Jomsom Muktinath Trek

Eight days up the deepest gorge on earth into the Tibetan rain shadow — and the one trek that works through the monsoon.

The Kali Gandaki runs between Dhaulagiri and Annapurna with seven vertical kilometres of mountain on either side, which makes this the deepest gorge in the world and puts everything north of it in a rain shadow. Walk up it and the landscape changes completely: subtropical forest and waterfalls at Tatopani, apple orchards and pine at Marpha, then bare ochre cliffs, prayer walls and Tibetan-Buddhist villages by the time you reach Muktinath at 3,760 m — a temple complex sacred to Hindus and Buddhists both, with 108 water spouts and a natural gas flame burning over a spring. Because the rain falls on the south side, this is the trek we run in July and August when everything else is a leech farm.

Why you'll love it

• ✓Muktinath temple at 3,760 m — 108 spouts and the eternal flame
• ✓The Kali Gandaki gorge, the deepest on earth, between two 8,000 m peaks
• ✓Tatopani hot springs & Marpha's apple brandy
• ✓Rain-shadow country — one of the few routes that works in monsoon
• ✓Spare day built into monsoon departures for the Jomsom flight

Day by day