There is a placeholder with links to the itinerary and all the photos from this trip – click here or below:
Late start despite strike warnings yesterday (Lerhic has a cunning plan).
Two cars (one private) pick us up at 10.00 to ensure we can get through any pickets. Get to Alleppey incident free for rice boat on time – amazing boat trip – Alleppey round trip – including super seer fish, daal, cabbage and coconut and green beans lunch.
After lunch stop at Saint Mary’s church Champa Cullum – good look at the snake boat which allegedly wins prizes. Super day out!
At end of day drive circa 30 minutes to Marari Beach resort…
…where we are deposited in our pool villa. Got our bearings. We end of the day at the beach Grill with a seafood platter (tiger prawns, jumbo prawns, small prawns, local fish and squid) and the shellfish platter (the same, minus the local fish and squid but with extra big prawns and rock lobster). Beer to wash it down.
There is a placeholder with links to the itinerary and all the photos from this trip – click here or below:
After breakfast (same except for hot pineapple jam) go into New City (Ernakulam) shopping. Success with shalwar kameez and sandals and skeeter beaters, but not so with cutlery and crockery.
Into Fort Cochin & Jewtown to one or two Emporia. Brought bronze man and silver pillbox for Daisy. Looked at and booked Brunton Boat Yard for dinner.
Returned lunchtime with purchases.
Snacked on beer and cashews – then relaxed on our balcony in the afternoon until the rains came.
Later had Keralan massage (not quite Ayervedic). Two onto one – Daisy in our room, me in the therapy room. Amazing.
One thing I particularly remember about the massage was how incredibly knowledgeable my masseurs were about cricket. When they found out I liked cricket they wanted to discuss England cricket with me, but seemed to know more about it than I did.
Watched sunset again and took took took to Brunton boat yard for a good meal with the first wine of the holiday – £50 price tag high for these parts. Prawns in coconut milk soup (both) plus spicy grilled mullet plus prawns Tandoori style (Daisy).
Returned on foot, dodging savage dogs watched a little more test match [West Indies v India] and slept.
Light lunch – prawns on sticks and mini dosas on hotel terrace.
Delightful Sheila provides us with ideas for shopping and agrees to come in early to advise Sharji.
We rest by pool, swim a little and enjoy late today sun on our terrace.
Then I spot cricketers on the parade ground and watch for a while. Get dressed to go out and play with “the other children”, by which time they were gone.
Consolation dinner – tangy grilled prawns – Daisy – and mixed seafood platter – me. Chocolate roulade – all delightful.
We were serenaded by Antony and Benny while we ate that evening. We still sometimes listen to the CD of their gentle, simple flute and strings music and strangely, at the time of writing, in February 2020, are there to be seen as one of the three images up front on the Malabar House website.
There is a placeholder with links to the itinerary and all the photos from this trip – click here or below:
Rose 4 o’clock-ish because flight has been brought forward 1 1/2 hours. I get irritated when we see the old flight time still on the board but Mangal gets the obsequious and ubiquitous Mr Sharma to explain that we really do have to leave at 7:15, not 8:45.
Mr Sharma pops up everywhere to make sure we are happy – including, hilariously, even on the plane.
That really is not an exaggeration. Mr Sharma came over to ask if we were OK and if we wanted anything so many times. When he disappeared from the boarding lounge, I said to Daisy, as a joke, “I bet he even pops onto the plane to make sure we are OK”…which he did! We had trouble containing our laughter, while telling him that we were still OK and didn’t need anything else.
We arrived at Bangalore and I sniff a chance of accelerating at arrival in Cochin by switching to the Cochin flight, but I’m 10 minutes too late. Dejected, will retire to the dreariest to business class lounge for Pepsis and waiting.
Arrived [Trivandrum] early (20 minutes) and even set off 10 minutes before we were due to land.
Sharji our driver is a pleasure, but the route seems so hazardous we cannot rest. I invent mosques and cricket matches game. From 3- 3 to 8-3 [in favour of] mosques, to 21-11 [in favour of] cricket matches, when we declared the winner.
Arrive [at Malabar House] late and knackered but switch rooms to a better suite and have dinner in room. I had seerfish in a delightful sauce, Daisy had a chicken dish.
There is a placeholder with links to the itinerary and all the photos from this trip – click here or below:
Rose early – breakfasted in Hard Yak style, then driven to airport. Met Tse-Ten’s bosses coincidentally during 2 1/2 hour delay our flight.
Also met unfortunate Matt who was sent home home from Everest trek on account of a dog bite!
Got to Yak And Yeti around lunchtime – we have been upgraded to club which is nice. Yak And Yeti all we had hoped for – sunny and hot but not too sunny and not too hot.
Both had a club sandwich and a beer for lunch around the pool.
Enjoyed the afternoon. Briefly saw Sarah and her kids [friend from home, ex wife of Alan Cohen], then had a hard game of tennis.
Enjoyed the cocktail hour in club while observing Danish embassy party.
Excellent product placement on my part in that picture…Janie also does some product placement – nice toes
Got ready to go out and went to Thamel House restaurant (once taxi driver could find it!) – Amazing mutton, chicken and wild boar – staff very friendly and even more so when we gave them the piece from Traveller through which we had found them.
First found “speak no evil” (starting price 145 down to market price of 26!). Then found the previous merchant who had sold us “bottoms up” but was out of the naughty broken one. However we were only five minutes down the road when she ran up to us with a fist full of monkeys including naughty.
Walked back to Snowlands, bought cake, then decided to seek some turquoise – got lost around Barkhor, got bearings, went back via Tremsikhang Market. Found jewellers, no real joy, finished circuit and found turquoise pillbox but nothing for Daisy.
Took cyclo home – great fun – though junctions felt chancy.
Dinner at Yeti – “char shu, sweet chicken, veg, chicken noodles and rice.
It’s hard to explain how much fun we had that day and how unexpected the fun part was. We had been somewhat dreading our return to Lhasa and looking forward to leaving Tibet, having completed our touring in Shigatse.
But we were better acclimatised now and the weather was much better by the time we returned to Lhasa, so our half day of free time in Lhasa felt liberating – we had no guide with us at last and (as far as we know) were exploring the place unsupervised. The Barkhor was great fun for just walking around, browsing and chatting with the locals. And we found the silly little bits and pieces we wanted, not least the monkeys, which still (February 2020) adorn a shelf in the Clanricarde flat.
Breakfast in refectory more laughable than dinner – course upon course of things we didn’t want – I make do with a little bread and cake.
Set off – photographed Drongotse Monastery [I cannot find a reference for this place, nor a photograph, but that is what I wrote down].
There was a problem re-visit to Shalu Monastery as it had been omitted from our permit.
We assumed and were told that the omission was an accident and that the worst that might happen if we were caught entering without a permit would be a $100 fine, which I agreed to underwrite, figuring (correctly) that the Chinese authorities were unlikely to be policing that remote spot on a Sunday in April.
Risking life and limb (well…a fine) we went anyway and were not disappointed nor were we fined – amazing murals and very friendly monks and terrific atmosphere.
On to Shigatse. Check into hotel light Chinese lunch at a local restaurant (vegetables chicken noodle soup and pork and peas).
Short rest before touring amazing Tashilimpu Monastery – amazing sites and interesting encounters – e.g. stunning Yunnanese Tibetan lady and some contact with a monks.
Got to witness butter milk tea and bread chanting session in main assembly hall. I got to try bread. Went on to Shigatse market which did little for us.
Return for our supper with some hope as we have specifically ordered our food to the surprise of chef who normally does eight dishes!.
Yes, we really were the only guests at this hotel, which was pretty much the only proper hotel in Shigatse. Tourism to Tibet, which hadn’t much taken off by then anyway, had taken a sizeable knock at that time – probably due to 9/11. It wasn’t likely to recover for a few years either, as the SARS scare came less than a year after our visit.
Arrive Gyantse Hotel – so much better – short rest then off to see Pelkor Chode Monastery and Gyantse Kumbum with stunning murals and amazing views of Gyantse town and Dzong.
Tibetan butter tea – adjudged slightly less disgusting than Butanese butter tea
Dinner at hotel was hilarious. We had to push to eat in bar rather than in freezing refectory – then on came dish after dish – five starters and six mains – only “highlights” were spicy chicken wings, double cooked pork and thipdu[sic – surely thukpa] (noodle soup).
There is a placeholder with links to the itinerary and all the photos from this trip – click here or below:
Breakfast improved by some yoghurt and cheese.
Visited Norbulingka Palace in morning – both Palace and gardens more interesting and charming than advertised in the guidebook.
Went to Barkhor as the weather is so much better today – firstly to the Tibetan traditional medicinal centre…
…then 2/3 of way round circuit at Makye Amye are stunning views of Barkhor circuit.
Weird Chinese tea with spices floating in it and very tasty some duck (flat noodles in soup) with chewy yak.
Finished Barkhor circuit buying bone shoes and bone monkey.
Back to base for free afternoon which we started at the Internet café. Perhaps it was the chewy yak or maybe the depressing hotel room but we were both in a foul mood – monkey got broken in ensuing pillow fight.
Actually I attribute the dual foul mood primarily to the altitude. I subsequently learnt that tetchiness is a well-known side effect of flying into such high altitude and doing stuff without thoroughly acclimatising first.
Made up in traditional fashion and rested.
Supper at Snowland again, with fried momos, yak burger and fries, yakitori with rice. Chocolate cake takeaway was a real treat with which to celebrate our impending escape from the Lhasa Hotel.
There is a placeholder with links to the itinerary and all the photos from this trip – click here or below:
Another mind bogglingly awful breakfast followed by another snow flurry-ridden outing, this time to Drepung Monastery – amazing murals on the walls and surprisingly little cultural revolution damage. Large complex with many chapels and halls. Saw few monks however.
Light lunch at yeti café – yak noodle soup superb, chicken noodle soup good but fried pork in batter was a poor choice. Resolve to return tonight nonetheless.
Siesta followed by outing to Sera Monastery – we time exit perfectly with the next snow storm.
Sera is smaller but lovely – we meet more monks and almost here outdoor debate – cricket match like, everyone turns up to agree that it snowed off! Witness amazing transient art work of mandala in sand.
Second siesta followed by excellent dinner at Yeti – double cooked pork, chicken in sweet garlic sauce, excellent wok fried fresh vegetables and egg fried rice. Daisy is still suffering altitude.
For some reason I didn’t even mention our visit to the Muslim Market when I wrote up the day, but it is clear from the photo sequencing and photo journal that we made that visit that afternoon. Perhaps the altitude was getting to me when I wrote up.
Yup, the altitude got to both of us, as the next day’s log will confirm. Daisy was suffering more, with breathlessness and extreme fatigue. But both of us for sure got the tetchiness which goes along side the more physical symptoms. Goes with the turf in Tibet, that altitude problem.
