Boudhanath Stupa is one of the most beautiful and impressive Buddhist temples in Nepal. Towering over the country’s capital Kathmandu, it is one of the city’s chief tourist attractions. It’s easy to see why — the glistening white dome is topped with a gold canopy and surrounded by innumerable brightly colored, fluttering prayer flags for an amazing visual impact.
According to legend, the stupa is the final resting place of an important sage called Kāṣyapa. There are several interesting legends describing how it was built. In one, recounted on the NileGuidance blog, an old woman petitioned the ruler of the area for land to build a temple to house the remains of the sage. The king granted her “as much land as a buffalo skin could cover,” so she cut the buffalo skin into thin strips and used the strips to encircle the area where the stupa now stands.
Per Wikipedia, another story is that after the old woman was granted permission to proceed building the temple, the scale and grandeur of the construction made nearby wealthy noblemen uneasy. They went to the king and said “if such a poor old dame were allowed to complete building such a stupendous tower, they themselves would have to dedicated a temple as great as a mountain, and so they decided to ask the King to disallow the further progress of the work.” The King refused, saying that he could not take back permission once he had already granted it. That is why the temple’s name literally means “Have finished giving the order to proceed with.”
Go during the Tibetan New Year, in February or March, to witness the Losar festival, which according to Sacred Destinations is the largest festival in Nepal.
To visit Nepal, American citizens need both a valid passport and a visa. You can get a visa on arrival, but of course you’ll get through the immigration line faster if you apply ahead of time, before you leave the US. No matter where you apply, to get a Nepal visa you need the following documents:
- One Nepal visa application
- One passport photo
- The appropriate visa fees for your desired length of stay. A 15-day multiple entry visa is $25, a one-month visa is $40, and a three-month multiple entry visa is $100.
RushMyTravelVisa makes getting your Nepal visa a breeze. We walk you through the paperwork and expedite your visa application for the fastest possible processing. If you plan to stop in other countries along the way, we’ll also research your itinerary to ensure you have all the visas you need to make it to and Nepal and back. Let us help you get your Nepal visa today!
Tags: Nepal, Nepal visa, Nepali visa
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