Nepal: From the Jungle to the Gates of Mustang

Twelve nights and around 685 miles on a Royal Enfield from Kathmandu to the gates of Mustang, and the difference from the operator’s other Nepali routes is Chitwan: two full nights there rather than a passing walk.

Patan opens it at 1,300 metres, then the descent to the Terai plain at 200 metres and an ecolodge on the edge of Nepal’s first national park. A boat trip and a jeep safari follow, and Chitwan holds one of the larger remaining populations of greater one-horned rhinoceros, along with gharial, the narrow-snouted crocodile that has all but disappeared elsewhere. Tiger, leopard and sloth bear are present too, though sightings are a matter of luck rather than arrangement.

Tansen comes next at 1,420 metres, a rural town in the Kali Gandaki corridor with very little tourism, then Tatopani for its hot springs with South Nilgiri at 6,800 metres above. Marpha follows at 2,680 metres in Lower Mustang, where the temples turn Buddhist and the landscape turns arid.

Kalopani is next, with the climb to the Muktinath temple at 3,700 metres, then two nights at Pokhara on Lake Phewa with an optional ride up to the Peace Pagoda for the lake and the mountains together. Gorkha follows with lunch in the Newar village at Bandipur, then a heritage residence at Nuwakot, and Kathmandu over a mountain pass through Shivapuri National Park with an evening in Thamel. Bike rental is included and the price is quoted per person. For a first trip to Nepal this is the better balanced of the operator’s routes, reaching the high country without committing to the hardest tracks above Jomsom.