Stepping off the tourist trail can be something of a gamble.
The well-tread path is beaten for a reason, and with it comes ease of finding
an affordable guesthouse, ease of transportation, a tendency toward having
English menus, speaking English in general, and having Western amenities. Along with all our well-touristed stops in Nepal, we decided to make a pitstop.
Tansen, or Palpa as it is locally known, is situated some six hours away from Pokhara. That’s
six hours of sardined in a public bus snaking down Nepal’s Siddhartha Highway, a
mountain road barely wide enough for the numerous buses to pass without their
mirrors kissing.
The town itself is practically carved into the mountainside.
Lanes and alleys stacked on one another, buildings tiered. Woven in between
shops and restaurants, numerous shrines and temples tucked away. Mother goats
sleep in the shade, their offspring prancing around them.
And somehow, this small town, in some ways so sleepy and
quiet, managed to be the loudest small town we’ve encountered. Buses,
motorbikes, and cars honked their way along, announcing the fact of forward
movement. Tractors hauled empty trailers that banged and hammered their
presence along the narrow streets. It was quite a feat, to have such a tiny place rival the noise of a big city.
Getting away from that can sometimes reveal a country’s
hidden gems. Other times, it is simply guidebooks trying to create something
from nothing. Tansen fell somewhere in the middle of those two.