Three Nights, Three Rooms in Kathmandu - Part One

Kathmandu- Three Nights, Three Rooms

18 long years, revisiting the place where I took my lovely bride on our honeymoon, one of the finest addresses in Kathmandu - Hotel De L'Annapurna.

Things have changed little, or well a little,  the hotel has dropped 'De L' and is now known simply as Hotel Annapurna. The team is very polite and courteous and that is where I will leave things. 

'Your room will take a little while' said our receptionist with a nice big nepali smile, the ladies are beautiful, so protesting was out of the question. So off we went to the coffee shop to have a bite, we weren't feeling too hungry, but it was time for lunch. How about the Nepali thali suggested the restaurant supervisor, by the time the thali came we were getting hungry. The thali was gorgeously presented in a very ornate silver platter with little silver katoris or bowls. There was a chicken curry and some mutton, not very exciting, however the fried fish was delicious. There was even some black dal, the one we call Ma ki Dal in Punjabi, but this was a very frail, unwell Ma, boiled, faintly spiced. The food itself is recognisable, our dishes look the same but each one tasted different, must be the water or the spices used.

Returning to the reception, our room was ready.

We were given a room on the ground floor, the first one on the right as you enter the corridor, it has a wonderfully damp smell and a gorgeous view of the kitchen exhaust from Arniko the Chinese restaurant and an almost dead, overgrown patch of lawn. This kind of room is what I call the doggy room, the last, most miserable room on a hotel's inventory, sold to the most unfortunate traveller.

Night One

Naturally, I had to decline and very kindly the reception team gave us a nicer room but with a twin bed. Well at least it did not smell, unlike the first one. This room faced the swimming pool lawns, the wife was pleased. Not for long, turns out there was a banquet function on the lawn right outside the window. The strains of soothing music travelled across the lawn, amazing I thought, how nice and civilised these chaps are, they do know how to host in style and look at our own functions, loud punjabi music assaulting the ears. Big mistake, in a short while, the party shook off all its decency and punjabi rock and desi songs blared right at our room.

There was no way we were eating in the middle of all that shor sharaba. We took a stroll down Durbar Marg looking for Baan Thai, we had fond memories of the restaurant from 18 years back. Business has moved up for Baan Thai, so much in fact that they've moved from the earlier first floor location to one on the fourth floor in another building. Plus there's no elevator, no way I was going to heave my heavy frame, wheezing up four floors.

We ended up at an Italian restaurant nearby,  they had a starter pretending to be a vegetable foundue made with bechamel sauce. Not nice at all.

Don't expect the food to be all that great on Darbar Marg, if you are looking for options other than KFC types. Try Thamel, that's what we did!

More on that later, in my next post.