The Pokhara Valley

The World Peace Stupa, a local landmark that crowns the ridge across the lake at an elevation of 1113m, provides one of the most satisfying short hikes in the Pokhara Valley. The views from the top are phenomenal, and since there are several routes up and back, you can work this into a loop that includes boating on the lake and/or visiting Chhorepatan. A basic up-and-back trip can be done in two to three hours, so you can leave after breakfast and be back in time for lunch.

Standing more than 40m tall, the stupa (sometimes entirely erroneously called the pagoda) looks as if it has been cross-bred with a lighthouse. It seems rather grandiose for a religious shrine, but the view from here is just about the best wide-angle panorama you can get of this part of the Himalayas, and certainly the only one with Phewa Tal and Pokhara in the foreground. Over on the far left you’ll see the towering hump of Dhaulagiri and its more westerly sisters, in the middle rises the Annapurna Himal and the graceful pyramid of Machhapuchhare, and off to the right are Manaslu, Himalchuli and Baudha. Small cafés provide refreshment, and the Japanese Buddhist organization that funded the monument’s construction maintains an adjacent monastery.

From the peaklet of Sarangkot (1590m), the high point of the ridge that rises north of Phewa Tal, the Himalayas spread themselves in a stomach-lurchingly splendid panorama – it almost feels as if you could reach over across the green gulf of the Seti Nadi, at your feet, and touch them. The lake views behind you are pretty special too, making this the most popular mountain viewpoint around Pokhara. Not quite as many peaks are visible here as at the World Peace Stupa, but they feel bigger and closer. Dominating the skyline, in beauty if not in height, is the 6997m summit of Machhapuchhare (“Fish-Tailed”), so named for its twin-peaked summit, though only one peak is visible from Pokhara.

Many people hike up in the afternoon, spend the night in one of the lodges that cling to the slopes ten minutes below the top, then catch the dawn views. Others get up in the dark, take a taxi up to the car park and then walk the final half-hour to the summit. Others still come to paraglide, taking in the panorama then circling down to the lakeshore in the later morning.

A road connects Sarangkot with Naudaada, about 10km further west on the Baglung Highway, making all sorts of longer trips beyond Sarangkot possible. A few villages are located along the way, notably Maula, the starting point of a flagstoned path up to Kaskikot, seat of the kingdom that once ruled the Pokhara Valley, perched on a craggy brow of the ridge with views as big as Sarangkot’s. A stone enclosure and a house-like Kali temple are all that remain of the citadel of the Kaski kings, which fell to the Gorkhalis without a fight in 1781. Naudaada is another 4.5km west of Maula, and the first place from which Machhapuchhre’s true fishtail profile can be seen. Two or three simple but attractive lodges offer trekking-style accommodation along the road between Maula and Naudaada. You’ll probably catch a bus from Naudaada back to Pokhara, but other interesting variations are possible, including walking down from Maula to Pame or heading west along the main road from Naudaada to Kande, and then taking the foot trail south up to Panchaase Daada.