Paragliding, hiking and mountain biking in Pokhara

by Vincent

The touristic neighbourhood, called "Lakeside", is like Thamel in Kathmandu: many shops, restaurants, spas, etc.

Flying over the city and the lake...

... and over the fields

It almost looks like I'm alone and piloting!

A paraglider ready to land next to the lake.

A human trying to fly like a bird by following a hawk. We call it "Parahawking"!

View from the World Peace Pagoda.

The World Peace Pagoda is a Buddhist monument offered by the Japanese to Pokhara.

A buddha in the World Peace Pagoda

A lot of boats in the lake...

On the last day, the weather was better.

We could even see a piece of a snowy mountain! But nothing more...

At the International Mountain Museum, we can see some equipement from prestigious mountaineering expeditions. On this photo, some equipement from the French expedition of 1950 on the Annapurna, which was the expedition that first climbed a peak over 8000m.

After eating this steak, I met Raoul the next morning.

Most of the tourists in Pokhara are trekkers who are going to start a trek or who come back from it. Indeed, Pokhara is located close to the Annapurna mountain range and the Annapurna Circuit and Annapurna Sanctuary treks are among the most popular treks in Nepal. It wasn't my case since my knee didn't allow me to discover the mountains. But there are many others things to do in Pokhara. One of the main attraction is the fantastic view on the snowy mountains. On a clear day, you can see all the Annapurnas with the Machhapuchhare as the most emblematic and holy mountain (it is not allowed to climb it), as well as the Dhaulagiri. I stayed 3 days and a half in Pokhara and I've seen almost no snowy mountain at all! The weather was quite bad, rainy and foggy. Every evening, there was a huge rain shower like if it was the monsoon.

But even if I wasn't able to go trekking in the mountains, I practiced a lot of others activities. On the first day, I went paragliding from Sarangkot, a hill next to Pokhara which has the reputation of being one of the best place of the world for paragliding. I had booked a cross-country flight of one hour but the conditions were not very good so my Swiss pilot told me during the flight that we couldn't do it. It was such a nice experience anyway. We were flying over the mountains and the lake Phewa Tal with the hawks. I had already done some paragliding before in Bolivia but that time, it was really better. And it was a good decision not to do the cross-country flight. 5 minutes after we landed, a big rainfall started. A Russian pilot with its client were still in the sky and didn't manage to land anywhere else than in the middle of the lake...

On the second day, I went for a walk to the World Peace Pagoda on top of a hill close to Pokhara. There are various options to get there but I chose the free one which requires to walk around the lake and then to climb up in the forest. When I arrived at the entrance of the forest, I saw a sign with a warning: "Don't walk alone, do not take valuables with you, thefts and attacks have been reported". I was alone, I had all of my money with me but I decided to continue anyway. Two minutes later, I met a kid who advised me again not to go, that it was dangerous. I started to worry a bit. The kid wanted of course to sell me his services of guide. He was asking for 1500 Roopies. Finally, I gave him 200 and he took me to the World Peace Pagoda.

On the last day, I rented a mountain bike and went up to Sarangkot again. The way was very steep and the hot weather didn't really help but it was a really nice trip. The view from the top was very nice even if I still couln't see any snowy mountain. Pokhara was a very cool place. I just hope that next time I come there, it will be for going in the snowy mountains instead of trying to see them...