nepal cycling tour

Bicycling to Pokhara (plus water-rafting)

This tour was organized at rather short notice... only two of us could go... Binoy Raveendran on his BSA ACT-110 (the best Indian geared bike!) and Amit Mukerjee on a Trek-3700.

Itinerary: Lumbini-Tansen-Pokhara-Fisling-Mugling-Narayanghat-Chitwan National Park
September 15 to 19, 2011

The plan: we have five days altogether; so the plan is to drive down to the nepal border at sunauli. cycle down and around lumbini. now, check up on route via tansen to pokhara - google maps shows a large part of this road as missing, so we aren't too sure. if road is in good shape, cycle to tansen (1.5 days). else, cycle along highway via bharatpur (nArAyanghAT) and mugling to pokharA (two days). for the boring stretches, go in the car (blue); rest bicycling (yellow) or water-rafting (red).

map of the lumbini-pokhara-narayanghat area. click for hi-res image.

terrain map with our various routes. the main cycling day was tansen to pokhara. the main rafting day (day 4) was fisling to 5km-point (distance from mugling). side bicycle tours to lumbini and chitwan national park.

out of pokhara, try to come back via some other route.

also, try to get in some serious water rafting - the rivers near pokhara are pretty sharp - maybe near mugling. ...

in other words, an opportunistic plan, try to maximize experience based on what turns up...

that was the plan...

what we finally ended up doing: lumbini, chitwan, pokhara, water rafting.

day 1 sep 14, Wed: lumbini - tAnsen: drive in overnight from kanpur to reach the border in the morning, cycle around lumbini till about 1pm. then we head over to the hills. cycle up some of the slopes till it gets too dark. drive to tansen.
day 2: tansen-pokhara - 120 km: cycle all the way. beautiful mountain landscapes, beautiful people. toughest bicycling day of the tour.
day 3: pokhara (morning): explore the town. hang around the seti river gorge with the local kids of the ram ghat neighbourhood. afternoon, drive down to fisling looking for a water-rafting trip tomorrow.
day 4: fisling - water rafting - narayanghat trishuli river raft flip; go 20km downriver. then cycle 35km to nArAyanghAT.
day 5, sep 19, sun: chitwan national park: cycle around the outer area (morning). drive back overnight to reach kanpur monday morning.

total distances: bicycle: 270km, car: 180km, raft: 25km.

* [ day 1: lumbini-tansen]
* [ day 2: tansen-pokhara 120km]
* [ day 3: pokhara]
* [ day 4: fisling-rafting-nArAyanghAT]
* [ day 5: chitwan]

[bumpy trails bicyclists homepage]

amitabha mukerjee for the bumpy trail bicyclists. sep 2011. feedback: mukerjee [at] gmail