As you may have seen in my previous blog “A Glimpse into Nepal’s attractions“, Nepal is very well known for Mt. Everest: but besides that, it also has 8 of the 14 highest peaks in the world. The Nepalese Himalayan range covers the northern part of the country along the Chinese border and accounts for a third of the Himalayan mountain system. It extends eight hundred kilometers from the Kanchanjunga massif to the Mahakali river. Between these two boundaries lie more than six hundred peaks with an altitude of more than six thousand meters.

Mountaineering - Nepal

Among several other reasons to Get in Nepal, tourists believe Mountaineering is the most important of them all. It was indeed the attraction that gained Nepal its first attentions from the outside world. But Nepal’s great peaks were being coveted by mountaineers since ages. Although there had been negotiations for a British expedition to Mt. Everest (Sagarmatha) as early as 1908 and a French expedition to Mt. Makalu in 1934, Nepal first opened its doors to outside visitors only in 1949.  By 1960, eighty-four expeditions, both large and small, had encountered the Nepalese Himalayas. This was the pioneer decade of mountaineering, combining both reconnaissance and climbing. All eight thousand meter peaks were climbed.  The most famous ascent of course was that of Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay: that of the 8,848 meter Mt. Everest in May, 29, 1953.

Trekking Himalayas- Nepal

Soon after the historical accent, aspiring climbers from all over the world stormed the Everest region as well as the other great Nepalese peaks; some getting success but a lot of them still had to return empty-handed because of the sheer complexity of the landscape. Throughout the history of Nepalese mountaineering, Nepal’s own climbers have played a major role. Locals like the Sherpas and the Lamas, famous in the world for their mountaineering skills have been able to scale these enormous peaks time and again, in addition to guiding and training people through those hostile environments. Apa Sherpa, the legendary mountaineer from Nepal, was able to scale the Mt. Everest for a record 19 times. Although formally designated as “trekking”, Nepal’s summits are pretty serious climbs and necessitate good mountaineering experience and thorough preparation.

Alongside such a glorious history and a rich mountaineering culture, the snow-capped lands of Nepal are now going through a rapid meltdown: as fast as thrice the pace the rest of the world. All due to global warming! The climate change on the high lands are posing momentous threats of glacier-bursts that can wreak havoc in the whole region and the civilizations that have flourished on the banks of these glacier-turned-rivers. If stringent steps aren’t taken in time, nature’s beautiful creations like these are going to quickly head towards destruction.