Hello to one and all from Pokara, really very little to report from the last three weeks and a meager 300km travelled. After waiting in Kathmandu for two weeks for adequate tyres to arrive for Rocanante sent specially from Bangkok my feet were as itchy as they can get to hit the road once more. Having been under a rigorous and some times brutal get fat plan in Kathmandu my energies were high and my lungs full to the brim with the comparitively large amount of oxygen at 1000m so it was with great spirits that I delved in to the Kathmandu traffic on a rainy Monday morning. Despite a few skin burning hours of sunshine which reminded me how nervous I am about how devishly hot the plains of India are going to be the rain followed me with a commendable taunascity so rarely seen in monsoon showers. It did little to dampen my mood as I followed an impeccably paved road through lush valley after lush valley with gushing rivers heavy with the monsoon cascading over every available rockface to accompany its brethren in the raging torrents racing towards the plains to add to the local's miseries.

I took my time on my way here taking a few side trips to Gorkar and Bondipor including a rather eventful camping beside bulging paddies which in retrospect was not the smartest idea but if you saw the view from my opened tent door you would understand the risk. So I arrived here a very damp boy and with a rather nasty dose of dysentry which in the last four days has destroyed what my 2 weeks of the costly get fat plan had achieved, serves me right for drinking well water during the monsoon, I might have to penney pinch in a more intelligent manner in the future.

There are many viable reasons for me to stay here in Pokara for an extended amount of time, the floods, the 40 degree heat in the plains at the moment and the vast amount of time I have to get to Delhi a mere 2000km away but I think the main reason is how much I love it here. Yoga every morning, followed by a swim in the lake (my first since Sydney), great cheap restaurants and an amazing family guest house tucked away at the agreeable price of a euro a night with some very interesting neighbors as only a place like Pokara can provide, viva las hippies! My plan at the moment is to pass another week here and then make my long awaited return to India and Varanasi, about 700km away.

I will finish with a quick ode to the Nepalese people. They are without doubt one of the most genuinely friendly people I have met on my travels to date with an unbelievable knowledge of the English language from large town to small complimented by manners that only close proximity to a commonwealth country can provide. Though never one to condone colonialism any institution which promotes the use of referring to me as "sir" by all and sundry has to have its good points, at last some bloody respect!