Bumm Bumm  BUMM BUMM BUMM BUMM BUMM BUMM BUMM BUMM
 Ow!  OW OW!
Since the apish theft of my lens cap, I no longer take monkeys lightly. The wild monkey still bit me in the upper arm – 2 times!
I love our close relatives anyway. And now the 500 EUR for vaccination prior to traveling pay off… P.S. |
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