Hi,
Just for those interested with getting tours/arrangement by itour.
General: All questions and enquiries answered promptly. at times just need a reminder, but all answered in time. Detailed information on what you get and see in the tour is well provided including the hotels that you will be staying (excluding those during the trekking period).
For the trekking part, the guides and porters are not fixed. They have a pool of guides and porters. For my trip this time, my guide was a bit passive. I had to take the effort to ask and get information out from him. While the porter, that turned out to be a more informative source.
tipping: I was not sure how much to provide a tip to both the guide and porter, but based on different sources on the internet, I just did a quick average of 5 euro's per day. [The guide indirectly indicated that it should be 20% of I was not sure what amount]. This is quite an amount for the 4 days, about 2 months apartment rent according to information from the porter.
I was met at the airport and also met when I arrived back in Kathmandu with the bus. My advise, if you are not interested to see the drive (basically just nerve recking drive throught mountain roads) which lasted for nearly 8 hours! I flew into Pokhara and took the bus back to Kathmandu, I would recommend if you can afford it, to just take the flight back especially if you have not much time to spare.
I am currently in Kathmandu, staying at the Tibet International Hotel. I think this is the best value hotel compared to the Hyatt or Radisson. It is way outside of the Thamel area. This would be for someone wanting less of the traffic and noise of the Thamel area. For this place, value for the money you pay is the best among all of the places I checked out. From Thamel to here it is about 300 rupees, but back to Thamel, you can bargain between 150-300.
Hope this small review and info on Kathmandu helps!
Cheers!
Here are some photos for those interested in the Tibet International hotel
Yeti Bar
Outside wall mural
Door decoration
View of the Hyatt from the hotel rooftop
Interior wall decoration
Bathroom amenities
Sitting room area (in the room)
Tea and bar facilities
Bed room section
Rooftop view
