Tilman Pass Trek

Welcome to Nepal. You land at Tribhuvan International Airport in Kathmandu (1,400 m), where our representative meets you in the arrivals hall and drives you to your hotel in Thamel.

Your guide joins you for a briefing that covers rather more than a normal trek: the sixteen-day plan, the six nights of camping, the technical equipment we supply, and the points on the route where the group can be turned round. Boots are fitted to crampons here rather than at 5,000 m, and we go through your personal kit item by item.

The rest of the day is free, and anything missing can be bought or hired in Thamel. Overnight in Kathmandu.

A long, winding drive north to the Tibetan border country. The road climbs out of the Kathmandu valley at Kakani and follows a ridge with the Ganesh Himal ahead, then drops to Trishuli Bazaar and grinds up the Bhote Koshi.

The last three hours are slow — a narrow road cut into the valley side, rebuilt in sections after the 2015 earthquake, with the river a long way below. The scenery is superb and the driving is not for the nervous.

Syabrubesi (1,460 m) is the roadhead at the confluence of the Bhote Koshi and the Langtang Khola, a single street of lodges and shops with a hot spring beside the river.

Around 7–8 hours including stops. The crew sorts loads this evening. Overnight at Syabrubesi.

The first walking day, climbing into the Langtang gorge on a good trail.

The route crosses the Bhote Koshi and follows the Langtang Khola east, climbing steadily through oak and rhododendron forest with the river white below. There are two or three simple tea stops along the way, at Bamboo and Rimche, and the forest is dense enough that views are rare — this is a walk in the trees.

Langur monkeys are common through this section and red panda live in the upper forest, though seeing one is a matter of real luck.

Lama Hotel (2,470 m) is a line of lodges in a clearing where the valley bends. Around 6 hours. Overnight at Lama Hotel.

The day the valley opens out and the mountains arrive.

The trail climbs through the last of the forest to Ghoda Tabela — 'horse stable' — where the trees stop and the valley widens into pasture. Langtang Lirung (7,227 m) comes into view above, and the walking becomes level and easy on the valley floor.

Beyond Ghoda Tabela the trail passes the site of the old Langtang village, destroyed in April 2015 when the earthquake brought an ice and rock avalanche off the mountain onto the settlement. The memorial and the rebuilt village stand on the same ground, and it is a place to walk through slowly.

Mundu (3,540 m) is a rebuilt settlement of stone lodges a little beyond, with mani walls and yak pasture around it. Around 6 hours. Overnight at Mundu.

A short, level morning to the last village in the valley.

The trail runs east across the flat valley floor past mani walls, chortens and grazing yaks, gaining height so gently that you barely notice. Langtang Lirung is directly above on the left the whole way.

Kyanjin Gompa (3,870 m) is a cluster of lodges around an old monastery, with a small cheese factory established with Swiss help in the 1950s — the yak cheese is genuinely good and worth buying. The village sits in a bowl with Langtang Lirung, Kimshung and Langshisa Ri around it.

You arrive by late morning, which leaves the afternoon for an easy walk up the moraine or simply for sitting outside. Around 3 hours. Overnight at Kyanjin Gompa.

The last day with a roof, spent gaining height and going over the technical drills.

The morning climb is Tserko Ri (4,984 m) or the shorter Kyanjin Ri (4,550 m), depending on how the group is moving. Tserko Ri is a four to five hour round trip and a serious pull, and from the top the whole Langtang Himal is laid out with Shishapangma across the border in Tibet.

The afternoon is training on the slope behind the village: crampons, ice axe, moving as a roped team, and ascending and descending a fixed line. Even for experienced trekkers this sets the drills the group will use on the pass.

Your guide makes the first honest assessment tonight of who is ready for the crossing, and repacks the loads for six days without resupply. Overnight at Kyanjin Gompa.

An easy day to the end of the trail, and the first camp.

The route follows the valley floor east past the airstrip and the old Jatang settlement, with the walls closing in and the glaciers appearing at the head of the valley. The walking is level and the ground is grass and gravel, so the day is short in effort even at this height.

Langshisa Kharka (4,080 m) is a broad yak pasture below the junction of the Langshisa and Langtang glaciers, with Langshisa Ri (6,427 m) and Dorje Lakpa (6,966 m) around it. Herders bring stock here in summer; otherwise it is empty.

The tents go up for the first time, and the crew settles into the routine that will run for the next week. Around 4 hours. Overnight camping at Langshisa Kharka.

The day the trail stops and the route begins.

From the kharka the group climbs onto the lateral moraine of the Langshisa Glacier and works south towards the head of the valley. There is no path: your guide picks a line through boulders, old moraine and ice, and the group moves together and slowly.

Progress is measured in hours rather than kilometres. Five hours of walking covers ground you would cross in two at sea level, and the altitude gain of more than 800 m is felt with every step.

Tilman Base Camp (4,900 m) is a flattened patch of moraine below the pass, exposed and cold, with meltwater the only source of water. The pass itself is visible above as a notch in the ridge.

Around 6 hours. An early meal, kit sorted, and an early night. Overnight camping at Tilman Base Camp.

The crossing, and the hardest day of the trek by a wide margin.

We leave camp before dawn, roped and in crampons, and climb the glacier and the snow slope to the col. The final section below the pass is steep enough to warrant a fixed line, and the group moves one at a time.

Tilman's Pass (5,350 m) is a narrow gap in the ridge with Dorje Lakpa and the Jugal Himal on either side. North, the Langtang glaciers run back the way you came; south, empty ridges fall away towards the Panch Pokhari basin with nothing man-made in the view at all.

The descent is the demanding half: steep snow, then loose moraine, then boulder fields, losing 750 m on unstable ground. Poles and patience.

Ten to twelve hours. Overnight camping below the pass.

A shorter day through empty country to the lakes.

The route descends the moraine and crosses a series of ridges and shallow basins, with no trail and no settlement anywhere in sight. The landscape is entirely different from the Langtang side — broad, rolling and open rather than closed in by walls of rock and ice.

Panch Pokhari (4,100 m) is five glacial lakes in a high basin, sacred to Hindus as a dwelling place of Shiva. There are small shrines and stone shelters at the water's edge, built for the Janai Purnima pilgrimage in August when thousands of people walk up from the valleys below.

For the rest of the year the basin is empty, and camping beside the lakes with the Jugal Himal on the skyline is the quiet counterpart to yesterday's crossing.

Around 5 hours. Overnight camping at Panch Pokhari.

The start of the long descent south, following the pilgrim route rather than a wilderness line.

A trail appears again below the lakes — worn by the August pilgrimage rather than by trekkers — and the walking becomes straightforward. The route follows a broad ridge with views back to the Jugal Himal and, on a clear morning, east towards the Rolwaling peaks.

Nasempati (3,650 m) is a set of open stone shelters on the ridge, built to house pilgrims on their way up. Empty outside the festival, it makes a good camp with water nearby.

The air is noticeably thicker after four days above 4,000 m, and appetite tends to come back tonight. Around 4–5 hours. Overnight camping at Nasempati.

Down off the ridge and back below the treeline.

The trail loses height steadily along the ridge and enters rhododendron and oak forest, thick and mossy and full of birdsong after a week of rock and ice. In spring the rhododendron here flowers for hours of walking.

Kami Kharka (2,700 m) is a grazing clearing used by herders from the villages below, with water and flat ground for the tents. This is the last camping night of the trek.

The temperature at night is a completely different proposition here — above freezing, with the smell of woodsmoke from the herders' fires. Around 5 hours. Overnight camping at Kami Kharka.

The last full walking day, down through farmland into the Melamchi valley.

The forest gives way to terraced fields of millet and maize, with water mills on the streams and buffalo tethered under the eaves. Villages appear every hour or so, and children walking to school become the main traffic on the trail.

Tempathang (1,800 m) is a Sherpa and Tamang village and the first place with a road connection, however rough. After a week without seeing anyone outside the group, the ordinary business of a working village is a pleasant shock.

This is where the porters and cook crew finish and where tips are given. Around 5–6 hours. Overnight in a homestay at Tempathang.

A jeep day back to the capital down the Melamchi valley.

The first two hours are on a rough hill road; from Melamchi Bazaar the surface improves and the route joins the Araniko Highway for the run into the Kathmandu valley.

The Melamchi valley is where the capital's water supply comes from, and you pass the tunnel works and pipeline on the way down — a useful piece of context for a city that spent decades short of water.

Around 5–6 hours. You arrive in Kathmandu (1,400 m) in the afternoon and transfer to your hotel, with the evening free. Overnight in Kathmandu.

Your last day in Nepal. If your flight leaves later there is time for Boudhanath, Pashupatinath or the old town at Bhaktapur with your guide.

Our representative collects you from your hotel and transfers you to Tribhuvan International Airport around three hours before departure.

Tilman's Pass is one of the least walked crossings in Nepal and you will very likely have had it entirely to yourselves. If you want the same character again, the Tashi Lapcha into the Khumbu and the Sherpani Col in the Makalu region are the two obvious next steps. Safe travels.