If you’ve ever flown to Jomsom from Pokhara, you’ll remember being amazed at the villages dotted about on the high ridges stretching down from the mighty flanks of Annapurna South. Tiny paths head along the ridge-tops towards high pastures and you wonder how far they go. The plane whizzes by this world in a Mustang-bound instant, but the idea of being down there on the ground watching the plane pass remains.

Well now the people of those aerial villages on the South Western side of the Annapurna massif have opened this fabulous landscape for off the beaten-track trekking. They’ll take you to one of those ridges and you’ll either be watching the morning flights glide below you or maybe gazing upon a sea of cloud with only islands of high mountains visible.

This is the Myagdi Parbat Eco-trek. It’s located in the area just to the West of Poon-hill, to the east of which lies one of Nepal’s most visited areas and lies right on the Great Himalaya Trail Cultural Route and the area is populated entirely by Magar people.

This is one of several new community-managed projects in Nepal, where a lot of work has gone into ensuring the benefit from your visit reaches the whole community. And in this case, they have one main goal – to invest all proceeds in increasing local access to education and health through Himanchal Education Foundation.

As good as this sound, is there anything more to it that just nice views? Is anybody going to want to go?

Actually, it sounds like a fabulous Nepal experience with a mixture of nature and culture in abundance. They say people come to Nepal for the mountains and return for the people. Well there are of course mountains in abundance. The views from Khopra, the highest point of the trek (3,660 m) that rests on one side of Annapurna South, are far better than Poon hill, and you can be enjoyed from your lodge window. You’ll go home with stunning sunrise pictures different to everybody else.

From Mohare Dandha, and many other locations, you can see 29 great mountain tops stretching east and west with great views of the Annapurnas, the Machhapuchhare, Phewa Lake, the often neglected Dhaulagiri and visit the community-managed yak-cow cross breeding farm (dzos produce as much milk as cows but keeps the particular taste of that from yaks).

The Magar people who live here wear sacks on their back called bangra which is a cross between a backpack and a huge pocket. You can see them being woven in Tikot, which vies incidentally for the title of being one of the prettiest villages in Nepal. There’s a homestay option here so you can bed and board with a family and see how Magar life is behind closed doors.

Depending on the time of year, there is, not for the faint of heart, a Yak-blood drinking festival in Paudawar somewhere in July, and in Lareni in winter. In Nangi, there’s a traditional paper-making shop run by local women, In Banskharka maidan (maidan means meadow), Mandarins grow in autumn. Above Nangi you’ll pass through a pristine, sacred forest with hidden temples around a natural swimming-pool that appears each Summer. Meet here Mr Moti, the Grower, a characterful, retired British Gurkha in his 70s who manages the community forest nursery here.

And because this is a community project, everybody is going to be giving you a warm welcome.

NB: this used to be called the Myagdi Parbat Eco-trek! If you are looking for a map of this trek, look for the Myagdi Parbat Eco-trek map!

Please contact us for further information and detailed itinerary for this trek.