Our lovely friend who had arranged the trip assured us that the resort was a mere ninety minutes drive from Kathmandu. We left straight after picking up Son from school at two thirty, and arrived at seven in the evening - you do the maths... partly this was down to several landslides on the road, but also down to her telling us a big fat porky pie.
Anyway, we arrived eventually. Borderlands is very loud, with a river crashing through the canyon on one side and a jungle full of noisy cicadas (or something) on the other, which was good, as it meant we could barely hear the kids whingeing that they were hungry (we normally eat around five). We went to bed straight after supper, lulled to sleep by the roar of the river/cicadas (what are cicadas anyway? are they just big grasshoppers?)/Hubby and Twin 2 coughing up quantities of gunk (they both still have pretend TB).
The next day everyone else at the resort went canyoning/hiking but we opted for the sit-on-the-grass-and-drink-pretend-cups-of-tea-served-by-Barbie option. Hubby got leeched (which he deserved, being the only one who avoided leeches at Kakani the other week) and I periodically exhorted Twin 2 to try to do her wees and poos on the potty, with limited success. Son went on a massive bug hunt, and in fact returned from the trip with a praying mantis, two grasshoppers, a spider, a moth and a caterpillar. All sadly now dead (we have renamed his insect house 'Belsen'). Actually had quite a pleasant time hanging out in the sunshine for a day and a half.
It wasn't until it was time to go that things took a turn for the worse.
We decided to leave immediately after lunch on the Sunday, so that we'd be back in time for Twin 2's physiotherapy session. We got as far as the top of the track heading out of the resort when the Land Rover suddenly lost power, so Hubby roll-reversed it back to the campsite. It wasn't long before there was a big gang of Nepali chaps trying to help Hubby to start the car. Realising that it could be some time, Twins and I lay down on a rug under a tree for a nap, and Son went of to catch more bugs.
Some two hours later, the car finally started again, to whoops of joy all round.
How happy we were as we jolted over landslides and around precipitous hairpin bends (have come to the conclusion that probably all the roads outside the Kathmandu valley are like this).
We had just been remarking smugly how lucky we were to have broken down so close to the resort, and how much harder it would have been if we'd been halfway to Kathmandu, when the car gave up again.
This time we managed to bump start it, as we were on a hill, so it only needed a bit of a nudge.
I remembered someone saying that bad things always come in threes.
So, I said to Hubby, if we break down, what happens? He had just finished reassuring me that someone would send mechanics out from camp to fix the car/take us home, when there was yet another depressing silence from under the bonnet.
Handily enough we came to a halt in a village, near a shop with a phone.
And it only took a mere seven hours for the mechanics to make it out from Kathmandu.
During which time the entire village turned out to come and point and giggle at the blonde twins, blond brother and slightly harassed-looking parents.
We were a little late to school on Monday morning.
Then Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday the school has had yet another holiday - Teehar (which is the same as Diwali, I think).
However, this time we decided not to attempt any more holiday trips. We took the car out once, yesterday, to go to the Supermarket to buy crisps and biscuits (can't cope when our cook is on holiday) and that's it.
Hubby is back in the UK next week, and the car is going into the garage, and I'm going no further than school. In a taxi.
ps - Oh, forgot to tell you about the wishing well. Last place we went there was a wishing well, and all the children got to throw in a coin and make a wish.
Son asked for the environment to be protected and everyone in the world to be happy; Twin 2 said she wanted to be Cinderella; Twin 1 wished for a white chicken.
I hope Father Christmas was listening!
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