After being on two flights covering a distance of more than 3,000km, we finally arrived at the first ‘pit-stop’ of our 5-day trip to Nepal — the beautiful city of Pokhara.

If you have missed out on my earlier stories of this wonderful #NepalAkuDatang trip, click here to recap.

We had only 12 hours to spend in Pokhara before the start of our 3-day Ghandruk trekking adventure. A short 12 hours to recover from the tiring flights and jet lag and settle down to change of weather from 30 degrees in Malaysia to below 10 degrees celcius in Pokara.

We checked in into our accommodation for the one night stay — the 4-star Mount Kailash Resort (click here to view)

A nice little hotel with two beautiful views, the famous Phewa Lake and the mountains.

The room is basic but most importantly clean and come with all basic necessities such as attached bathroom, adequate power points with international adaptors, towels and toiletries and high-speed WiFi (very important for a blogger like me! 😛 )

Pokhara, especially the lakeside area in my opinion is a tourist resort town. Plenty of tourist-oriented shops, bars, restaurants, money changers and trekking shops. In comparison with Kathmandu, this is a nicer (and clamer + cleaner) place for holiday goers.

Nasi Goring anyone?

Too bad we only had 12 hours so we just went straight to the most famous attraction of Pokhara, the Phewa Lake.

Phewa Lake, Phewa Tal or Fewa Lake is a freshwater lake in Nepal located in the south of the Pokhara Valley. The lake is stream-fed but a dam regulates the water reserve, therefore, the lake is classified as semi-natural freshwater lake. It is the second largest lake in Nepal, the largest in Gandaki Zone followed by Begnas Lake. Phewa lake is located at an altitude of 742 m (2,434 ft) it covers an area of about 5.23 km2 (2.0 sq mi)[3] with an average depth of about 8.6 m (28 ft) with maximum water depth is 24 m (79 ft). The Annapurna range on the north is only about 28 km (linear distance) away from the lake, and the lake is famous for the reflection of mount Machhapuchhre and other mountain peaks of the Annapurna and Dhaulagiri ranges on its surface.

Source: Wikipedia

Beautiful sight. Perfect place to just chill.

It is recommended for those going to Pokhara to rent one of these boats and enjoy the beauty of Phewa Lake at different times of the day.

As the sun sets on our first day in Nepal, we head back to our hotel and stopped at a nearby trekking shop to buy last-minute equipment for our 3-day Ghandruk trek.

The product’s quality may not be as good as original items but at quarter of the original price (after lengthy bargaining), it is good enough to last for a couple of trekking/hiking trips.

It is cheaper to buy things like walking stick, gloves, headlight etc here in comparison to Malaysia. Of course for crucial items like trekking boots, it’s best to buy original and way ahead before a trekking trip.

We were caught off-guard with the rather sudden change of weather after the sun sets. When we went out around 4pm, it was still 15 degrees but as we head back to the hotel, the temperature dropped to around 2 degrees celcius. And we had our one-layer of cloth and flip flops on!

A quick dinner in cold condition! Naan, rice, palak paneer and fish curry. Honey lemon tea.

Live entertainment. A common thing for restaurants at the lakeside area.

After a well-deserved 6 hours sleep, we were all set to start our trekking adventure. A quick visit to the Phewa Lake while waiting for our guide to arrive.

The morning fog gives the lake a completely different kind of awesome scene. It is true that visitors should come check out the lake at different times of the day — from sunrise to sunset!

I’ll definitely come back to Pokhara and Phewa Lake one day to have a nice romantic boat ride with my other half. A good reason to come back.

Pokhara is pretty but we got an adventure ahead of us. It’s time to be up close with the Annapurna mountains.

To be continued in Part 3. Click here to recap on all my #NepalAkuDatang stories, photos and video.