Nepal & Bhutan Tour

You will be met in the arrivals hall at Tribhuvan International Airport and driven to your hotel, usually 30 to 45 minutes depending on traffic. Nepal issues visas on arrival: fill in the form at the electronic kiosks before the payment desk, and bring a passport photograph and cash in a major currency to speed it up.

Your guide comes to the hotel for a briefing on the days ahead. Kathmandu sits at about 1,400 m so there is no altitude concern tonight.

Altitude: 1,350 m  |  Overnight: 3-5 Stars  |  Meals: Breakfast

A full day across Kathmandu's UNESCO monument zones with a licensed cultural guide and a private vehicle.

Kathmandu Durbar Square is the old royal complex of the Malla kings and later the Shah dynasty, a dense cluster of pagoda temples, courtyards and palace wings built between the twelfth and eighteenth centuries. The Kumari Ghar here houses Nepal's living goddess, a young girl chosen from the Newar Shakya community who appears at her carved window most afternoons. Much of the square was damaged in the 2015 earthquake and the restoration, done with traditional joinery and reused timber, is itself worth watching.

Pashupatinath is the most important Hindu temple in Nepal and one of the great Shiva shrines of the subcontinent, a UNESCO site on the banks of the Bagmati. Non-Hindus cannot enter the main temple, but the far bank gives an open view across the ghats where open-air cremations take place through the day. It is confronting the first time and also completely ordinary here, a public part of life rather than something hidden.

Swayambhunath sits on a hill west of the city, reached by 365 stone steps through a forest full of rhesus macaques, which is where the nickname Monkey Temple comes from. The stupa is one of the oldest religious sites in the valley, with the Buddha's eyes painted on all four sides and a spire of thirteen gilded rings. The terrace gives the best single view over Kathmandu.

Boudhanath is one of the largest stupas in the world and the centre of Tibetan Buddhist life in Nepal, particularly since 1959 when refugees settled around it. The white dome is 36 m across, ringed by prayer wheels and surrounded by more than fifty gompas. Walk the kora clockwise at dusk with the local crowd as the monks come out of evening puja: it is the most atmospheric hour in Kathmandu.

Altitude: 1,350 m  |  Overnight: 3-5 Stars  |  Meals: Breakfast

Morning flight from Kathmandu to Paro. Sit on the left for the Himalayan view: on a clear day the aircraft tracks Everest, Makalu and Kangchenjunga along the horizon before turning into Bhutan.

The Paro approach threads between forested ridges and only a small number of pilots in the world are certified to fly it. Your Bhutanese guide and driver meet you in the arrivals hall and stay with you for the whole trip.

Paro sits at 2,280 m in a broad valley of terraced rice fields and holds Bhutan's only international airport. The Rinpung Dzong, a fortress monastery from 1646, dominates the river, and the National Museum in the old watchtower above it holds an excellent collection of thangkas, textiles and masks.

The afternoon is deliberately light. Paro sits at 2,280 m and it is worth walking the main street and having a first bowl of ema datshi while the altitude settles.

Altitude: 2,200 m  |  Overnight: Hotel  |  Meals: Breakfast

The Tiger's Nest in the morning, which is the physical high point of the trip and the reason most people come to Bhutan.

Taktsang, the Tiger's Nest, clings to a cliff face 900 m above the Paro valley and is the image everyone has of Bhutan. Padmasambhava is said to have flown here on the back of a tigress in the eighth century. The hike takes two to three hours up through blue pine forest, with a cafeteria at the halfway viewpoint and a final flight of steps down and up across a waterfall. Horses can be hired for the lower half.

Afterwards we drive the hour and a half to Thimphu, crossing the Chhuzom confluence where the Paro and Thimphu rivers meet and three chortens stand in Bhutanese, Nepali and Tibetan styles side by side.

Altitude: 3,120 m  |  Overnight: Hotel  |  Meals: Breakfast

A morning hike up to Wangditse Goenpa through blue pine forest above Thimphu, an easy two hours with a long view down the valley to the Tashichho Dzong and the Buddha Dordenma.

Thimphu is the only national capital in the world without traffic lights, still directed at its main junction by a white-gloved policeman. The Tashichho Dzong houses the government and the central monastic body, the Buddha Dordenma sits 51 m high above the valley, and the weekend market, the textile museum and the takin preserve fill a comfortable day.

The afternoon covers the town itself: the weekend market if your dates fall right, the textile museum, the takin preserve where Bhutan's improbable national animal lives, and the National Memorial Chorten where local people circumambulate all day.

Altitude: 2,320 m  |  Overnight: Hotel  |  Meals: Breakfast

East over the Dochula pass to Punakha, with a hike to Lungchutse Goenpa from the top of the pass.

Punakha was Bhutan's capital until 1955 and its dzong, built in 1637 at the confluence of the Pho Chhu and Mo Chhu rivers, is the most beautiful building in the country. The drive there crosses the Dochula pass at 3,100 m, where 108 memorial chortens stand on a knoll and, on a clear morning, the eastern Himalaya lines the horizon.

The Lungchutse hike climbs through rhododendron and moss forest to a small monastery at about 3,570 m, taking two to three hours return, and on a clear morning the Himalayan view from the ridge is the best in western Bhutan.

Altitude: 3,566 m  |  Overnight: Hotel  |  Meals: Breakfast

A morning walk up to the Khamsum Yulley Namgyal Chorten, crossing the Mo Chhu on a suspension bridge and climbing through rice terraces for about an hour. The chorten was built in the 1990s and the interior murals are some of the most accomplished modern religious painting in Bhutan.

Time at the Punakha Dzong itself before the drive back west to Paro over the Dochula, with a stop at the 108 chortens.

Evening free in Paro. If you want a hot stone bath, the traditional Bhutanese one with river stones heated in a fire and dropped into a wooden tub of water and artemisia, this is the night to have it.

Altitude: 1,200 m  |  Overnight: Hotel  |  Meals: Breakfast

Morning flight back to Kathmandu, then straight into the second half of the valley.

Patan, or Lalitpur, holds the finest concentration of Newar architecture in Nepal. Its Durbar Square has the Krishna Mandir, carved from stone in 1637, the Golden Temple with its gilded facade and resident tortoises, and the Patan Museum, widely considered the best museum in the country. The surrounding lanes are still full of working metalworkers and thangka painters.

Bhaktapur is the best preserved of the valley's three medieval cities and the one where the old town still functions as a town rather than a monument. Brick lanes open into Durbar Square, Taumadhi Square with the five-tiered Nyatapola temple, and Dattatreya Square with the Peacock Window. Pottery Square is a working pottery. Try the juju dhau, the local king curd served in a clay bowl.

Nagarkot is a ridge village at about 2,175 m on the eastern rim of the valley, an hour and a half from Kathmandu, and it is where people go for the Himalayan sunrise. On a clear morning the view runs from Ganesh Himal and Langtang across to Gauri Shankar and, on the best days, Everest on the far eastern horizon. October to March are the clear months.

Altitude: 2,175 m  |  Overnight: 3-5 Stars  |  Meals: Breakfast

Sunrise from the Nagarkot ridge before breakfast, then back down into Kathmandu.

Transfer to the airport about three hours before your international flight. If you have a late departure we will hold a day room rather than leave you sitting in the terminal.

If you would rather not go home yet, this is the easy point to extend: Pokhara, a wildlife stay in Chitwan or Bardiya, or a short trek. Tell us before you travel and we will build it in at cost.

Altitude: 1,350 m  |  Meals: Breakfast