Motorbike Tours

What the roads are actually like

This is the part tour listings skip. Nepal's road network outside the highways is not sealed road with potholes — much of it is unsealed mountain track: loose gravel, embedded rock, river crossings, and long exposed sections with a drop on one side and no barrier.

The Jomsom to Muktinath road, on the classic Mustang route, includes stretches that are effectively a dry riverbed. It is ridden daily by locals on 150cc bikes, so it is entirely possible — but if your riding experience is road-only, this is off-road riding and you should know that before you commit.

We will ask what you have ridden and where. It is not a formality.

The routes worth riding

Kathmandu – Pokhara – Jomsom – Muktinath. The standard tour, roughly a week. Tarmac to Pokhara and Beni, then the Kali Gandaki gorge on deteriorating surface into the rain shadow. The landscape change is the reason to ride it: subtropical to high desert in two days.

Upper Mustang to Lo Manthang. Beyond Kagbeni, restricted permit required. The best riding in Nepal — dry, dramatic canyon country, almost no traffic — and the one route where the motorbike genuinely beats walking, because the distances between villages are long and dull on foot.

Manang, up the Marsyangdi. Rideable to around Manang village. High, cold and increasingly rough the further you go.

The mid-hills. Underrated. Bandipur, Tansen, Ilam in the east tea country — small roads through villages, no altitude, and almost no foreign riders.

Bikes

Royal Enfield Himalayan is the default and the right choice for most people: built for exactly this, reasonable ground clearance, and every mechanic in the country knows it.

Enfield Classic 350 looks the part and is heavier and less suited to the rough sections, but is fine if you are staying on the main routes.

Smaller Japanese and Indian trail bikes are available and are genuinely easier on the technical ground. Do not choose a bike on looks; choose it on whether you can pick it up alone.

Licence and permits

You need a valid motorcycle licence from your own country and an International Driving Permit endorsed for motorcycles — obtained at home before you travel, as it cannot be issued in Nepal. Police checks do happen and riding without one voids any insurance you think you have.

Restricted areas including Upper Mustang need the same permits as trekkers, arranged through an agency, with a guide.

Season

October to May for most routes. Upper Mustang rides through the monsoon, being in rain shadow, which makes it the summer option when everything else is mud. Winter closes the highest sections with snow.

Avoid riding at night anywhere in Nepal. Unlit vehicles, livestock on the road and unmarked roadworks make it disproportionately dangerous.