Multi-Day Tours in Nepal

Multiday tours in Nepal are built from a short list of stops that the country strings together well. The Kathmandu Valley comes first: seven monument zones, among them the Durbar squares of Kathmandu, Patan and Bhaktapur, Boudhanath, Pashupatinath and Swayambhunath, were listed by UNESCO in 1979. Pokhara follows, a lakeside town about 200 km west, where Annapurna shows from the hill of Sarangkot. In the southern Terai, Chitwan became Nepal's first national park in 1973, holds most of the country's one-horned rhinos and has been World Heritage since 1984. Lumbini, listed in 1997, is the traditional birthplace of the Buddha, with an Ashoka pillar from the 3rd century BCE. Hill towns such as Bandipur and Tansen, and tea country in Ilam, sit off the main line.

Nepal multiday tours are almost all private departures with a guide and vehicle. Two to five days stay in the valley, with a night at Nagarkot or Dhulikhel for sunrise. Chitwan runs two or three days, reached by road or by a short flight from Kathmandu. Pokhara takes three days, and the classic triangle of Kathmandu, Pokhara and Chitwan fills six to eleven. Lumbini is added to Kathmandu in a five-night tour. Village homestays at Ghale Gaun, Sirubari and Kumpur show life outside the towns. Treks counted in days start with a three-day Dhampus walk and reach the Everest and Annapurna regions, and one tour continues to Lhasa.

Practical. Kathmandu has January afternoons near 19C with nights around 2C, and July at 28C with heavy monsoon rain, about 380 mm that month. Pokhara is warmer and wetter, and Chitwan's monsoon runs from mid-June to late September. In the monsoon cloud often hides the peaks, so mountain days suit the dry months. Lumbini is a long day by road from Kathmandu, or a flight to Bhairahawa.