The Other Side Pt. 10 – Midnight Run

Midnight run into old town Kathmandu. It’s almost one in the morning on our last night in Kathmandu.  Karen is long since gone to bed.  Greg, Jeff and I are sitting in Jeff’s hotel room.  The bottle of Scotch has been hit hard, already. This is after a couple of hours in the bar and sundry other refreshments.  It’s trouble time.

Jeff says something like, “Let’s go get a couple of rickshaws and ride them into the heart of Themal.  I guarantee it’s a once-in-a-lifetime experience.”   I was tired and just wanted to go to bed.  But, how can you not take advantage of a once in a lifetime experience?  So we find our way to a crowded corner in Themal, rent a couple of rickshaws, and start rolling south into the heart of  Kathmandu. Only dogs and the occasional rickshaw driver are awake.  It’s dead quiet.  We roll along streets that just hours before were crowded with hundreds of thousands of people.

Now there is no one.

We visit all the temples that we’e spent the last couple of days elbowing our way in.  Now they’re  deserted except for us.  Above is shot from my rickshaw as we go deeper into Themal.  Jeff is sitting next to me, keeping up an on-going dialog in Nepalese with our driver.  We pass the Scotch back and forth between rickshaws.  Jeff was right.  I will never forget this night.