As we traced fingers across maps, planning pre-departure routes from the comfort of our London flat, the Tashi Labsta pass was integral. It’s the most aesthetic route into Solu Khumbu from the west. No backtracking, no days of trudging up,…
Langtang: Peaks, Lodges and Snow
Few places in the world can boast such accessible mountain grandeur as the Langtang Valley north of Kathmandu. Two days on easy trails took us from the roadhead at Syabru Besi to Kyanjin Gompa. Nestled in the shadow of mighty…
Ganesh Himal: A Nepali Shangri La
We set off up the vertical climb to Keraunja in low spirits. The Manaslu experience had been disappointing, but as we were still loving the high Himalayan passes the thought of a week in the foothills did not fill us…
Getting Indian transit visas in Kathmandu
The days of pre-dawn queues to pick up bottle tops with little numbers on from the Indian Embassy are happily a thing of the past. In November 2012 a new online system was introduced. Here is how we got our…
Manaslu blues: Wrong way without a guide
We’d expected too much, maybe that was the problem. Guides had variously described the Manaslu Circuit as ‘the best trek in the country’, ‘the new Annapurna Circuit’, ‘Nepal’s best kept secret’, ‘an untouched gem’. Still on a high from Annapurna, we…