Nepal (April 2016): Valleys of Nepal‛s Northwestern Corner
6. Api Valley
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Finally we visited the valley of Api Khola. We entered the valley using a shortcut while going down along Mahakali Nadi to avoid an unnecessary loss of elevation.
View over the lower part of Api valley.
Hiking in the lower part of the valley. As had become routine on this trip, the trail had been destroyed by former landslides, avalanches, and floods
We eventually reached the upper section of the valley, a flatter area used as pasture (kharka) during the summer.
View of the lower part of Api valley from the rim of the upper valley. Our path had been consistently on the right (northern) side of the valley, which was slightly less steep than the other side.
Stone shelters in Api kharka. In the summer herders put a plastic tarp that they bring with them over the single beam of these shelters.
We set our camp for two nights near a Hindu shrine built on a small rock outcrop.
Other views of the shrine.
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Narrow bridge over Api Khola near our camp.
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Mountain ridge on the northern side of our camp.
Api Himal seen from our camp at different times of the day.
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Other views of Api Himal while hiking further up into the valley.
In our last day in the valley, we had a late afternoon snowfall. Clear weather returned in the evening and the almost-full-moon night was magnificent.
View on the next morning.
Morning descent from the upper section of the valley.
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We eventually reached the lower part of the valley.
We crossed the bridge over Api Khola that we had crossed in the opposite direction almost two weeks before...
...and we returned to Darchula, where we spent a night. On the next morning this Mahindra jeep drove us back to Atariya via Dadeldhura. It had been an excellent trip in a very remote part of Nepal.
