8 nights, 3 stops. This is one of the routes we actually run across Nepal. It is the spine of a trip, not the trip. Tell us how you travel and the plan reshapes it into yours.
Each stop earns its nights. The quiz decides how long you stay in each, and whether a stop drops off entirely because it is not you.
Brick temple squares and tiered pagoda roofs at Kathmandu, Patan and Bhaktapur, the white dome and painted eyes of Boudhanath, cremation fires on the river steps at Pashupatinath.
Sal forest and tall elephant grass along the Narayani and Rapti rivers, rhinos standing in the shallows, gharial crocodiles laid out on the sandbanks.
Phewa Lake at 822 metres with the Annapurna wall and the fishtail spike of Machapuchare behind it, a white pagoda on the south ridge, paragliders off Sarangkot.
From the Nepal file. Real places, filed by people who went, not scraped from a Top 10 list.
A 25 to 30 minute tandem flight off the Sarangkot ridge over Phewa Lake, with the Annapurnas on one side and the town below. Transport to launch is normally included.
An hour of Himalayan flying out of Kathmandu at first light, with a guaranteed window seat and the eastern range passing at eye level.
The great white stupa with its painted eyes, walked clockwise with the evening crowd as the butter lamps go on around the base.
The best preserved of the three royal squares, rebuilt after the 2015 earthquake, and the town around it is still a working brick and pottery city rather than a museum.
The Kathmandu Valley's own cooking, built on buffalo, rice flour, black lentils and fermented vegetables. A spread of small plates rather than one dish.
King curd. Thick sweetened buffalo-milk yoghurt set in a clay pot, the thing Bhaktapur is known for outside its temples.
Five short questions, about three minutes. The plan starts from this route and a library of Nepal trips we have tested, then reshapes the nights, the food and the days to your pace and budget.
No sponsored stops, no filler days. If a place stays on your plan, it earned the spot.