The Journey: The real Nepal and the real India. A journey where following in the footsteps of the Buddha, we will discover the same landscapes, the same people and the same truths, that more than 2,500 years ago the Buddha discovered. This is a meditation on the road, with daily meditation instructions to discover our true potential as human beings. This spiritual adventure is valid for anyone who wants to see and discover the profound universal truths still alive in Nepal & India, not just for those who consider themselves Buddhists.
This Christmas program will be accompanied by Antonio Pascual, a student of Eastern philosophy and art in the monasteries of Nepal and India since 1974. He now lives in Kathmandu where he specializes as a pilgrimage and meditation guide.
This Christmas program starts in Kathmandu, Nepal, on Wednesday 28 December 2011, with the meeting with our representative at the chosen hotel (check in time after noon) and a welcome dinner with a presentation of the whole program, and finished in Kathmandu, Nepal on Wednesday 11 January 2012 at noon.
This program can be combined with any of the other itineraries we have in the Himalayas, like Tibet, Bhutan or extensions in Nepal or India, either individually or in groups.
For more information go to our website www.mysticalasia.com part of Dharma Adventure group or contact our team at sm@dharma.com.np
Selected hotels: Hotels for this tour are the best available in the different places that we will visit, where some are basic, because there are only for the use of pilgrims who make this journey. However, but in the major cities, we have selected hotels that although not deluxe, nevertheless offers high standards of quality and service for your convenience.
Kathmandu: Hotel Malla Lumbini: Buddha Maya Garden Kusinagara: Hotel Lotus Nikko Patna: Hotel Chanakya Rajgir: The Indo Hokke Hotel Bodhgaya: Hotel Lotus Nikko Varanasi: Hotel Ramada Plaza
Note: for extra hotel nights in Kathmandu, please contact our team at sm@dharma.com.np
Visa information: For this program your clients can get the Nepal visa at arrival 30 or 90 days multiple entries, depending on how long before or after our program start they are planning to stay. Please refer to our visa information posted @ our website www.MisticalAsia.com but it is very important to mention to your clients to get India multiple entry visa, before departure, from their own countries.
Day 01: Kathmandu Arrive at the designated hotel after 12pm, and meeting with our representative to give us an overview of the entire program and welcome dinner.
Day 02: Kathmandu sightseeing tour around the old part of town, with its pagoda-style temples with stunning wood carvings, we also will visit the holy stupas of Swayambhunath and Boudhanath, revered since ancient times. In the afternoon visit to the Tibetan Monastery of Kopan.
Day 03: Kathmandu Full day excursion visiting the city of Patan, also known as the City of Fine Arts, the traditional center for carving and Newar Buddhist sculpture. In the afternoon visit to the city of Bhaktapur, the city of devotees, where we will enjoy an impressive display of temples. In the main square we will have the opportunity to see the best example in Nepal of the pagoda architectural style, the famous Nyatapola Temple. From here we will go to Holy Namo Buddha Stupa, where the Buddha in one of his previous lives, did charity of his own body to a hungry tigress.
Day 4: Kathmandu - Lumbini overland, along the spectacular Trisuli River, to the southwest of the country to Lumbini, near the border with India.
Day 5: Lumbini – Kapilavastu Lumbini is the most sacred Buddhist site of Nepal, where more than 2,500 years ago the Queen Mayadevi gave birth to Prince Siddhartha Gautama, who became Sakyamuni Buddha the sage of the Sakya clan.
Day 6: Lumbini - Kusinagara overland to enter India on the way to Kusinagara where Lord Buddha entered Parinirvana, his passing away, showing the teachings on the impermanence nature of everything that is produce.
Day 7: Kushinagar - Vaishali - Patna overland to visit Vaishali, where offering of honey was done to Lord Buddha by the monkeys and where Lord Buddha gave important teachings, especially to his female disciples. Overnight stay at the historic city of Pataliputra.
Day 8: Patna - Nalanda - Rajgir overland to the city of Rajgir, where Lord Buddha gave important teachings on transcendental wisdom on top of the hill called Vulture Peak. On the way visit the ruins of the famous Nalanda monastic university, which in its golden days housed more than 10,000 monks and Buddhist scholars.
Day 9: Rajgir - Bodhgaya overland to Bohgaya, where the Buddha after years of meditation and asceticism, awakened to the ways to end all sufferings, the center of the universe, for the Buddhist people, where the Buddha’s of past, present and future come to become Enlightened.
Day 10: Bodhgaya days of insight, meditation, and enjoyment of the peace & joyful environment, where pilgrims from all parts of the world, pay homage to the Mahabodhi stupa of enlightenment and the Bodhi tree under which the Lord Buddha attained Enlightment.
Day 11: Bodhgaya at leisure to received teachings & meditate in any of the many Buddhist monasteries and centers here.
Day 12: Bodhgaya - Varanasi overland to Varanasi, the heart of India. Sightseeing of the city and its ghats where they do the cremations ceremonies for their dead’s on the banks of the sacred river Ganges.
Day 13: Varanasi - Sarnath excursion to Sarnath, where Lord Buddha gave his first sermon after enlightenment, exposing real truths about live and death that are still as valid today as thousands of years ago, truths that if meditate upon will bring understanding of reality as it is, which will help us to empty our mind of meaningless concerns and worries, bringing peace of mind, and Nirvana eventually.
Day 14: Varanasi - Kathmandu flight to Kathmandu, transfer to the hotel, and at leisure for the rest of the day until the farewell dinner, in the evening.
Day 15: Kathmandu at leisure until 12 noon and end of our services.
