ROGER NORUM rises to a challenge that takes in hippie haunts and heart-stopping vistas of Himalayan splendour

A PAIR of uniformed schoolgirls with bright red ribbons in their hair skipping down a hillside trailed obediently by a band of giant brown oxen, a team of guides and porters, praying silently, heads bowed, before the agged peak of Machhapuchhre, a mountain they consider sacred.

I'd been in Nepal for only two days but already I had been granted access to these magical scenes.

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Set deep in the Himalayas sandwiched between India and China, Nepal is the birthplace of adventure tourism.

The country was tainted for ears by abject poverty, a bloody royal massacre and a crippling Maoist rebellion but the current political situation is somewhat more settled and it is now firmly back on the map as the quintessential destination for Westerners in search of enlightenment and exercise.

Late last year, the Prince Harry-supported Khumbu Challenge saw several dozen Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans making the trek to Mount Everest base camp and England rugby veteran Josh Lewsey narrowly failed in his attempt to reach the summit in May.

Last October, however, I was one of the first guests on Intrepid Travel's new Nepal Adventure tour. The 15-day trip eases you into trekking via other activities: paddling along the vigorous Trisuli River, poking around hippie Pokhara and kicking back at a handful of pampering eco-lodges around the country.

The actual trekking bit, which takes in an untrampled corner of mid-west Nepal's Annapurna Conservation Area, makes an excellent alternative to the famed Everest Base Camp and Annapurna Circuit routes.

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If you've ever hoped to experience the land of the yak and yeti but lack the endurance of such hardened adventurers as Sir Ranulph Fiennes, this is the trip for you.

A sojourn in the Nepali great outdoors is best in the spring (March to June) and autumn (September to November). I prefer the later months as the evenings are cooler and the air lighter.

We set out from Kathmandu on a crisp autumn morning for the hill station of Nuwakot, a small Newari settlement on the western ridge of the Kathmandu valley.

Together with a group of five women, I stayed at a traditional manor house once owned by noble Nepali families. It has since been converted into an eco-lodge, with terracotta-tiled roofs, adobe floors and creaky old wooden beds set into niches.

Bedding down after a celebratory dinner of dal bhat, Nepal's national dish of rice and lentils, I awoke before dawn and perched on my terrace in silence, still a little tipsy from the rakshi (millet alcohol) and chang (fermented rice beer). I gazed at bands of morning sunlight slicing across the peaks of the Annapurna range. The world of busy, buzzing Kathmandu, with its power outages and its water shortages, seemed an age away.

FROM HERE, we descended to the narrow Trisuli river valley where we navigated rapids in inflatable canoes for several days and explored more tranquil, lilting waters that were safe enough for us to jump into.

At night, we made our way to stunning white sandy beaches, where our crew had already set up tents and a dining area for our arrival. I fell asleep to the sounds of the river crashing against the rocks and the clanging bells of goats scaling the forested mountains above.

The Trisuli carried us towards the erstwhile hippie outpost of Pokhara, where we lazed out on the town's lake aboard wooden skiffs and geared up for our five-day hike, which was going to be the most challenging leg of the tour.
Early the next morning we boarded a rickety tin bus and headed towards the thickly forested ridges of the Annapurna range.

North of the Modi Khola River, terraced fields quickly became a steep, dense jungle of orchids and rhododendrons.
The five-hour slog was strenuous but every step was worth the pay-off: up to the wooded col of Tara Top, with its views straight out to the Annapurna massif, the summit of the monolithic Lamjung Himal and the Himalayan foothills that drop to the Ganges and the plains of India.

At an elevation of 10,000ft, this small knoll's beguiling views are rarely surpassed, even on more formidable treks.
Being the only man travelling with a group of five women wasn't a piece of cake, however. I had to empathise when they complained about spiders and the lack of showers and hairdryers, most notably during a short, monsoon-strength thunderstorm at Tara Top.

Once the sun came out after that rainstorm, however, the peaks of five of the world's 10 tallest mountains unveiled themselves right in front of us.

There they were, impossibly high, stark against a clear blue sky and cradled by puffy, toothpastewhite pillows of clouds. Trek in the humbling shadow of a great mountain with your worst enemy, it's said, and chances are you'll end up friends.

The heft of our support team took some getting used to. It included nine porters, one chef, four kitchen staff and three guides: nearly three Nepalis for every tour participant. Though the porters were saddled with hulking wicker baskets containing all our gear, I rarely saw them without a smile.

Every day at 6.30am sharp, a cup of hot coffee and a bowl of warm water would magically appear at the door of my tent on a silvery platter.

There are people who claim that Nepal is still a developing country but this is what I call civilised.

AFTER Tara Top, we skirted the river's west bank down to a ridge above the village of Siklis, one of the largest settlements of the ethnic Gurung people and famous for producing hundreds of fearless Gurkha soldiers who have served Britain so well.

The afternoon of our arrival at Siklis, our last day trekking, we played an impromptu game of football on an open paddock, the majestic Himalayas watching over us as the sun slowly set. It was the guides and porters versus the tourists and some Gurkha boys from town.

Let's just say that the tourists won - in every possible way.

GETTING THERE:
Intrepid Travel (0203 147 7777/www.intrepidtravel.com/nxa) offers a 14-night Nepal Adventure from £1,300pp (two sharing), half board. Includes trek of Kathmandu Valley, Pokhara, and Siklis and return flights from Heathrow to Kathmandu with Qatar Airways.

Tiger Mountain Pokhara Lodge (www.tigermountain.com) offers bungalows from £168pp per night (two sharing), full board. Nepal Tourism Board: 020 8900 9485/www.welcomenepal.com