Many countries including the U.S., U.K., Australia & Canada issue travel alerts so that their citizens could keep an up-to-date knowledge on political & other hassles they might face during a travel. Visitors of certain countries face more risks that others due to various bilateral, regional, religious, & economic conflicts. For example, American citizen have been warned against traveling Afghanistan, Kenya & Iraq among some others. Similarly, Westerners are asked to be careful while visiting Jammu & Kashmir region of India & Pakistan. China too is sensitive toward the Westerners traveling in Tibet with “Free Tibet” T-shirts. Travel alerts are also issued during the time of an epidemic outbreak in any country or region.

Hence, we ask you to heed to the travel advisory notices issued by your home country against traveling any foreign country. As far as Nepal is concerned, there had some travel advisory alerts against traveling Nepal during the Maoist insurgency period. However, now that the Maoists themselves have shunned the violent path & have been elected to the government in 2008 with a promise of welcoming a record one million tourists in 2011, we are confident to assure you that there are no any security threats for traveling in Nepal mountains. Certainly, there is some law & order problems in the southernmost part of Terai region of Nepal bordering with Nepal – but there have no any policies against foreigners traveling in Nepal. Hence, no country has issued any travel alerts against visiting Nepal.

As of now there is no any travel alerts against visiting Nepal. However, we encourage you to visit the detailed country specific information on Nepal issued by different countries. Click here to visit the country specific information on Nepal issued by the U.S. Department of State, here by the Australia Government, here by the U. K. Government, & here by Canadian Consular Affairs.

Trekking Companies

When travelling to Nepal and trying to organize your trek, there are a daunting number of travel agencies out there to choose from. It can be overwhelming even when just looking on the internet, especially for the first time traveler. In order for you to have a happy and successful trip it’s important to make the right choice. Bad choices can not only ruin your holiday but also end up costing you a lot of money.

There are many examples of so called trekking companies and tour agencies offering service in Nepal taking advantage and money form unsuspecting tourists. These operators are not licensed by the government, they normally sub contract out your trek to other companies, taking commission from them and avoiding paying the correct taxes and license fees. This can also result in inflated trip prices for the tourist. These bad operators are only concerned with their own wealth and often pay their trekking staff very poorly and in most occasion don’t offer them insurance, proper equipment or any other kind of support.

• Make sure the company is registered,
• Make sure that they insure their staff
• Don’t be afraid to ask around to check the companies’ reputation.
• Of course just because a company is registered it doesn’t mean they are a good operator. Other things you should check up on are
• Is the company environmentally conscious?
• Do they support local projects?
• Is the company culturally aware and sensitive?
• Are their guides and porters supplied with proper clothing and equipment?
• Do their staff have good skills in English?
• Do their staff have first aid training?

As with all things travel related, a little bit of common sense and pre trip research goes a long way to making your trip a success. You should take advantage of traveler’s web sites and blogs and speak to as many other travelers as possible to help you make your choices about which company to use.