Eben Jones with crashed Tara Air twin otter

Nepal

“The adventurous way or the gentle way?” Roop asked.  My kids both yelled “Adventurous!”  And seconds later I was utterly soaked. It was only our second day in Nepal and my family and I were already well and truly into our adventure as we white-water rafted on the Trisuli River. It was great fun and our first afternoon ended with us camping on a riverbank. The next morning we rafted...

Quest for the Snow Leopard

by Darla Hillard and Rodney Jackson It has been thirty years since we came face-to-face with our first wild snow leopard. We didn’t follow the rules; we weren’t careful what we wished for. We dreamed big, we got lucky, and we fell in love—not just with each other, but also with a beautiful, secretive big cat that shares her realm with the beautiful, indigenous people of high-mountain Central...

Across the Himalayas in a 128 Days

Jane Poretsis interviews Sunil Tamang Sunil Tamang’s great passion for adventure started at the young age of just 8 years old – when he ran away from home to see the JanaiPurnima Festival in GosainKunda, a few villages away. Twelve years later he still remembers vividly asking first his mother and then his father if he could go. Sadly they said he could not as it was two days walk away and they thought...

A Royal Wedding in a Magical Kingdom

by Jane Poretsis On this day, 31 year old King Jigme Khesar Namgyal Wangchuck married the beautiful 21 year old student Jetsun Pema; in a 17th century monastic fortress in Punakha , the former capitol of Bhutan. The day was marked by processions and solemn ritual. Celebratory songs, the beating of drums and traditional trumpets also resounded across the courtyard of the ancient monastery. Nervously, Pema...

A New Kind of Happiness

by Steve Evans As the passenger jetliner flew past eight of the ten highest mountains in the world, I knew I was in for an adventure. To my left, looking out the window of the plane, I could see Mt. Everest towering high above the other mountains. It seemed close enough to touch if I could only stretch out my hand and reach through the glass. The plane turned north, into the mighty Himalayas and began its...

Shamanism

Who Were the Spirits of Bumthang? A Sneek Peek into Bumthang’s World of Spirits! by Kunzang Choden   Bhutan perhaps has as many spirits as humans. Through thousands of years, the Bhutanese have shared territories, natural resources, and a bittersweet relationship with spirits that inhabit the valleys and gorges, hills and mountain tops, rivers and lakes, forests and trees. All along, living side by side...

Volunteering

  Medical volunteers’ kick-start high altitude genetics study by Charles Malcolm-Brown MA FRSA (Chairman) The Mountain Trust   Towards the end of 2010 the Mountain Trust was approached by Sean Cox to see whether we could help with some exciting high altitude medical research in Nepal with big implications for medical care worldwide. Leading the research is Professor Montgomery from University...