Before we arrived in Bangkok, we also spent time in Kathmandu, Nepal's capital. Getting there was a simple matter of 170km from Pokhara. So that was just a 7 hour coach journey. Still, at least there were no landslides and no 8-point turns in buses on cliff tops! After checking into the hotel where we were spending the last night of the tour, we decided to wander into Thamel, the tourist-y area of Kathmandu to have a look at the shops and to find the hostel where Jo and I were paying a fiver between us for each night there, so wanted to make sure it existed and had a roof and maybe even possibly electricity. Stumbled upon the Holyland hostel (thankfully it did actually exist) so that was a relief to know we hadn't been conned out of a £1.20 deposit.

For our last night as a group, Vipul chose to take us to a restaurant called Rumdoodle's, where I went with my world challenge group in 2002. All groups who go there are given an oversized 'Yeti foot' to sign and decorate as we pleased to go on the walls with thousands of others, and despite looking for about half an hour I couldn't find the one from my last visit there. It also turned out to be Vipul's 30th birthday so there was lots of beer and drinks and a bit of dancing (mostly from crazy Nepalese people - there are videos somewhere that will hopefully see the light of day before too long).

The next morning was the last official part of the tour and it involved an early morning trip to Swayambhunath aka the monkey temple. It is a little way out of Kathmandu and offers a great view of the valley which houses the city, and as the name suggests, there are monkeys roaming free around the temple complex. After 2 weeks of being very careful of what we ate and drank, a few of us decided to try a 'lassi' which is a yoghurt drink where fresh yoghurt is blended with various fruits - very tasty and quite refreshing, we just worried that it may come back to haunt us so to speak! After the temple we went back to Thamel and had a final group breakfast at a small cafe. This officially concluded the tour although we all agreed to meet up at Kilroy's restaurant in the evening, and hoped Vipul would be able to join us too before he led the same tour we had just been on in reverse back to Delhi! Jo and I then walked the short distance to Holyland, hoping it would be ok considering the low low price we were paying. It was a pleasant surprise that we had a large double bed, a TV, ensuite western toilet and even a dressing room!? No air conditioning, but pretty decent nonetheless.

Dinner at Kilroy's was good fun, with more western food on the menu, all of the tour members minus Ray and Yin made it, but not Vipul. Still we had a good laugh before going to K-Too bar to watch the live Premiership football (of course!). Before heading back to the hostel pretty early as I was feeling pretty rough - feeling really cold despite having a temperature!

The day after we didn't do very much cos I was still feeling awful though Jo managed to help me get my temperature down, along with a combination of gallons of water. We met up with Tom and Beth from the tour group in the afternoon to have a drink and discussed our plans for Thailand as we would all be there at the same time, and we booked a very nice looking hostel in Chiang Mai - it even has a pool!

The next day was our last in Nepal before flying to Bangkok and we didn't do very much at all before getting a taxi to the airport very early so we only had 3 hours to wait. I was still feeling pretty rough and wasn't looking forward to the flight but as long as I had water and a seat it was all good. Despite boarding on time, we then sat on the runway for over an hour but eventually we managed to take off and head to Thailand...