Kathmandu

Friends, Romans, Countrymen; lend me your beards! Lest you think I jest, I mean this quite seriously. We're going to Pakistan and I've been advised that a full beard goes down very well with the locals, particularly if you're the kind of person who's not overly keen on getting kidnapped/shot. Here's my effort so far:

Hmm. I flatter myself to think I have an array of talents, but beard-growing doesn't appear to be one of them.

And so, seemlessly, to our big news: we are going to attempt to get back to Europe overland via Pakistan, Iran and Turkey. There are three principle reasons why we're doing this:
1. The penguins forced us into it (I've got the post-traumatic stress disorder to prove it)
2. All that stuff about kidnapping and shooting was, in fact, in jest (hahaa, the double bluff!). Everybody we've spoken to has said that the Pakistanis are the most hospitable and kind people they've ever met and it should be an amazing country to visit for this and many other reasons.
3. I reckon getting all the way there and all the way back again overland would feel like a real achievement.

The sticking point appears to be getting from the safe haven of Lahore across the potentially dangerous Western half of Pakistan and into Iran. The main route is not all that far from the Afghanistan border, where things can get a bit ropey. Still, we've got a get-out clause if the authorities deem it too dangerous for four souls (two human, two penguin) to travel from Quetta to Taftan, even with an armed escort (routinely provided gratis by the Pakistan government): we'll go South to Karachi and, horror of horrors, board a plane to Tehran or Istanbul.

So, other than mulling over all of that and filling out mountains of infuriating paperwork to get the visas sorted out (should be all done in the next couple of days), we've just been hanging around in Kathmandu really. Not much to report. Oh, the penguins did get stolen briefly by a difficult child who for some reason took a liking to them. I know, beats me too! Here are some pictures, with one of the penguins attempting to break into the Pakistani embassy to follow in due course: