Upper Mustang Overland Tour

After your plane lands at Tribhuvan International Airport, you go through the check-in process. There you’ll find our representative holding a “Nepal Hiking Team” sign. They will take you to a good 3-star hotel, so you don't have to worry about anything.

The ride through Kathmandu lets you see the city's crowded roads and busy local life for the first time. Once you get to your room, you can rest or walk around nearby to get used to the place before your Upper Mustang Overland Tour starts.

You'll see Nepal's best old places at four special spots that UNESCO says are very important. Each place tells its own story that you can learn about. At the old Swayambhunath temple, you can turn the prayer wheels like local people do. Monkeys play and jump all around the temple area.

Then you'll walk around the huge Boudhanath stupa, which is one of the biggest in the world. You can walk in circles around this holy place with other people who come to pray. You'll hear quiet chanting and feel how peaceful it gets when people pray together. At Pashupatinath temple, you'll watch important Hindu religious events happen next to the Bagmati River.

You get to see old palaces where kings used to live long ago. These old buildings have nice wood designs and paintings from way back. Walking through these important places helps you understand Nepal's past and gets you excited for your mountain trip.

After you eat breakfast, your Upper Mustang Jeep Tour from Kathmandu starts with a drive to Pokhara, which is Nepal's second biggest city. The road goes through green farming areas with hills, curvy rivers, and small valleys that hide between big mountains.

This gives you your first look at what the Himalayan area looks like before your real mountain trip starts. The drive from Kathmandu to Pokhara takes about six hours, and when you get there, you'll stay in a nice hotel for the night.

During the evening, you can take a quiet boat ride on Fewa Lake, where the calm water shows the reflection of Mount Machhapuchhre and the Annapurna mountains. This peaceful time lets you relax and enjoy the pretty views before your big adventure keeps going.

A nice drive to Kagbeni starts in the morning, and the road shows you beautiful mountain views all along the way. Kagbeni village sits in the Kali Gandaki River valley and serves as the main gateway to enter Mustang. People call Kagbeni the gateway to Upper Mustang because everyone has to pass through here. 

Long ago, traders used this place as an important stop when they carried goods between Nepal and other places. There's a checkpoint at Kagbeni where officers check all groups going to the Muktinath and Mustang areas. You need to show your special papers here before they let you go further. 

As you drive deeper into Kagbeni, you'll see how the land changes from green rolling hills to dry, grey-white rocky areas. Tibetan culture becomes very clear here, and the place starts to feel more like Tibet than Nepal. Kagbeni was built like a fortified town and played a big role during the old days when people traded salt between Tibet and Nepal.

When you get to Kagbeni, you can walk on the stone streets and see prayer wheels attached to the walls of small temples and religious buildings. You can also visit "the Red Monastery," which has red painted walls and looks like one huge block of stone.

The drive from Kagbeni to Charang takes you through bright white hills and empty land that looks like a desert. Charang sits just south of Lo Manthang, which is the main walled city of the Mustang Kingdom, and this village has lots of old history and culture. 

You'll see a fort called a Dzong, many religious towers called stupas, houses made from stone and mud bricks, and a famous monastery. The area around here is dry like a desert, and you can see great views of the Himalayan mountains and the deep Kali Gandaki valley.

When you get to Charang, you can visit the monastery where the inside walls have bright painted pictures of the Medicine Buddha Mandala. These paintings are very important to Mustang's religious life, and you can find similar ones in almost every village around here. 

The monastery still holds religious ceremonies and prayers that local people think are very important. You can watch how people live their traditional lives here, including how they grow food, do prayer ceremonies, and take care of old buildings that have been here for hundreds of years.

From Charang, you'll take a walk to the Luri Cave, which is part of what makes Upper Mustang Jeep Tour Packages so special. The Luri Gompa sits southeast of Lo Manthang and is an old cave system that nobody knows much about, or how it started. The Luri Cave sits among sandstone rocks and cliffs that wind and weather have shaped into amazing forms.

These cliffs have many caves carved into them, and one of these caves holds the inner part of Luri Gompa, which is like a small treasure of Buddhist art. The Luri Gompa is a cave monastery that sits high above the broken landscape like an eagle's home. People also call it "the Sky Cave" sometimes.

This is one of the last cave monasteries left in Lo Manthang and Tibet, and the Luri Gompa has no written records about when people built it. Painted with red color and sitting on a ledge of a cliff that's one hundred meters high, the Gompa stands out against the sand and bone-colored stone columns. It belongs to the Kagyu group of Buddhism and goes back to the 13th or 14th century.

You can see part of the Luri Gompa from the valley below, where its mud-brick building sits on a ledge of one of the sandstone columns. At first, it looks like you can only get to the cave by climbing the column itself, but a twisting path goes up one hundred meters to a door in a lower cave. Inside this cave is a notched log that you climb to reach the Gompa.

The best parts of the Gompa are in its inner rooms that were carved out or made bigger, with smooth walls. Natural light comes in through a small window, making the space look magical. After you explore the cave, you'll go back to Charang. You'll sleep at a guesthouse with breakfast, lunch, and dinner included.

From Charang, you'll drive to the capital of the Mustang Kingdom - Lo Manthang, which is the highlight of Upper Mustang Jeep Tour Packages. The drive shows you a beautiful and strange desert land with high hills that look different from anywhere else. Once you get to Lo Manthang, you can walk around the village and see everything on foot.

Lo Manthang has lots to see and gives you a wonderful look at Tibetan Buddhist ways of life. Lhoba and Bon people live here, and Lo Manthang is famous for its tall white-painted mud brick walls, temples, and the King's Palace. This special building with nine corners and five floors was built around 1400.

You'll visit Lo Manthang's monasteries, the King's palace, and many other important places. There are four main temples in Lo Manthang that you should know about. The Jampa Lhakhang or Jampa Gompa is the oldest one, built in the early 1400s, and people call it the "God House." The Thubchen Gompa is a big red meeting hall and temple built in the late 1400s that’s in the southwest of the Jampa Gompa. The Chodey Gompa is now the main city temple, and the Choprang Gompa is what people call the "New Gompa."

Not long ago, people found at least twelve caves north of Annapurna near the village. These caves have old Buddhist paintings inside them and sit on steep cliffs that are 14,000 feet high.

You can either walk or drive to Chosar Village today from Lo Manthang in your Upper Mustang Caves and Monasteries Jeep Tour. Chosar village is a pretty small place with stone walls and white-colored hills that look like old bones. While you're there, you can also visit the famous Chosar caves.

From Lo Manthang, the path goes past dry water channels to an old, broken fortress, then across a bridge through small farming areas until you reach Chosar. You'll see the deep-red Nyphu Gompa at Chosar come into view. This building is built right into the rock face like someone carefully planned it to fit there. The ghostly white hills around the village look like they were carved out of hardened milk and candy.

Amazing mountains mark where Tibet starts, and small streams follow along the trail. This valley used to be the main place where traders stopped, and was on the trading road between Tibet and Lhasa. 

Chosar has broken pieces of old forts scattered around that once protected the valley from a good position. After you look around the village and explore the Chosar caves, you'll drive back to Charang.

On this day, you'll take a hike to the famous Ghar Gompa from Charang. The Ghar Gompa sits about 3 hours away from Charang and is the oldest monastery in all of Mustang. It goes back to the 8th century and was built by Guru Rinpoche, who started Tibetan Buddhism.

People say the Gompa covers the heart of Balmo, a female giant that Guru Rinpoche beat in a big fight way back in the 8th century. It sits just past the small settlement of Lo Gekar.
Ghar Gompa has beautiful paintings that show detailed stories and old tales about Gods and bad spirits. The door to the Gompa has the Four Guardian Kings on both sides, and inside the temple, you'll find great painted, carved stones and statues of Guru Rinpoche, Palden Lhamo riding a horse, and Vajrapani.

There are also many Tsa Tsa carvings around the prayer wheels on the side of Ghar Gompa. After you look around the Gompa and learn about its history, you'll hike back to Charang.

Your journey from Lo Manthang begins with a jeep ride to Jomsom, taking you through several remote villages. You'll pass through Jaite, Shyangbochen, Vena, Samar, Chhusang, and Kagbeni, each one showing you a different side of Mustang life.

The jeep travels through the famous Kali Gandaki Gorge, which holds the record as the world's deepest gorge. Massive peaks rise up around you, such as Dhaulagiri on one side and Annapurna on the other.

Every village you drive through tells its own story through stone houses that have stood for centuries. The scenery changes constantly as you travel. You'll see terraced farmland in hillsides where local families grow barley and buckwheat. The hills here look different from other parts of Nepal, as this region sits in the rain shadow of the big mountains.

Rock formations here look like nothing else you've seen, shaped by thousands of years of wind and weather. Your driver will often stop in small villages where you can walk around, meet local people, and take photos of the incredible mountain views that surround you at every turn.

After breakfast in Jomsom, you begin the journey back to Pokhara, traveling through the Kali Gandaki Valley. The drive takes you through changing landscapes as you leave the dry highlands of Mustang behind. The road passes through different terrain.

Along the way, you pass through small towns and villages where local life continues at its own pace. Snow-capped peaks appear in the distance, offering trekkers stunning views of the Annapurna and Dhaulagiri ranges. Small streams and forests replace the landscape of the upper regions.

This long but rewarding drive gives you time to reflect on your Upper Mustang Overland tour while enjoying the comfort of road travel. The changing views outside your window tell the story of Nepal's diverse geography in just a few hours.

By evening, you arrive in Pokhara, where the lakeside atmosphere provides a perfect balance to the rugged terrain you have just explored. The calm waters of Phewa Lake and vibrant town setting welcome you back to comfortable surroundings.

Today marks your final journey as you head back to Kathmandu on the same beautiful highway that brought you to Upper Mustang. The drive gives you time to watch the green hills and think about all the incredible moments from your Upper Mustang Jeep Tour.

When you reach Kathmandu, something special waits for you. The Nepal Hiking Team will give you a trip completion certificate with your name on it. Many trekkers tell us this certificate becomes one of their favourite keepsakes from the whole trip.

The drive back gives you a chance to process everything you've seen and done over these 13 days. From the ancient monasteries to the dramatic cliffs, from meeting local people to pushing yourself on challenging trails.

Your remarkable adventure through Nepal's hidden paths reaches its final chapter today. We arrange comfortable transportation to Tribhuvan International Airport, making sure you arrive with plenty of time before your international departure.

As you prepare to leave Nepal behind, you carry much more than souvenirs and photos. The memories of high mountain passes, quiet villages, and shared stories with fellow trekkers become part of who you are.

The friendships formed on mountain trails often prove as valuable as the stunning views themselves of the Upper Mustang Overland Tour. Whether sharing a warm meal in a tea house or helping each other through challenging sections, these connections add meaning to every step of your trek.

Many trekkers find themselves planning their next Himalayan adventure before they even board their flight home. The mountains have a unique pull that draws people back again and again. If you feel that same calling, we help you explore more of what this incredible region offers.