Heaven is a myth, Nepal is real: an adventure by Jake Baggaley

"We rode 1000 km of road, trails and off-road tracks through the north of central Nepal up close to the Tibet border of the Mustang region passing through jungles, high altitude mountain passes and finally a high mountain plateau that is the beautiful untouched mustang region. Using Royal Enfield Himalayan's that we hired out of Kathmandu, we loaded up our kit into the few bags we had and escaped the beautiful chaos of Nepalese city life out into the wilderness of the mountains, riding past elegant stupas covered in prayer flags and elaborate, ornate Hindi temples on the way.

We circled the Annapurna range up to a high point at Muktinath of 3800 m where the engines of the bikes struggled against the altitude and the only way to get petrol was from 1.5l coke bottles in the small shops that lined the track up to the town. We rode all day until the cold of night started to set in, the trails were too rough and with the 500 m drop to the valley or river below the trail in our minds, we aimed to stop each day before nightfall.

Furthermore, we were staying in teahouses used to house trekkers on the Annapurna circuit, but as late November is coming to the end of hiking season as the cold weather sets in up high, we didn't see too many fellow travelers and beside the occasional 4x4 speeding past on the impossibly narrow trails, we felt like we had the mountains to ourselves" Jake Baggaley