![\"katmandu.jpg\"](\"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/02\/katmandu.jpg\")
<\/p>\nFor many people, stepping off a plane into Katmandu is an exhilarating shock – the sights, sounds and smells can quickly lead to sensory overload. Whether it is buzzing around the crazy polluted traffic in a taxi, trundling…<\/p>\n
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For many people, stepping off a plane into Katmandu is an exhilarating shock – the sights, sounds and smells can quickly lead to sensory overload. Whether it is buzzing around the crazy polluted traffic in a taxi, trundling down the narrow winding streets of the old town in a rickshaw, marveling at Durbar Sq or dodging the tiger balm sellers and trekking touts in Thamel, Katmandu can be an intoxicating, amazing and exhausting place.<\/p>\n
As the largest (and pretty much the only) city in the country, Katmandu also feels like another developing-world city rushing into a modern era of concrete and traffic pollution. Take a walk in the backstreets, however, and the capital’s amazing cultural and artistic heritage reveals itself in hidden temples overflowing with marigolds, courtyards full of drying chillis and rice, and tiny hobbit-sized workshops largely unchanged since the Middle Ages.<\/p>\n
Katmandu has been a travelers Mecca since the 1960s but these days you’re less likely to see a tie-dyed hippy in search of enlightenment than a well-heeled Gore-Tex-clad tourist in search of a good espresso. With tourist numbers down and political tensions up, the last few years have been uncertain, yet residents have retained a good-humored self-respect.<\/p>\n
Katmandu is well worth a week of your time, but it’s too easy to spend too much time stuck in touristy Thamel. Enjoy the Internet caf\u00e9s, the Western music and the lemon cheesecake, but make sure you also get out into the ‘real Nepal’, before your time runs out.<\/p>\n
Climate
\nClimate: Nepal’s climate varies with its topography. It ranges from sub-tropical to arctic depending upon the altitude. The Terai region has a hot and humid climate. The mid-land region is pleasant almost all the year round, although winter nights are cool. The northern mountain region, around an altitude above 3,353 m. has an alpine climate with a considerably lower temperature in winter as expected.<\/p>\n
Monsoon: The Monsoon of Nepal has made two clear wet and dry seasons. Wet days of summer are Monsoon days. Most of the rainfalls in Nepal are due to Monsoon in summer. The rest are dry days. Spring and Autumn are in between seasons. In general the monsoon begins from mid June and ends at beginning of September. The months of seasons vary with altitude and slope of the mountain. Northern slopes and higher altitudes are less warm than those of southern slopes and lower altitude. The raining season depends on monsoon activities. Mostly rains at night, making the following days crispy clean and fresh. The length of summer and autumn also depend on the Monsoon. Most of the northern belt of the Trans-Himalayan zone is monsoon-shadowed and ideal for trekking. The climate of Katmandu valley can be taken as a standard.
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\nSummer: (May-August) is hottest season of Nepal. Hot but dry days are more comfortable than those of Monsoon days which are hot and humid.<\/p>\n
Autumn: (September to November) begins with the end of Monsoon and ends with beginning of winter in November. It is also a festival season. You can enjoy lots of green and blue sky. Best season for out door activities like trekking, rafting, and wild life jungle safari.<\/p>\n
Winter: Cold months are November till February. Winter days are also dry days with a few rains. Typical day of Katmandu valley in winter season is as warm as 20 degree Celsius in a sunny days but night temperature falls below freezing. The little rains in winter are due to Mediterranean activities. Hence the winter rainfall in western Nepal has more rain than those of eastern Nepal.<\/p>\n
Spring: (February till April): Spring begins with occasional shower and rains. The days are mild days with the new vegetation. The sky is not as blue as Autumn. It is a little hazy if no shower for a long period.<\/p>\n
The climate of Nepal is best assessed with the climate at 4 distinct places.
\nThese are Katmandu valley, Pokhara valley (West), Chitwan (Terai), and Namche Bazaar (East & High mountain).<\/p>\n
History
\nBefore Nepal’s emergence as a nation in the latter half of the 18th century, the designation ‘Nepal’ was largely applied only to the Katmandu Valley. Thus up until the unification of the country, Nepal’s history is largely the history of the Katmandu Valley. References to Nepal in famous Hindu epics such as the Mahabharata, Puranas and also Buddhist and Jain scriptures, establish the country’s antiquity as an independent political and territorial entity. The Vamshavalis or chronicles, the oldest of which was written during the 14th century, are the only fairly reliable basis for Nepal’s ancient history. The Vamshavalis mention the rule of several dynasties the Gopalas, the Abhiras and the Kiratas — over a stretch of centuries. However, no extant historical evidence has yet authenticated the rule of these legendary dynasties. The documented history of Nepal begins with the Changu Narayan temple inscription of King Manadeva I (C 464-505 A.D.) of the Lichavi dynasty.<\/p>\n
Lichavi Dynasty
\nThe Lichavis are said to have migrated into Nepal from north India in around 250 A.D. The first Lichavi king of historical importance was Manadeva 1. Another important Lichavi monarch was Anshuverma who opened trade routes to Tibet. One of his daughters, Bhrikuti, who was married to Tibetan ruler Tsrong-tsong Gompo, was instrumental in spreading the Gospel of the Buddha in Tibet and China. Anshuverma has been referred to as a man of many talents in the accounts of the Chinese traveler Huen Tsang, who had visited India in the 7th century AD.<\/p>\n
Narendradeval another Lichavi king initiated friendly relations with China and his successors laid the foundations of friendship with India by entering into matrimonial alliances with the Indian royal families. The Lichchhavi rule spanned over a period of about 630 years, the last ruler being Jayakamadeva.<\/p>\n
Malla Dynasty
\nAfter the fall of the Lichchhavis came the Malla period during which the foundation of the city of Kantipur (later Katmandu) was laid. The early Malla rule started with Ari Malla in the 12th century and over the next two centuries grew into a large empire before disintegrating into small principalities which later became known as the Baisi (i.e. the twenty-two principalities). This was more or less coincidental with the emergence of the Chaubisi (i.e. twenty-four principalities). The history of these principalities remains shrouded up until the time when they joined other kingdoms, both large and small, to form the unified Kingdom of Nepal.
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\nJayasthiti Malla, with who commences the later Malla period in the Katmandu Valley, reigned towards the end of the 14th century. Though his rule was rather short, his place among the rulers in the Valley is eminent for the various social and economic reforms such as the ‘Sanskritization’ of the Valley people, new methods of land measurement and allocation etc. Yakshya Malla, the grandson of Jayasthiti Malla, ruled the Katmandu Valley until almost the end of the 15th century. After his demise, the Valley was divided into three independent Valley kingdoms — Katmandu, Bhaktapur and Patan — in about 1484 A.D. This division led the Malla rulers into internecine wars for territorial and commercial gains. Mutually debilitating wars gradually weakened them and by the time of King Prithvi Narayan Shah\u00d5s invasion of the Valley, they had by themselves reached the brink of political extinction. The last rulers were Jaya Prakash Malla, Tej Narsingh Malla and Ranjit Malla of Katmandu, Patan and Bhaktapur respectively.<\/p>\n
Shah Dynasty, Unification of Nepal
\nPrithvi Narayan Shah (c 1769-1775), with whom we move into the modern period of Nepal’s history, was the ninth generation descendant of Dravya Shah (1559-1570), the founder of the ruling house of Gorkha. Prithvi Narayan Shah succeeded his father King Nara Bhupal Shah to the throne of Gorkha in 1743 AD. King Prithvi Narayan Shah was quite aware of the political situation of the Valley kingdoms as well as of the Barsi and Chaubisi principalities. He foresaw the need for unifying the small principalities as an urgent condition for survival in the future and set him self to the task accordingly.<\/p>\n
His assessment of the situation among the hill principalities was correct, and the principalities were subjugated fairly easily. King Prithvi Narayan Shah’s victory march began with the conquest of Nuwakot, which lies between Katmandu and Gorkha, in 1744. After Nuwakot, he occupied strategic points in the hills surrounding the Katmandu Valley. The Valley\u00d5s communications with the outside world were thus cut off. The occupation of the Kuti Pass in about 1756 stopped the Valley\u00d5s trade with Tibet. Finally, King Prithvi Narayan Shah entered the Valley. After the victory of Kirtipur. King Jaya Prakash Malla of Katmandu sought help from the British and so the East India Company sent a contingent of soldiers under Captain Kinloch in 1767. The British force was defeated at Sindhuli by King Prithvi Narayan Shah\u00d5s army. This defeat of the British completely shattered the hopes of King Jaya Prakash Malla. The capture of Katmandu (September 25. 1768) was dramatic. As the people of Katmandu were celebrating the festival of Indrajatra, Prithvi Narayan Shah and his men marched into the city. A throne was put on the palace courtyard for the king of Katmandu. Prithvi Narayan Shah sat on the throne and was hailed by the people as the king of Katmandu. Jaya Prakash Malla managed to escape with his life and took asylum in Patan. When Patan was captured a few weeks later, both Jaya Prakash Malla and the king of Patan, Tej Narsingh Mallal took refuge in Bhaktapur, which was also captured after some time. Thus the Katmandu Valley was conquered by King Prithvi Narayan Shah and Katmandu became the capital of the modern Nepal by 1769.<\/p>\n
King Prithvi Narayan Shah was successful in bringing together diverse religion-ethnic groups under one national. He was a true nationalist in his outlook and was in favor of adopting a closed-door policy with regard to the British. Not only had his social and economic views guided the country’s socio-economic course for a long time, his use of the imagery, ‘a yam between two boulders in Nepal’s geopolitical context formed the principal guideline of the country\u2019s foreign policy for future centuries.<\/p>\n
The War with British – The Nepalese had differences of opinion with the East India Company regarding the ownership of the land strip of the western Terai, particularly Butwal and Seoraj. The outcome of the conflict was a war with the British. The British launched their attack on the Nepali forces at Nalapani, the western most point of Nepal’s frontier at the close of 1814. Though the Nepalese were able to inflict heavy losses to the British army on various fronts, the larger army and the superior weapons of the British proved too strong. The Nepali army evacuated the areas west of the Mahakali river and ultimately the treaty of Sugauli was signed with the British in 1816. Among other things, this treaty took away a large chunk of the Terai from Nepal and the rivers Mahakali and Mechi were fixed as the country’s western and eastern boundaries. At this time, King Girvana Yuddha Biktram Shah was on the throne of Nepal, and the power of state was in the hands of Prime Minister Bhimsen Thapa who wielded enormous power during the rule of King Girvana Yuddha Bikram Shah and his son King Rajendra Bikram Shah.<\/p>\n
Source: http:\/\/www.thamel.com\/htms\/history.htm<\/a> , For many people, stepping off a plane into Katmandu is an exhilarating shock – the sights, sounds and smells can quickly lead to sensory overload. Whether it is buzzing around the crazy polluted traffic in a taxi, trundling…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[44,45],"class_list":["post-2997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plan-your-vacation-to-asia-with-our-traveling-information","tag-katmandu","tag-nepal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2997"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3093,"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2997\/revisions\/3093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.asianinny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nhttp:\/\/www.impala.com.np\/english\/nepal_climate.php <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"