Text 19367, 57 rader
Skriven 2014-11-14 10:14:00 av MICHAEL LOO (1:123/140)
Ärende: Asia 282
================
Airport transfers being included, we arranged for an early
exit, our driver being the same guy, and as it turns out
in conversation the brother of the front desk guy and a
member of the family that owns both hotels. He tried to get
us to hire him to drive us to Pokhara, but we already had
reservations for Everest flightseeing and then out of town
with Buddha Air.

We were dropped off at the domestic terminal, where two
scruffy individuals scooped up our bags where the guy had
dropped them, hurrying us along into the building, where
the counter hadn't opened yet. Of course, they asked for
tips, and so they got a buck each - there was hardly a
choice without making a scene. These two ended up being a
little bit useful, taking our stuff to the police office
for safekeeping, for which I would have gladly paid the
couple bucks, but there was no additional charge.

U4 101 KTM KTM 0630 0730 B19 2AC

We were on the second flight of the day, for which they
announced an indeterminate delay, which wouldn't suit our
schedule, so they put us on the first flight, which went
out an hour late; as it turned out, the second one went a
short while after, but better safe et cetera.

The Buddha Air schedule is a statement of intentions rather
than a promise, everything depending on the cloud cover,
haziness, wind, and whether the airplane wants to go up.
This is understandable as the company had lost one if its
flightseeing planes and a bunch of revenue passengers on the
0630 departure just over a year before. This gave us only
modest pause, as Lilli had long wanted to see the mountain,
and trekking to base camp or something was an opportunity
missed in the past, if it had been available at all.

It wasn't the clearest day ever, but when we got above the
pollution of the valley, the views were pretty good, and
some nice photos were taken despite the scratchy windows and
the intense vibrations. Plus we were right by the propeller,
I wonder who chose those seats. The pretty flight attendant
was all business but gave a little sympathy to the addled
older couple that we were and helped us out a little, giving
us an extra cockpit visit, and so on. I recommend the
experience - it was on the whole like crawling into a coffee
table book for an hour.

When we landed, we were dumped off outside the terminal, by
the parking lot, whence we had to walk a block back, go
through security, collect our stuff from the office, and get
checked in for the other flight, where we were of course
expected. On the way we met our scruffy friends, with waves
and ironic smiles all round.

___ Blue Wave/386 v2.30
--- Platinum Xpress/Win/WINServer v3.0pr5
 * Origin: Check Out Doc's QWK Mail  Via Web BBS > DocsPlace.org  (1:123/140)