When it comes to negotiating extreme roads of the Greater Himalayas, Bengaluru’s Nidhi Tiwari, founder of Women Beyond Boundaries (WBB), has yet again made it to the mountain range. Nidhi recently led a crew of five women drivers on a daunting expedition to Upper Mustang in northern Nepal. They drove for 13 days from Delhi to Lo Manthang and back, covering 3,000 km.
“We have now become the first crew of women drivers to reach Lo Manthang, the erstwhile capital of the kingdom of Lo,” said Nidhi.
Desolate and rarely accessed, the road to Lo Manthang is considered to be among the top three extreme terrain roads in the Himalayan belt. The 36-year-old mother of two, an outdoor educator and adventure lover, was born in Dharwad and raised in Bengaluru. “I heard the northern Nepal terrain was challenging. That’s how we had the temerity to choose something that poses a challenge to all of us. If you have a nose to drive, love to be part of driving expeditions and a strong mind to take up challenges, this is what you should do,” she added.
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With an average elevation of over 12,000 feet, the area hosts two of the higher peaks in the Greater Himalayas that stand above 8,000 metres – the Dhaulagiri and Annapurna.
“We drove from Delhi and entered Nepal via Gorakhpur, and reached Pokhara in two days. From there started the off-road section into the Mustang valley. The section from Muktinath to Lo Manthang is ambitious, located just 50 km short of the Chinese border, and offers some breathtaking views,” she said.
The other participants on this drive were Bengaluru-based Rashmi Gururaja Koppar, an academician; Suneeti Sudame, an IT professional from Pune; physiotherapist Soumya Goyal and e-commerce professional Deepa Krishnan, both from Bengaluru.
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“The learning curve was simply incredible, as Mustang is famous, or rather infamous, for its non-existent and challenging roads, punctuated by numerous streams,” adds Nidhi.