Blog #4 from Jeff - Patan Durbar Square

Our next 4 nights are in Boudhanath so this morning we had our last meditation and Mysore session in the shala at Hotel Vajra.

It’s so nice to practice in such a beautiful shala, so nice that Sami couldn’t help but joining in!

After practice, breakfast and packing we headed out to Boudanath stopping in Patan Dunbar Square, a UNESCO World Heritage Site for the day. Patan Dunbar Square is one of the oldest Buddhist cities in Nepal and up until the late 19th Century, was an independent kingdom with a Royal Palace.

It has 55 major temples including the stunning Golden Temple which was built as a Newari Buddhist monastery in 1409.

The town is known for its lovely neighborhood courtyards which are accessed through narrow tunnels and the red tiled courtyards of the Royal Palace one of which is now home to a great museum.

The Patan Museum displays the traditional sacred arts of Nepal offering detailed explanations about the objects and the gods depicted in simple understandable terms.

And we had a delicious buffet lunch at a great open air roof top restaurant with gorgeous panoramas of the city, before heading to Boudanath where we arrived in time to meet James for an educational tour and discussion about the Bouda Stupa.

In the morning, we are meeting at 6:00 AM to practice noble silence and meditation while we circumambulate the stupa before Mysore practice at a shala above the Himalayan Java Company with a birds eye view of the stupa!