Experiencing glimpses of Mt. Everest from Udaypur

•  Amber Bamjan Tamang

I am a tourism entrepreneur based in Kathmandu, who was born in Solukhumbu. I have visited various famous tourist areas in Nepal. But today I am going to narrate about a place which is unheard and unknown, yet from here you can see both the famous peak of Mt Everest and the fascinating lush green landscape of terai which is the storehouse of grains of Nepal.

There may be other places like this, but this is what I have seen and experienced. This is an opportunity given to us by the Covid-19 pandemic. The trekking business with which I was associated remained shut down for months which has made me restless.

Our family took this restless moment and the fearful situation created by Covid-19 to go out and have fresh air though there would not be so much a romantic moment due to Covid-19. The time for Dashain and Tihar arrived and we embarked on our out trip.

Daughters like maternal uncle’s home and wife like parent’s home always. I also used to be busy during Dashain and would not get any time to reach in law’s home. We planned and decided to reach my in-law’s house at Bagaha, Triyuga in Udaipur with safety measures.

Though Tamang people do not celebrate the festival of Dashain like Hindus by worshiping the deity of Gurga, yet they do observe this festival by putting a white tick on foreheads and exchange blessings after worshipping ancestors.

Our family’s return trip to Kathmandu was delayed for safety stay in the village due to the spreading spree of the deadly virus in Kathmandu.

A small village near Udaipur cement near the dense forest in the northern side of Chure Bhawar and in the south of Mahabharat hills which is the eastern side of Udaipur district is a main landscape in the inner eastern part.

We talked about visiting this spot where flowers bloomed and birds chirped in the trees and fascinating vegetation could attract you.

We had heard about the existence of Udaipurgadhi in Udaipur, but we did not know anything about its significance. We decided to visit this historical spot for which we reserved a local tempo and traveled for 35 km western hills.

As our tempo whirled through one of the gravel roads to our destination, we had a short glimpse of Mt Everest peak from the hills while moving along.

I hurried to stop the temp driver to halt the movement of the tempo. I thought it was cloud and not what I thought of in my mind. But as I stared at the sight of the peak, I finally confirmed that it was the tip of peak of Mt Everest seen between Nuptse and Lhotse peaks.

I took some of the photographs though I am not a professional photographer. On asking the driver, I was told that everyone there knew that those peaks were seen from that spot, but nobody knew that it was the peak of Mt Everest.

Since I was born in Solukhumb which is the district of Mt Everest and I was engaged in the tourism sector, I especially knew about Mt Everest. Mt Everest which is the pride and identity of Nepal as seen from our own village and district was something very romantic for us to visit this Udaipurgadhi and a matter of discussion for all.

That evening I transferred some of the photos I took and uploaded in my Facebook through app.

The discussion started about how one feels about seeing Mt Everest from Udaipur and more interesting to visit the temple of Raitamai in this region while hiking in the hills of Udaipur.

Then we reserved a jeep and moved 40km towards Rauta hills from Gaighat of Udaipur along with the family to see more romantic sights.

Though Rauta Pokhari is not mentioned in the list of tourist spots in Nepal, yet we reached this romantic spot as we crossed difficult gravel roads via Gaighat-Khotang road after leaving the blacktopped road. We could  see various captivating ranges of Himals as we moved across the hills of this region for two hours in a jeep. Rauta Pokhari is famous here.

According to the locals just below the hill, the pond never dries up so it is considered magical and pious. So, people have been worshiping the image of the deity on the bank of this pond since ancient times.

I could easily see the peaks of Gauri Shanker, Makalu, Mt Everest, Kanchanjunga, and Number of my village.

At least five out of eight highest mountains (8000ers) could be seen from this spot including viewing Cho Yo Himal, Lhotse, Makalu, and Mt Everest.

Many other peaks of Himal could be seen from this spot which is just 1700 meters high from sea level. We returned after visiting the temple of Rautamai and seeing the sight of Sagarmatha.

This was the most memorable thing for me as from this region one could see most of the peaks of the mountains in Nepal and also could be observed the lush green plain landscape of terai which could also be a special spot for tourism.

It is high time that we start to prepare for the infrastructure development of these touristic destinations and we need to make publicity for them.

If Udaipur could be added to the map of tourism, it could be one of the top destinations in the country, and it could contribute to the prosperity of the local people and development.

Trekking entrepreneur Tamang is former second vice-chairman