Mountain Flight from Kathmandu

We collect you from your hotel at around half past five and drive to the domestic terminal at Tribhuvan, where the mountain flights leave shortly after dawn - the air is clearest in the first hour of daylight and the aircraft are on the ground again before the thermals build. The flight lasts about an hour: the aircraft tracks east along the Himalaya at around 25,000 feet, turns at Everest and comes back on the same line. In that hour you pass Langtang Lirung, Dorje Lakpa, Gauri Shankar, Melungtse, Cho Oyu, Nuptse, Lhotse, Makalu and Everest itself, close enough on a clear morning to pick out the Khumbu icefall and the South Col. Every seat is a window seat on these aircraft, and the cabin crew call passengers forward to the flight deck one at a time so that everyone gets the view straight ahead down the range. You are back at your hotel in time for a late breakfast, with the whole of the rest of the day free. Flights operate roughly October to April; they are delayed or cancelled rather than flown into cloud, so we plan this early in a trip to leave room for a second attempt.