Up in the sky
- 30 Dec 2024
With Nepal’s snowy Himalayan peaks as a backdrop, the sky above Pokhara transformed into a vibrant canvas of colours for the country’s International Hot-air Balloon Festival.
Hot-air balloons from more than 10 countries participated in the festival.
Tourism is a major earner for Nepal, which saw over a million foreign visitors this year after a post-pandemic bounceback, and investments are being made in hotels and airports to cater to travellers.
“We felt that we must bring a balloon festival like this to Nepal,” Sabin Maharjan, an organiser of the event, told the media.
“A ride here can be very exciting as you can see mountains, hills and lakes,” Maharjan added.
“All passengers tell us that they are very happy -- such a festival will boost our tourism.”
The balloons created a mesmerizing display against a stunning sight of the snow-capped Annapurna range.
“It is spectacular,” American balloon pilot Derek Hamcock, 67, said.
“As soon as you go above the small range here you see all the Himalayas. Unbelievable, every time you see them it is unbelievable.”
Balloons shaped as a rat and a frog from were among those joining in the fun, slowly drifting with the breeze.
“You never know where you are going,” said Diego Criado del Rey, 29, a balloon pilot from Spain.
“So it is pretty much you and the nature -- not fighting, but being together. You go where the nature tells you.”
Nepal’s Civil Aviation Authority issued a notice for the skies over Pokhara for a duration of nine days to allow balloon flights.
Although more than two centuries have passed since France’s Montgolfier brothers made the first manned flight, ballooning can still capture the imagination.
Tourism is one of the largest and fastest-growing industries in Nepal, employing more than a million people and contributing 7.9% of the total GDP.
Premier destinations include Pokhara, the Annapurna trekking circuit and the four UNESCO world heritage sites—Lumbini, Sagarmatha National Park (home to Mount Everest), seven sites in the Kathmandu Valley collectively listed as one, and Chitwan National Park.
Nepal is a landlocked country in South Asia. It is mainly situated in the Himalayas, but also includes parts of the Indo-Gangetic Plain. It borders the Tibet Autonomous Region of China to the north, and India to the south, east, and west, while it is narrowly separated from Bangladesh by the Siliguri Corridor, and from Bhutan by the Indian state of Sikkim.
Nepal has a diverse geography, including fertile plains, subalpine forested hills, and eight of the world’s ten tallest mountains, including Mount Everest, the highest point on Earth.
Kathmandu is the nation’s capital and the largest city. Nepal is a multi-ethnic, multi-lingual, multi-religious, and multi-cultural state, with Nepali as the official language.
The name “Nepal” is first recorded in texts from the Vedic period of the Indian subcontinent, the era in ancient Nepal when Hinduism was founded, the predominant religion of the country.
In the middle of the first millennium BC, Gautama Buddha, the founder of Buddhism, was born in Lumbini in southern Nepal. Parts of northern Nepal were intertwined with the culture of Tibet.
The centrally located Kathmandu Valley is intertwined with the culture of Indo-Aryans, and was the seat of the prosperous Newar confederacy known as Nepal Mandala. The Himalayan branch of the ancient Silk Road was dominated by the valley’s traders. The cosmopolitan region developed distinct traditional art and architecture.
By the 18th century, the Gorkha Kingdom achieved the unification of Nepal. The Shah dynasty established the Kingdom of Nepal and later formed an alliance with the British Empire, under its Rana dynasty of premiers. The country was never colonised but served as a buffer state between Imperial China and British India.
Parliamentary democracy was introduced in 1951 but was twice suspended by Nepalese monarchs, in 1960 and 2005. The Nepalese Civil War in the 1990s and early 2000s resulted in the establishment of a secular republic in 2008, ending the world’s last Hindu monarchy.
The number of international visitors crossed one million in 2018 for the first time (not counting Indian tourists arriving by land).
Nepal’s share of visitors to South Asia is about 6%, and they spend much less on average, with Nepal sharing 1.7% of the earnings.
Most of Nepal’s mountaineering earning comes from Mount Everest, which is more accessible from the Nepalese side.
Agencies