Here is what some of the people who have been on our treks have written


SteveAnyon-Smith
18 April 2000


This was my third trek in Nepal, having visited the Annurpurna Region in 1995 and with Bharat and Dave in the beautiful and wildlife-filled Langstang Valley in1998. Bharat's company “Explore Alpine Adventure” specialises in wildlife watching treks and tours in Nepal, Tibet and Bhutan. The company is active in the area of conservation. In Langtang National Park he has been successful in having action taken against those who were flagrantly abusing park regulations with respect to the killing of wildlife. Bharat has set up the “Nalang Bird Watching Club” in his native village to educate schoolchildren and others on the importance of preserving habitat for the local bird and animal life.

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Reg Clark
11 Carmen St
St Ives NSW 2075
Australia
regclark@zip.com.au


For me this was the trip of a lifetime---- something I have always wanted to do and now had the opportunity. We arranged a very comprehensive and economical itinerary through a Nepalese firm called Explore Alpine Adventure (P) Ltd in Kathmandu. It ran for a period of 28 days and was to take us from Kathmandu to Hetauda, Kosi Tapu Wetlands then west to Royal Bardia NP, up to Pokhara and Guleriya thence to Royal Chitwan and eventually back to Kathmandu, spending varying periods fully accommodated, in each of these places. Our transport whilst covering the ground varied from our regular 12 seater bus to dugout canoes, 4x4 sedans, elephants boats, jeeps and much footwork.


We moved from snow at Pulchowki to the dust of the Nepal Terai along andeven over the Indian border looking for birds. We used roads which writhed like snakes many hundreds of feet above rushing green rivers driving under road and traffic conditions which still gives me white knuckles when I think of it.


Our guide and mentor was Bharat Regmi who was the right man in the right Job, an excellent birder and a great organizer to whom nothing was too much Trouble. He showed us his country which is amongst the ten poorest in the world and yet was full of variety and interest. Birding-wise I am not the best qualified to comment except to say that I saw many things I had only read about Woodpeckers, Hornbills, Wallcreepers, Dippers, Ibisbills,Floricans etc. These were only highlights of the total of 345 species we saw/ The mammals were also present , I saw Gangetic Dolphins, Crocodiles, a Python, Leopard, Bison, Rhinos and magnificent stags with heads like Christmas Trees.


For all this bounty I would like to thank Bharat Regmi, guide and organiser extraordinaire.

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Matej Meglic
Trzic
Slovinia
2004


I came to Nepal in September 2004, to climb the mountain Dorjelakpa along with 6 of my Slovinian friends. It was a 45 day expedition, fully organised by Explore Alpine Adventure. They do for you what your heart desires. Really they do. The whole expedition was very well planned by them:good cookers, good sherpers, very strong porters, we were guided through interesting moutain paths .

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Sugata


Sugata must be our oldest client. He celebrated both his 90th and 92nd birthday on our Annapurna trek. You can read his story, in fact his book ( www.sugata.info ). He just keeps coming back.


Now living in Norway, he's been coming to Nepal since he was ordained a Therevada monk in Swayanbhunat in 1956.


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Report of Bird Observations for Period of 11/9/01 to 24/9/01 in the Langtang Valley of Nepal.


B. Regmi, C. Yates, M. Fletcher, J. Keating


We would like to report on a recent 14 day bird watching  trek of the Langtang Valley of Nepal. Our group of 4 was led by the well-known bird watching tour guide, Bharat Regmi of Explore Alpine Adventure Tours, the other three members of the group being amateur bird observers from Australia. 


Our walk started at Dhunche (1,950 m) and followed the Langtang Valley to Kyanjin Gompa (3,800 m) where we spent two days climbing both to the top of Yalla Peak (5,540 m) and to the bottom of the South Langtang Ri Glacier (5,000 m). We then returned to Dhunche via the Gosainkund Lakes (4,370 m).


Over the 14 day period we sighted over 159 species of birds


Our most significant sightings included:

1. the Nepal Wren Babbler (Pnoepyga immaculatta),
2. a group of  over 20 Snow Partridge (Lerwa lerwa) on Yalla Peak;
3. a group of 4 Tibetan Snowcock (Tetraogallus tibetanus);
4. 10 Himalayan Snowcock (Tetraogallus himalayensis) at Sin Gompa (3,500 m);
5. a group of 4 Satyr Tragopan (Tragopan satyra);
6. a flock of Mountain Imperial Pigeon (Ducula badia) -  this is believed to be the first record of these birds above 3,048 m (at Ghoda Tabala);
7.  more than 20 Ibisbill (Ibidorhyncha struthersii) on the Langtang Khola below Kyanjin Gompa (3,800 m);
8. a Large Niltava (Niltava grandis);
9. a black backed Forked Tail (Enicerus immaculatus ) an unusual record  above 2,100 m (at Tholo Syabru),
10. a group of  3 Black-headed Bunting ( Emberiza melanocephala), most probably the first record above an elevation of 2,050 m (at  Syabru);
11. a Wood Snipe (Gallinago nemoicola), and;
12. the Yellow-Rumped Honeyguide (Indicator axnthonotus).

Other species of personal interest included:


The Himalayan Monal, Klij Phesant,  the Black-throated Parrotbill, the Alpine Swift, a Snow Pigeon, the Rock Pigeon, the Lammergeier, Eurasian Sparrowhawk, the Common Buzzard, the Oriental Honey-buzzard, the Yellow-billed Blue Magpie, 4 species of Minivert (all in the same area of bush!), the Brown Dipper, the Golden Bush-robin, the Spotted Forktail, Hodgson’s Bushchat, the White-tailed Nuthatch, the Rusty-flanked Treecreeper, 6 species of tit, the Rusty-cheeked Scimitar-Babbler, 4 species of Accentor, 5 species of  Rosefinch (male and female) and several male Yellow-breasted Greenfinch.


A good time was had by all!


Chris Yates and Michelle Fletcher
Email: yatesin@space.com
Ph     : 0249 731443
Address:  7 Henry Rd Morisset Park, NSW Australia, 2259


Jillian Keating
Email: Jill_Keating@hotmail.com
Ph     : 0242 283070
Address:  5 Robsons Rd Keiraville, NSW Australia, 2500


Bharat Regmi
Email: exploretrek@wlink.com.np
Website: http://www.explorealpinenepal.com
Ph     : 00977-1-4700714/4700175
Address: Explore Alpine Adventure, Kathmandu, Nepal


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Birdwatching Trek to Rara Lake


6 March to 17 March 2000


Bharat Regmi – Kathmandu, Nepal
Steve Anyon-Smith – Sydney, Australia
Dave Sheils – Sydney, Australia
Barry Virtue – Berry, Australia
+ 13 Nepalese support staff


Getting to Rara National Park


First, you have to get to Jumla.....


Bharat and his company Explore Alpine Adventure P. L. organised all the logistics. How, I can only wonder.


Barry, Dave Bharat and I flew from KTM to Nepalgunj (Necon Air – very good) and from there chartered a Yeti Airlines plane to Jumla. Accompanying us were the trek cook and his assistant who had caught the bus from KTM to Nepalgunj with our fresh food. The rest of the food, equipment, porters and other staff had travelled by bus to Surkhet from KTM and walked to Jumla (6 days). Two local guides/porters were hired in Jumla for half of the trek. We all meet on the afternoon of March 7 in Jumla. Jumla is is known to be a difficult town in which to find fresh food, guides or just about anything else. Nothing we saw or experienced has changed that notion. 


The route we took to Rara is unlikely to be followed as the trail(s) is/are not very well travelled. We took the latest maps available in KTM and these were of some use, as were the local guides. We still took a few wrong turns. In 1999 148 trekkers made it to Rara. Some may be still out there! We took a path known as the “high route”. I’m still not sure what this means as the “low route” was just as high. Don’t even bother asking how we returned. Suffice to say that with the weather the way it was (see below) we couldn’t take any “well travelled” route but relied on the continual advice from locals. As it turned out we visited villages that had not seen any foreign visitors before (ever). We were surprise to learn this, but the remoteness of this region cannot be over-emphasised. Don’t get seriously sick!!


The Trek


Despite the lack of high peaks the trek is quite strenuous. There are few gentle grades. Mostly it is steep unmade paths or swithbacks and no “steps”. The paths are not inherently dangerous, but were made so by ice and snow in some sections. Some high passes on the route were closed and had to be avoided. There are no lodges that you would call habitable, and other than Nepali tea, no food is available. Campsites are fairly numerous but long sections are too steep or have no water for sites. Most of the trek is in forest but much of it has been degraded by the activities of the local people, sometimes depressingly so.


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March, 2003


Just when you think that you have done everything, seen everything, and been everywhere, then you arrive on the Indian sub-continent and find yourself experiencing extreme cultural shock.  Words cannot express what your senses experienced there, the sights, the sounds, and the smells. The land seems to be caught in a time warp spanning from the ancient times to the present, and you are, at the same time, both delighted and appalled by it all.


Nevertheless, after spending nearly six weeks in India and Nepal, we would have to say that we had one of the greatest adventures of a lifetime.  It’s probably more accurate to say many adventures since our trip was a series of eventful happenings as we wandered across northern Indian into the tiny country of Nepal. 


In India we wasted little time traveling since most of our movements were done during the night while we tried to sleep on the train’s sleeping car. After arriving in New Delhi our first sleeping car experience took us to Ranthambore National Park, the one area where one is most likely to see a tiger during the daytime. We saw no tiger but we did see signs of his presence, and many other mammals and birds.  Our next train trip took us to the wet lands of Bharatpur, one of the world’s most famous bird sanctuaries.   Unfortunately, for us a drought had dried up a lot of the national park; nevertheless, we observed a multitude of our feathered friends in the several days that we were there. From Bharatpur we traveled to Agra where we took a boat ride on the Chambal River in the morning to view the Ganges dolphin, mugger and gharial crocodile, and birds. In the afternoon we were pleased to visit and experience one of the world’s great works of art- the Taj Mahal.


From Agra another long overnight trip took us north of New Delhi to Nainital and Pangot, communities nestled in the foothills of the Himalayan Mountains, where we saw a wide range of mountain birds and braved cold, unheated nights. A short drive from Nainital took us to Corbett National Park.  During our stay there we survived one of nature’s  furies.  For two days a torrential downpour virtually washed us out of Corbett.  We were lucky to get out of the park as drivers and guides had to literally rebuild washed away sections.  Going out was like being in a kitchen blender.  Yet, there was a silver lining in that terrible storm.  When we reached Dhikala, deep in side the park, the storm relented for about 45 minutes. This allowed us time to climb the watchtower.  After descending the tower we walked around and suddenly our guide called “tiger”.  We looked out through the tall grass and could not see anything.  Yet we did observe monkeys high in a tree all looking down at the same spot in the grass.  Nancy got our spotting telescope and trained it on that area of grass and looking through the scope one could make out the face of a tiger.  This glimpse of what our guide said was a female tiger was all we got and we were delighted to have it. The next day our driver spotted a mountain goat, the common goral. Our last overnight train ride took us back to New Delhi where we birded for a day and then caught our connecting flight to Nepal. 


Nepal is a Lilliputian kingdom that forms a buffer zone between the giants of India and China.  From these two areas (the Sino-Tibetian plateau and the Indo-Aryan plains) cultures have mixed for centuries producing people who seem to be less frantic and more serene then those of its neighbors.  Nepal was a welcome respite from our hectic days in Northern India.  We did not find Shangri-La there, but we did come away convinced that somewhere in that kingdom it must exist.


Royal Chitwan National Park, and back to the capital.  Kathmandu’s valley is highly polluted; yet the hills surrounding the capital have abundant wild life.  On our way to Pokhara we stopped by the river and found four ibisbills, birds that we were eager to see as they represented to us one of the quintessential birds of Asia. The resort city of Pokhara is on one lake and near others. On the lakes and hills surrounding the city we saw some uncommon birds (i.e. Blyth’s kingfisher, blue-eared kingfisher) and on the bank of a lake a Eurasian otter. Our mammal bonanza came down in Royal Chitwan National Park where one-horned rhino were legion (one allowed us to approach with in 15 meters--of course, we had the protection of being on an elephant!). Sloth bear were plentiful (we saw a huge male and a female with a cub on its back).  Deer were abundant, sambar, chital, muntjac, and hog. Water buffalo were present and probably our best sighting was a gaur, the largest of the bovine family.


In Nepal in an area about as large as Maricopa County, Arizona we saw 325 birds and in northern Indian we saw 340 birds.  Summed together we viewed 440 some birds on the sub-continent. However, we only sampled a small part of this area.  Hopefully, we can return to experience Goa, Southern India, and Sri Lanka.  Bharat has persuaded us that in spite of the liabilities of six decades and a few extra pounds that we should essay the Langtung trek.  It would be great to accomplish this so we have promised to return.


---Larry

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90th Birthday at Muktinath Sugata, aged 90, treks from Muktinath to Pokera and a home for the Chhairo Gompa photographs


‘How old is he?’
‘Nabbe’ (90)
‘Nabbe! Is she is daughter?’
‘Sita’ (friend)
‘Sita!’


If I had a rupee for every time some one asked us or Saligrame our porter/guide these questions we’d have been kept in apple pie for our 20 days on the mountains. We even devised a T shirt:


‘I am 90, please, no questions, no tiger balm, no hashish, no problem’. The questions started from the beginning and in a way we never tired of them – honest and direct, they caused a smile of amazement, accomplishment or disbelief. And that 90 was one of the reasons we were here, to celebrate Sugata’s birthday in the Himalayas.


There was another reason. Sugata first came to Nepal in 1954, and to these mountains in 1960 and in writing his life story, we were remembering and re-living these times. Little did we know that we would find an inspiring solution to a 1960 loose end.


In 1954 Sugata travelled overland from Sweden, then his home, to India and from there to Nepal were he became a Buddhist monk of the Theravada tradition in Ananda Kuti, Swayambhunath, Kathmandu. He was as much an object of interest then being the only white skinned monk as he was in the mountains 2001 aged 90. Already a monk with a difference, he had a further trademark of 3 Leica cameras hanging around his neck, and because of this attracted the attention of a certain Sam Sherchan, a merchant from Tukuche who invited this perfect combination of a monk and a photographer to accompany him in up to Tukuche to photograph  what is sometimes called ‘Devil Dancing’ or more correctly Sha Na, or Black Hat. These were Buddhist celebrations that took place every November to reinact with elaborate dance and dramatic masks the victory of good over evil.


In November 1960 Sugata travelled with Sam Sherchan from Pokera to Tukuche, part in a bamboo basket on the back of a porter (he was recovering from blood poisoning in his leg), part on a mule, (that died in Ulleri) and finally on foot. It took 3 months there and back.


In 2001 we took the aeroplane from Pokera airport (which was no longer a meadow full of cows that had to be herded away) to Jomson. We went first uphill to Muktinath, where we were amongst fellow eccentrics like bare footed Sadhus of indeterminate age, and perhaps because of this the questions began slowly, but I leant the vocabulary, the words nube and ‘sati’. I, the ‘sati’, am exactly Sugata’s age when he first arrived in Nepal, 43, and from the start I enjoy the pace we travel at, it suits me fine: off at 7, walking no more than 6 hours a day and with frequent stops for Nepali chai and its antidote apple pie.


Chhairo Gompa


Just after Marpha we crossed the bridge to the Tibetan Refugee camp in Chhairo where an unusual grove of tall evergreen deodar trees gave shade and protection from the wind whipping up the Kali Gandaki (as it does) to an isolated settlement of 200 Tibetan refugees, and a substantial and old walled Gompa.


Sugata came alone to this Gompa in 1960 and took many photographs of the ornate brass and the elegantly carved wooden Buddha figures and also the magnificent thanka wall paintings. It must have been soon after his visit all were stolen; when he came again in 1979 the empty Gompa was guarded fruitlessly by Gorkhas – the moveable contents no doubt sold.


Today the wall paintings had all but disappeared to water penetration, and only the fixed Buddha figures remained. In their faded glory they were still impressive, perhaps even more so, humanly worn as we all are with age; particularly the giant painted clay image of Padmasambhava, broken but still firmly holding the heads of greed, hate, delusion - still overcoming.


Outside Tukuche we visited another ruin, the original Tukuche Gompa where Sugata had photographed the Black Hat ceremony. In November 1960 people had travelled for days over high passes and the place was milling, the masks were taken out of their locked caskets, under the umbrella the Guru Rimpoche arrived, the dance commenced, Sugata photographed, from sun rise to sun set. Today, despite being a ruin, it is a magical place, tucked behind a hill in a protected valley, patched green with new grain shoots and apple trees, still fertile from the time the monks worked the land.


90


Sugata’s birthday itself was spent mostly in the hot springs of Tatopani, where he more or less lived for 4 days. In the evening however, he ascended the stone steps to the garden of the Dhaulageri Lodge and partook of a Tuburg beer and birthday cake under the falling clementine trees. Our courteous and friendly host, Bhuwan Gauchan invited him the next day for a feast of milk rice in memory of his 1960 journey. Then, under strict orders from Amrit Ananda, Sam Sherchan fed him milk rice for his entire 3 months expedition, turning Sugata’s finger nails white but avoiding the uncertainties of local food.


When asked what had changed in the valley over the years Sugata would reply ‘The ubiquitous trail of pink Chinese toilet paper is no longer around – which means there are more toilets. And there are less blisters – when I came in 1979 everyone seemed to suffer from blisters. But the mountains, they are the same, and still as awe inspiring.’ The whole trek, organised by Explore Alpine Adventures (Kathmandu), was for both of us a gentle unravelling of a past as well as plenty of the here and now, in a perfect inspiring setting of great mountains.


The Chhairo Gompa circle


In the end the photographs commissioned by Sam Sharchan in 1960 were not used – the Lamas did not want to publicise their ceremonies, and like the masks the hundreds of photographs and slides lay in Sugata’s boxes these many years.


Until now that is. Until we had dinner with Shashi Dhoj Tulachan, a Thanka artist, on our 2nd last evening in Kathmandu, and he told us that with a committee of others (the Kali Gandaki Foundation Trust) he is raising funds to restore the Chhairo Gompa, and yes, definitely the 1960 photographs would be extremely useful for the restoration work. It took a circuitous and fascinating route, every turn of which was a surprising adventure, to get to Shashi. We had to meet Patrick and Purna in Tukuche who first mentioned Shashi Dhoj Tulachan’s interest in restoring the Gompa. We had to meet Bhuwan in Dhaulagiri lodge, Tatopani, and talk to him about the Sam Sherchan family; Bhuwan had to meet the widow of Sam Sherchan at a wedding in Kathmandu and mention Sugata’s travels with her husband in 1960; Mrs San Sherchan had to be so interested to meet us she returned a day early from another wedding in Pokera and when we met her she had to be immediately decisive enough to telephone Shashi Dhoj Tukachan. Shashi, without knowing anything about us, said we should meet immediately.


There was a touching moment when we first met Shashi. Sugata suddenly remembered a photograph from that time.

‘When I came up to Tukuche,’ Sugata began turning to Shashi, ‘I visited a Thanka artist. He had two houses, one he used exclusively to paint in and it was little way from his family house to give him isolation and concentration. I took a photograph of him and another of him with his little son, who was just beginning to lean this old tradition. In the courtyard was a hen, and I asked if that was the hen that provided the yolk for the tempera. ‘Yes’ said the man, and I took a photograph of the hen as well.’


Shashi’s face became more and more incredulous and finally bust in laughter.

‘I was that little son,’ he finally said.


Reflections in Kathmandu


I am thinking on Sugata’s longevity. This morning at breakfast he had his usual petrol as he calls it – porridge, 3 eggs, 4 cups of chai and curd. There has to be more to it than nearly 80 years a fulsome vegetarian.


There is his forehead Shiva lingha, that strong horizontal line between his eye brows, that indicator of the ‘will do’. ‘Whatever you want you will get’, said the Sadhu we met on his way up to Muktinath on the Kali Gandaki  plain who sat down on a stone and gave Sugata his astrological reading. (I’ve watched him passing a loiterer on the Annapurna circuit, I’ve seen him pick up speed.) ‘108 will be your best year,’ were the Sadhu’s parting words.


But there is something more. It is his depth and serenity of enjoyment. Hours he spent in the Tatopani hot springs, 2-3-4 times a day, often returning well after dusk in torch light feeling his way up the stone steps to a beer or hot chocolate. He can sleep any where any time. Never that modern cry of ‘I had a restless night’, ‘If I sleep in the day I cannot sleep at night’. None of that. Gone. Fast asleep. In a bed or in an Nepali bus from Pokera to Kathmandu, over paved and unpaved roads, he sleeps. No problem.


The book about Sugata’s life will hopefully be published at the end of 2001. If you are interested please contact Rachel Kellett: Half Moon, Metfield, Suffolk, IP20 OLA, UK. rk@lifeinplastic.com
The Kali Gandaki Foundation Trust can be contacted at kgft@unlimit.com, or www.kgft.org
Explore Alpine Adventure, PO Box 5371, Kathmandu, Nepal.
Tel 00977-1-4700714/4700175
E-mail: exploretrek@wlink.com.np
Website: http://www.explorealpinenepal.com


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Explore Alpine Adventures in Kathmandu and his email is:


exploretrek@wlink.com.np


This company is owned by three men, all Nepali, so working with them is directly benefitting the local people. We were very impressed by the fact that the amount of our fees paid to the porters were 90% rather than around 50% at many travel agencies.


Sometimes his written English is "creative", but we never had a hard time understanding him in conversation. He has written that he has just taken some tourists to his village for a stay which would be very interesting as well... to live in a local village for a couple days and see how they acutally live.


Bharat has also started a conservation project near his village. They are trying to save a piece of the forest there. 10% of all the profits from his travel agency go to funding the maintenance of this forest. Considering how minimal their monetary existance is, we find that a commenable endeavor.


We highly recommend Bharat not only because we had positive business dealing with him and his company, but because we felt we had established a good friendship. As we found out at the end of our trip, it can be very nice to have a friend looking out for you.


We know you will enjoy your travels in Nepal. Don't hesitate to give us a call if you have any other questions or just use it as an excuse to come visit us on Samish Island! Our address is:
10352 Wallen Rd, Bow, WA 98232
360-766-6657


All the best,


Thais & Howard


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Once upon a time in Nepal ………….
(Eirik’s dinnerspeech at the Hotel de’l Anna Khatmandu 11.04.2007)


This is how many fairy-like stories start - - - so: