Only few days were remaining for January 1st of 2019. Three of us, office colleagues, planned for a 4-day-trip to Poon Hill (a beautiful hill station located in Western Nepal).
On a very early morning of 29th December, we caught a tourist bus to Pokhara. After around 5 hours of journey, we were overwhelmed to get warm welcome from hotel representatives of Pokhara City just in-front of our bus door. They were showing us leaflets and trying to convince to stay at their hotels. Tourism is one of the major economic sources of the district and thousands of national and international tourists visit Pokhara each year; especially for New Year, honeymoons and other special occasions. Not of a surprise, most of the hotels with fair cost were already booked because of the high time of New Year. We were also smart enough to pre-book a hotel room. So, we directly took a taxi to the hotel, had some rest and went for some sight-seeing around the streets and lake side. The streets of Pokhara were damn clean and dustfree, unlike Kathmandu. The scenic beauty of the Fewa Lake was mind blowing. Anyone who visits Pokhara do not and should not miss the opportunity to roam around Fewa lake-side. After some sight-seeing, we returned to our hotel with hearts filled with joy and stomach filled with light and delicious dinner at a typical Nepali restaurant.
For the next day, our destination was Poon Hill. So, in the very early morning we caught a bus to Nayapul from Baglung Buspark. On the way, through window glass, we could see very beautiful mountains capped with snows and just kissed by Sun. After about 2 hours of bus ride, we reached Nayapul. We got off the bus, had some tea-biscuit and waited for a jeep or a van which could take us to Ulleri. Ulleri is the place from where the hike by foot gets started. After more than an hour of wait, we were able to catch a jeep and we got off at Ulleri in about 45 minutes of ride. Then, we started walking up the hills. It was not more than only five minutes of walk and we started taking photographs. The scenic beauty was so attractive that we couldn’t stop posing for photos. After that, we marched forward walking onto stone paved steep and narrow roadways which quite looked like stairs made up of stones in some places.
Everything around us was so natural. The time was completely with us. We passed by many national and international tourists. International tourists had their guide and porter along with them. Most of the international tourists used to greet us saying Namaste ! (a cultural Nepali way of greeting people). It felt like they are too humble, polite and enjoying their hike. Surprisingly, there were some tourists who were marching for Mt. Annapurna and looked very prepared for a number of weeks with lots of stuffs loaded on porter. We three were walking together in a slow pace. One of our friends was very confident and jolly at the same time. She cracked jokes on the way and no wonder her humor made our journey very smooth. When any of us felt tired, we used to take few minutes of rest by sitting on the stones, drinking water and eating foods in the nearby hotels.
After walking for about 8 hours uphill we entered from a gate where “welcome to Poon Hill” was written. It was almost dark and we were too tired. We directly went to the hotel that we had booked earlier (from Pokhara) and took some rest. The hotel was situated at the base of the main top hill station. It was too cold that we had to wear multiple clothes to make ourselves warm. We ate regular Nepali food; dal (lentils), bhat (rice) and tarkari (vegetables) at the hotel which was super delicious. It was raining too and there was no electricity that night. We stayed near the fire logs to prevent our-self from freezing. We had no idea that the place would be that cold. Rubbing our hands, we marched towards our room and slept.
Next day, with an excitement to see sunrise from Poon hill station, we woke up at 4am in the early morning. Our windows were partially covered with snow. As most of the hotels including ours were located at the base of Poon Hill, we had to walk up the stairs for 45 minutes to reach the top. The stairs were quite slippery because of some snow cubes. As it was still dark in the morning, we had to switch on the torch from our phone to climb the stairs. Also, we didn’t want sun to rise before we reach the top.
Finally, we were at the top of hill, the final destination. Almost 30 people were already there before us and were waiting eagerly for the sun to rise. We could see such a huge and beautiful mountain ranges of the Mt. Dhaulagiri, Mt. Annapurna, Mt. Gangapurna and Mt. Hiunchuli standing at a same place at the top of Poon Hill. There was a tower in the middle of the hill from where the view was pleasing. After few minutes, we could see some sun rays peeking out from white snow-capped mountains turning them (mountains) into red-yellow. People exclaimed saying- “Look at there. The sun is coming up.”
Glimpse of sun rising from the middle of those beautiful mountains was the first ever experience for me. The feeling was super amazing. I felt very close to the nature, the Himalayas, the sun and Nepal. We jumped with joy taking plenty of photographs. I was surprised to see that in just some blink of minutes the Sun came out completely. After that, we drank a mug of hot salty tea (a type of tea which is famous in hilly region of Nepal) from a stall there and thanked them. We felt like heaven in the freezing cold. We then returned back to the hotel and started our journey back to Ulleri on foot. Our hearts were filled with joy and happiness because of the blessings from our mother nature. We came back to Nayapul by a jeep and to Pokhara by a bus.
At Pokhara, people were welcoming New year in an amazing way. There was a street festival with music concerts, food stalls, and full of people walking on the road dancing and singing songs. We had dinner at one of the restaurants where some other friends also joined in. It was a great evening. The next day early in the morning we caught a bus to Kathmandu and left Pokhara with beautiful photos and memories of the early days of 2019.
The trip was adventurous, exciting and worth our holiday time.
PS: Poon Hill is one of the most famous view point in Nepal to view beautiful high peak mountains.
Totally can feel the experience and now desperately waiting the day I could be there to grab the view of my own….
Thanks for sharing your journey.