Happy Nepali New Year! Good luck and best wishes for the year 2073. This is the official calendar of Nepal called Vikrama Samva and was founded by the legendary king Vikramaditya. The Nepali calendar is 56.7 years ahead of the solar Gregorian calendar that we use in the West.
We are delighted to report that The Mountain Company picked up the bronze award for "2015 AITO Tour Operator of the Year" at Association of Independent Tour Operators ("AITO") 40th anniversary dinner in London. This award is based on customer reviews on AITO.com so many thanks to all of you who wrote reviews after your holidays with us in 2015. Thanks to our amazing partners, guides, cooks and porters in all of our destination countries especially Nepal where we got through a very challenging Autumn season dealing with lack of fuel due to border blockade with India and impact from earthquake in Spring 2015.
There has been a succession of positive news for Nepal as the UK Foreign Commonwealth Office (“FCOâ€) changed their travel advisory to Nepal by lifting the travel restrictions to Manaslu and Langtang. Both of these regions were impacted by April & May 2015 earthquake. Currently there are no travel restrictions in place to Nepal so now is a great time to plan a visit!
The other boost for tourism in Nepal was the visit by Prince Harry in March. After his official tour of Nepal where he visited Kathmandu, Bardia National Park and Annapurna foothills he decided to extend for a further six days to help with rebuilding a school. There is no doubt his visit was well received by Nepalis and his support was appreciated giving a large boost for tourism. For photos of Prince Harry's visit take a look at Daily Telegraph website
At the moment there is a second Royal visit to the Himalayas with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge currently travelling in Bhutan. In fact today William and Kate walked up to Paro Taktsang known as the Tiger’s Nest monastery. This is quite a steep walk taking most people about four to five hours, you can see the photos of their walk on Daily Mail website . After arrival to Paro yesterday they also visited Thimphu Dzong and met King Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck and Queen Jetsun Pema.
Please get in contact if you have any questions or require further information on any of our trips. I am in Kathmandu at the moment and will be back in UK in mid May. Trek on!
Roland Hunter The Mountain Company| AITO Member 5170
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Telephone: +44 (0) 207 0187031
2016 TMC group departures in Nepal, Bhutan and India
Summer in Pakistan & Ladakh
Over the Summer we have all of our treks in Pakistan now guaranteed to run starting with Snow Lake via Hispar La in mid July followed by K2 Base Camp & Concordia and K2 & Gondogoro La treks in late July into August. Ade Summers will lead all of these treks for us.
In late Summer, our Ladakh Sky Trail led by Almas Khan is now guaranteed to run and there is currently availability..
Intensive 3 day Wilderness First Aid course organised by KEEP
First aid training for Nepal and Bhutanese guides
Well done to all of our trek guides who passed their 3 day Intensive Wilderness First Aid course at Kathmandu Environment Education Project ("KEEP") in February. For the first time two of our Bhutanese guides, Tashi Wangdi and Sangay Tashi, flew over to Kathmandu for this training. This is part of our drive to improve standards among our partners in destination countries as we move towards implementing British Standard 8848 to run safer adventurous trips outside of the UK. For more information on BS8848 and risk assessments
Top book recommendation for our Spring newsletter
The Himalayan Bond written by Purna Bhardwaj
The Himalayan Bond: The Sacred Relationship Between Man And The Environment is the full title for this excellent book written by Puran. This is about a journey through India taken by two men: one Indian, Dani, and one British, Roland (any connection?). Dani introduces Roland to the charm and magic of India and leads him to his ancestral mountain landscape, revealing the treasures, simplicity and spirituality of Dani's heritage.
Top hotel recommendation for our Spring newsletter
Dalai La Boutique hotel in Kathmandu (Nepal)
Dalai La is located in the heart of Kathmandu and is now the best available hotel in Thamel. One of the attractive features of this property is their courtyard where you can retreat from the hustle and bustle of Thamel. The buildings have been constructed in traditional Nepalese style with old hand-carved pillars, traditional lattice windows and hand-made terracotta bricks on the facade of the hotel. There are 25 rooms in classical design with a fusion of Buddhist artifacts. Please take a look at Dalai La Boutique Hotel website
The Mountain Co's new Facebook Page
Join and "Like" us on Facebook
We have been active on our new The Mountain Co's Page on Facebook sharing the latest news and information from the Himalaya and Karakoram. In case you missed our updates I have copied the links below to the roundup of main new stories we have shared:
The Mountain Co is a member of the Association of Independent Tour Operators
Independent traveller reviews AITO website
The Mountain Company is a member of the Association of Independent Tour Operators ("AITO"). On AITO's website, so far we have received 36 reviews and of those 35 were "Excellent" and 1 review "Good". Click here to read or submit a review on AITO website
