Before planning your travel, you should consult with your government regarding any current travel alerts relating to the areas you are planning to travel in. On arrival you should register with your embassy or register on the relevant travel alert website depending on your country of origin. Most countries governments operate very good travel information and alert websites. You should consult and register with these prior to your departure. Regarding Nepal, the political situation is presently regarded as safe and stable and a lot of governments are removing travel alerts for Nepal from their lists.
Trekking Companies
When traveling 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.
To ensure that you don’t use one of these bad operators when booking your trip here are a few things you should check up on:
- 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.
