Getting anywhere is sometimes a struggle in this country. For a start there are often bandhas (strikes) or chakka jams (road blocks). Secondly, each year during the monsoon, the roads are destroyed by the rain. Nepal is extremely porous, and either the mountain sides come sliding down on the road, or the foundation of the roads gets washed away under it. Or, as happened a few days ago on the east-west high way, the only major road through Nepal, bridges get washed away by the powerful flooded rivers. To the left is the beginning of a landslide. We arrived here around four in the afternoon and quickly decided that it would be too dangerous to continue. A few hours later, it looked like this...

So, we could not go that way! The next day we tried going the other way, we'd been told that the road was cleared from landslides and open. As it turns out, it was very open, in fact it was missing. A bridge had simply been flushed away, leaving a ten meter hole in the road... The photos speak quite good for themselves I think. They are trying to build diversions, and until it is possible to drive around, people are crossing on foot to find a bus on the other side. When we first came to this site, we understood before we knew what had happened that this was not something that would be cleared quickly. Usually the Nepalis are very good at waiting, just sitting around doing nothing. But this time, buses were turning around, and people started walking immediately. This is how we realised that something big had happened. Still, we couldn't believe our eyes when we saw the hole. This explained the lines of trucks that we had past the last many kilometers...

Maybe a coincidence, anyway quite ironic, is this sign just some 50 meters from the former bridge. This is the district of Kapilbastu welcoming all drivers into their district, wishing them a safe and happy journey. Or, as they say it here, happy your journey!