Dolpo Region

Trekking Dolpo Region

Trekking Dolpo Region: The world’s highest horse racing…a glimmering turquoise lake… yarchagumba for a healthy life & the Dolpi folks will welcome you with a heart that’s warm… Trekking Dolpo Region falls behind the rain shadow zone of the Dhaulagiri Mountains (range) and this is desert land at higher elevations that’s so much like the arid plateau of Tibet, but then this is why you can go to Dolpo at any time of your choosing, or a time that suits your conveniences…perfectly. Some trekkers would like to compare Nepal’s mountains to the Patagonia or even the Alps of Europe, these are all mountains anyway, but Nepal’s mountains will take your breath away, maybe even forever, but for those who live to tell their stories of Nepal’s Himalayas have written books of which some are ‘bestsellers’’ on the planet…passed down to the generations till eternity…within this scenario falls the heady landscapes of the Dolpo region; which was till now, not heard off accept from artistic thangkas or spiritual accounts from the earliest of visitors. Trekking Dolpo Region opened the gates to its territory in 1989 & then Peter Mathiessen’s contemplative book ‘The Snow Leopard’’ and Eric Valli’s blockbuster movie ‘Caravan’’ shed light on the blazing scenery of this once hidden land, which began attracting the bold & brave trekker looking for some more unusual…& extraordinary ventures in the true wilderness…and this is what Dolpa offers in abundance.

From the early ‘90s, Trekking Dolpo Region began to get only a small portion of the hordes of visitors that make a beeline into the different tourism spots of Nepal. most trek operators seem to venture more into the Inner Dolpo – but with Gurkha Adventures, we begin with lower Dolpa & gradually wade into the inner & upper sanctums of mystical Dolpa with entry that goes beyond Phoksundo Lake to the ancient 800-year-old Shey Gompa – and this gives visitors a fantastic introduction to hidden cultural mysticism which is an experience to encounter when visiting this region (even in the monsoon!).

Dolpo’s mysticism is evident all over the region – stories of myth say Dolpo is a Beyul, an assumed “hidden valley” created by Guru Rinpoche as a last resort for those of remarkably pure mind. In present day Dolpo, its northern zones are inhabited by Rokpa farmers and Drokpa nomads from Tibet, who are blocked from the rest of Nepal by snow almost throughout the year. These folks live out their lives in some of the highest inhabited villages on planet earth, perched within mountains of bleak, Spartan beauty that could drive your imaginations to another world…in any case, there are no two Dolpos on earth, there’s only one…a natural phenomenon of nature’s wonders, God’s gift to a world that seems to have forgotten where true beauty lies.