Namobuddha Tour

We drive east out of Kathmandu, about forty kilometres, and stop first at Panauti - a small and largely intact Newar town at the confluence of the Roshi and Punyamata rivers, with the Indreshwar Mahadev temple at its centre. The temple dates in part from the twelfth century and its roof struts are among the oldest surviving wood carving in Nepal; the town around it has changed very little and sees a fraction of Bhaktapur's visitors. From Panauti we continue to Namobuddha, where a stupa marks the story of a prince who gave his body to a starving tigress and her cubs, an act of compassion in a previous life of the Buddha, and which has been a pilgrimage site for a very long time. Above the stupa stands Thrangu Tashi Yangtse, a large working monastery whose monks you hear before you see; visitors can walk the kora around the hill, sit in on the afternoon chanting, and eat in the monastery kitchen. We come back via the ridge at Dhulikhel, which has its own long Himalayan view, and reach Kathmandu in the early evening.