Dhampus Pass

Dhampus pass is a long, technical & hard trekking pass beneath Mount Dhaulagiri and this is a camping trek and we need to bring everything with us, this trekking is loved by mountaineers as the best trekking of Nepal. Dhaulagiri ventures into a wild and remote area of Nepal Himalaya whereas Dhampus pass takes across Dhaulagiri all the way to Annapurna range and takes us out to Marpha village – Marpha is one of the trekking destinations of Annapurna circuit trek or Upper Mustang trekking trail. It also crosses some high passes with no easy escape route from them such as; FRENCH PASS AT 5,380M, DHAMPUS PASS 5,380M.

Variation, Famous & Selected treks in Dhampus Pass are – DBC Trek/ Dhampus Peak Trek

Behind the adventure there are many hardships but the beauty of this high pass trekking is never second. The Dhaulagiri trail is not very touristy, towering mountains in front of us in a shape of a perfect pyramid, multi-layered a few hundred meters high waterfalls along the way, tall waterfalls falling form icy block is very near (although invisible, the amount of water falling from them will make believe that they were quite huge), steeply climbing trail with hugging a vertical cliff and which dropped all the way down to the river below with a shaky walkway built from bamboo rods and branches adds thrilling joy while trekking. Even the large yellow boulders shaped by the force of the runoff of river are stunning.

But the steep and loose moraine to the glacier in small but steep drop offs to the river flowing under it needs gentle precautions. Before getting to the base camp of Dhaulagiri lots of adventure such as; the glacier flowing from the West side of Dhaulagiri, crossing a river that originated from under the ice before reaching the reach the Japanese base camp (Japanese basecamp is on the glacier itself at an altitude of 4,150 m), arrow exposed trail that provided the entrance to the valley leading to the Dhaulagiri basecamp proper is tricky and beautiful.

In this adventure over the Dhampus across Dhaulagiri we have to stay many nights in tented camp in many basecamps such as; JAPANESE BASECAMP 4150 M, DHAULAGIRI BASECAMP 4,600M, HIDDEN VALLEY CAMP 5,050M, Italian BC 4300M and Italian BC at an elevation of 3600M – most of these camps are where we will spent one night at least and are on the moraine.

The view of Eiger Wall of Dhaulagiri – a 5,900 m vertical wall of granite that rises straight up from the glacier, main bulk of Dhaulagiri which raises to the heaves above in a series of icefalls and ice fields and to the left of the Eiger Wall lies the main Dhaulagiri icefall which makes its way in form of broken ice towers to the main glacier below; all are wild and stunning landscape in Dhampus pass or Dhaulagiri base camp trekking.

Some of the major mountains we can see in the trekking over Dhampus pass are; Mt. Jirbang 6,062m at the beginning, Dhaulagiri II over 7,000 M, Mt Dhaulagiri itslef at 8167M and most of the mountain from its infinite range, Mt Annapurna at 8091 M and the most of the Annapurna Himalaya range, Mountain range from the Tilicho peak and surrounding from nearby Mesokanta pass.

Dhampus peak lies right before the Dhampus pass which stands at 6000 meters and is most climbed peak of the region.

After crossing Dhampus pass we will get on Annapurna side of the Himalaya with view of magnificent Annapurna Group with the Nilgiri Peaks and the Annapurna from the Dhampus pass itself. But right after crossing the pass from a viewpoint at 4,000m near the campsite of Yak Kharka has a great panorama extending from Tibet in the north to the Annapurna massif in the south, view of entire Mustang region, Thorong La, Mesokanta La, Tilicho Peak, Jomsom, and the peaks of Annapurna and also the scenery of small planes coming to land in Jomsom air strip.

After descent from Yakkharka to Marfa with 1,000 m steep downhill Dhampus pass concludes back to the easy trails which we have started at 800m, like a month ago.