Retired Nomads Part 4: Phewa Lake

Monday October 20, 2025

The artwork for Diwali was finished this morning, and we got checked out and headed to the airport for the 25-minute flight to Pokhara. It left well after we were supposed to arrive in Pokhara. The guide says they are always late.

The Marriott Lobby

finished artwork for the festival - there was a party at the hotel that night that we missed

at the airport - nice luggage transport to and from the plane?

The view of the mountains as we got off the plane was awesome. We were met by our guide Shiva and his driver Khumar.

as we stepped off the plane

in the small airport that we walked directly into the bag pickup

in the parking lot of the airport

We checked into the Temple Tree Resort and Spa and had lunch at the hotel. We split a pizza and then toured the grounds. The hotel grounds are lovely rooms but quite basic. Later, as we laid in the damp bed, Greg said it felt like we were camping.

Temple Tree Resort

our room

view right outside of our room

Oriental Magpie-robin

bar area

pool

We had free time after lunch, and we walked to a gelato place and walked along the lake. We stopped at a mini mart for water and Coke Zero and walked back to the hotel.

the paddle boats

Shiva took us to the boat launch at 3:00 for about an hour on the paddle boat. Yep, a paddle boat. For those who has done even a small one (like the cute swan boats) know it always looks fun and then after 5 minutes you can’t make the boat move. The guide helped the boat guy peddle since it was a large boat with 6 people in it.

Phewa is the largest among the three lakes in Pokhara valley. It was peaceful with beautiful surroundings. There was a Temple in the middle of the lake on a small island. We could have gotten off to see it, but we opted to stay on board and just circle the island.

entrance to launch site

launch site

Tom, Cathy & Shiva

After the boat ride we had the rest of the day to ourselves. The Diwali festival was in full swing with lots of decorating with marigold and sand or rice Mandelas, and other patterns. There were also quite a few groups dancing. For the first group, (that was very good), I thought I was videoing, but it didn’t work. I finally figured out what I was doing wrong and got a smaller group on the corner of the restaurant where we were going to eat.

walking the main road

Later we had dinner at the Med 5 restaurant for dinner and enjoyed a Mezze platter. We sat upstairs on the balcony and could see the mountains in one direction and the lake and the dancers in the other direction.

Mezze platter - hummus, lebna, baba ganoush, spicy tomato sauce, tahini & pita bread

We got more water and soda and came across another dance company. The town was full of twinkling lights and many people decorating the sidewalks. It was a happy accident to be in Nepal during Diwali.