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Back to the Bhutan/Indian BorderJan 3, 2009
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HIGHLIGHTS
• Drive back to Phuntsholing
DETAIL
Apparently everything happens in three’s. First my flight to Kathmandu turns in to a fiasco as I cannot get a direct flight from Paro, secondly lovely British Airways doesn’t know their thing from their elbow and now there’s a landslide on the road back to Phuntsholing.
I decide to skip visiting the museum and so we make our way to Phuntsholing anticipating the probable wait due to landslide. But all is OK and we pass where the landslide occurred and we, well Sangay and Tashi have lunch as I am not hungry. They drink and eat here like you would never believe – plates and plates of red rice.
We drive down from 3,000 metres from the edge of the Himalaya’s through beautiful clear blue skies and at about 1,000 metres we encounter fog, well actually we are in cloud.
It’s getting warmer though and I enjoy it. I just don’t know how these people can live here. Do the warm up – most probably July 23, between 2:45 and 3:00pm.
There are loads of workers on the sides of the road: sweeping, removing rocks, making gutters and Sangay tells me that the workers are from Assam, India. He then surprises me by saying that Bhutanese are lazy and that Indians work for less money.
We make it to Phuntsholing, 150kms in six hours – an average of 25KPH! The hotel is lovely, just like the others I have stayed in. I have been spoilt for the past week and I know I will have to go back to reality, $5 per night rooms but for now I will enjoy it.
The red sun is setting and is enshrouded by mist so I can look directly at it. It feels as if I am back in the desert.
So it’s back to Siliguri tomorrow and I may just continue on to the Nepalese border and clear customs and get ready for my flight to Kathmandu on the 5th.
