A river can rise after hours of heavy rain. In Nepal’s mountains, however, a flood can sometimes arrive from somewhere people cannot even see. High above the valleys, glaciers are retreating, frozen ground is changing, lakes are expanding, and steep mountain slopes are becoming increasingly unstable. When ice, rock, snow and water suddenly move together, the result can be far…
On the morning of August 26, the Himalayas appeared to unleash their own warning. A massive section of glacier broke away near the Langtang region of northern Nepal. Ice and rock plunged down the mountain, creating an enormous avalanche and debris flow that entered the river system before surging toward communities along the Nepal–Tibet border. Within minutes, the landscape changed.…
A catastrophic flash flood tore through Nepal’s northern Rasuwa District on August 26, sending a powerful surge of water, mud, rocks and debris down the Bhote Koshi river system and leaving a trail of destruction across communities, roads, bridges and hydropower projects. What began high in the Himalayas rapidly became one of Nepal’s most devastating recent disasters. As of August…
Planning a trip to Nepal for the first time can feel overwhelming. With Himalayan mountains, ancient cities, peaceful lakes, jungle safaris, colorful festivals, and countless trekking routes, there is far more to see than you can fit into one trip. But if you have 10 days in Nepal, you can experience an excellent mix of culture, nature, adventure, wildlife, and…
Few treks in the world reward your effort as generously as the Annapurna Base Camp Trek. In a week or so of walking, you climb from subtropical villages and rhododendron forests into a vast glacial amphitheatre ringed by some of the highest peaks on earth. Standing at 4,130 metres inside the Annapurna Sanctuary, with Annapurna I towering above you and…
Somewhere in the middle of most Nepal trips there is a day that wasn’t in the plan. The Lukla flight cancelled. The permit office needed one more day. You landed at midnight and the trek starts on Thursday. You came down from altitude and your body has opinions about doing anything strenuous. Lakuri Bhanjyang is the answer to that day.…
Most people who fly into Lukla walk the same corridor. Namche, Tengboche, Dingboche, Gorak Shep, then a pre-dawn scramble up Kala Patthar for the photograph they came for. Two valleys west, almost nobody goes. The Gokyo valley holds a chain of glacial lakes at 4,700 to 5,000 metres, fed by seepage from the Ngozumpa Glacier. That glacier runs roughly 36…
Api Himal rises 7,132 metres above the far-western corner of Nepal. On clear mornings, people see it from across the Indian border. Almost nobody climbs it. In a country that sells more than a thousand climbing permits a year, the far west is a rounding error. In the spring season before the government intervened, Nepal issued 1,168 climbing permits. More…
In four weeks, expedition teams will start leaving Kathmandu for Cho Oyu, the 8,188-meter mountain that straddles the Nepal–Tibet border six kilometers west of Everest. Its Tibetan name means “Turquoise Goddess.” Among mountaineers it carries a different label: the most achievable of the world’s fourteen 8,000-meter peaks. That reputation rests on real features. The standard northwest ridge route from Tibet…
Ask ten trekking guides in Thamel and you’ll get four different answers. Ask the internet and you’ll get a hedge: “it depends on what you want to see.” That’s true and useless. You came here for an answer, so here’s mine. The most beautiful trek in Nepal is the Gokyo Lakes trek crossed via Renjo La Pass. I’ll make the…