Champadevi day hike is a perfect trekking trip that you can make refreshed yourself in short span of Nepal Holiday. 

From wilderness to freshness and to the haphazard city, you can experience a lot in a less time and less distance of Champadevi hiking route. Champadevi hiking trail, located in the southwest of Kirtipur, an ancient city of Kathmandu Nepal, is a pure nature walk. Situated at the altitude of 2278 m, Champadevi hill is the third highest hill around Kathmandu valley. This hill is famous not only for hiking but also for one of most popular pilgrimage sites in the Hindu and Buddhist religions called Champadevi Mai (temple of Champadevi Goddess). 

Hike to Champadevi temple is hike to skip the crowd of Kathmandu and get in the nature, in short time. After driving for an hour from city center of Kathmandu takes you to the starting point of dense forest of Pine.

With that being said, best tome to hike to Champadevi is either in the spring or in autumn. Autumn is September to November and spring is March to May.

Although this day hiking activity is famous for all around the year, Monsoon season is not recommended for Champadevi hiking trail.

Why not monsoon? Because, the trail of Champadevi hiking route is inside the forest, the trail is wild and densely covered with bushes. This kind of trekking trail might not be enjoying if it rains. In the monsoon season, trail of Champadevi hiking route will not be easy to walk. The downhill walk from the top of the hiking destination might be slippery.

This hike is filled with diverse vegetation and various species of birds, hike to Champadevi is also famous destination for bird watching in Nepal. The chirps of birds and their graceful sightings will be a good memory of hiking in Nepal. The calmness of nature makes your heart feel overwhelmed and freshens your spirit. The trail towards the north ridge through pine forested area provides fresh smell of roots and leaves. The higher you go the better the view of the different valley and village shows below you. Such beautiful panoramic views of hills, White Mountains, valley and forest you could feast your eyes on. 

The route for hike to champadevi is one of the best destinations near Kathmandu valley including the view of Kathmandu, Lalitpur and Bhaktapur districts and the beautiful mountains such as Mt Everest, Ganesh Himal, Annapurna, Langtang mt Manaslu etc. If you have very short time to spend in Nepal visit or want to take break from busy life of Kathmandu while visiting Nepal, or wish to hide from the disturbance of vehicles and pollution, hike to Champadevi can be the best destination. 

The cost illustrated is the one day hiking cost. However, Champadevi hike can also be done as one night stay hiking destination. Either stay inside the jungle in a basic accommodation (near by the village) or stay at a luxury at star hotel at the hilltop of Chandragiri. From Chandragiri hill, you can witness the surreal view of the panoramic mountain in 270 degree. With saying that, the cost of Champadevi hiking will be duration dependent.

In general, the cost of day hike package to Champadevi hike includes guide, transportation and the entrance fee. But the all the package of Nepalgram can be customized and accordingly the cost of Champadevi hike will fluctuate.

There are two routes to go to the summit of Champadevi hill hike. Route of Champadevi hike for you can either go from the Pharping or you can climb direct from the MachheGaon. Both of these hike start point of Champadevi hike are from the village towards the wilderness of nature and beautiful view points.

After about 2 hours of walking, you will reach to the hilltop of Champadevi hiking trail at Champadevi temple. At the top of the Champadevi hill, there is temple where you can offer your prayers. From the top, you can see another famous hiking destination near Kathmandu Nepal “the Chandragiri hill” on one side and “the Kathmandu valley” on the other side. You can enjoy the breathtaking view of central and western Himalayan range at the same time.

Champadevi is a hill hike, so it is better to avoid hiking Champadevi hike in the monsoon season. June is a peak month of monsoon. That is why, June is not recommended to hike to Champadevi. But weather in hills, changes dramatically and monsoon does not mean it will rain every day; thus people hike in June (or in monsoon) as well.

In December the weather will be good with blue sky. The amount of precipitation will be less and the White Mountains will be bright and clear because of winter. In the winter, alike to rest of the world Nepal observes snow fall in its mountain. Thus from Champadevi hill hike, you will be able to see the mountain tops with full of snow, in distance. However, the winter hiking will be cold. Windy day or day without sunlight might go around 5 degrees Celsius.

December is recommended over June, indeed.

Both months are good for Champadevi hike. April is a peak month of spring, where October is a peak month of autumn. Both autumn and spring are famous for traveling to Nepal. Comparatively, spring is drier than autumn, in Nepal.

October is preferred over April for Champadevi hike. However, both these month are best for travel/hike.

The Champadevi hiking trail is pretty easy. Hiking trail is well-managed with stone steps. The pine forest along the trail gives good vibe while walking near the chaotic city of Kathmandu. To stay for a while at the top and relax before you soak yourself into the heavenly nature, do not forget to take water and snacks with you. For your kind information here is no place to buy anything up there.

If you want short cut to Champadevi hike route, you can ascend through Machhegaon village. From there you can reach to the top of Champadevi hill within 3 hours hike. This route is not well developed, and has really narrow trail, so it might be very difficult to ascend. Especially in summer and rainy season this route is not recommended at all.

Nepalgram adventure provides an experienced local guide for one-day hike to Champadevi. Except from Champadevi hike we organize trekking in any part of Nepal trek destination. With Nepalgram best price is guaranteed for extra added values. Our packages on high demand are Everest Base camp Trekking in Everest Region, Manaslu Circuit Trekking in Manaslu Region, Annapurna Circuit Trek in Annapurna Region and Langtang valley trek in Langtang Region.

Day hiking to Champadevi is more or less 8 hours of hiking. Uphill at the beginning and straight downhill on the other side of Champadevi hiking route will surely demand a dedicated mind for a day hike. Saying that, there are pro and cons of group join hike versus solo hike to Champadevi hill.

Firstly, benefit of hiking in group; this will allow a chance to know more people. If you love talking with people, hiking and talking with stranger (other than your guide) will be amazing during the downhill of Champadevi hike. Regarding private hiking package, you will have your own peace with the nature. Your presence in the natural silence might help you to relax your introverted mind. Chirping of bird and sounds of leaves and chilling air with view of the wider mountain range and deep river valley will certainly be your private beauty. As a private trip member, our guide will modify the route as per your interest or customization of trip en route is always okay.

Secondly, as a member of group hiker; you need to follow the mentality of group and you might not get your private time with nature, unless you leave the group far behind or you stay behind the group – both are not recommended. As a solo hiker you might not entertain your extroverted mind in tedious long uphill and lengthy downhill of Champadevi hike.

Champadevi hike trail is famous for nature with wilderness near the crowded city of Kathmandu. At the same time, Nagarkot Changu Narayan is a famous hiking destination near Kathmandu with sunrise or sunset being its ornament.

These two nature hike of Kathmandu are both beautiful, but distinctly – Champadevi hike is harder than Nagarkot to Changunarayan hill hiking.

1.   Anthropological aspect

In Champadevi hill hiking route, we will pass by pharping village and most of the hike will be more along the jungle and less through the village. Just the end of the hiking route of Champadevi has village walk, at Machhegaon.

In contrast, Changunarayan to Nagarkot hike is all along the villages. Few pine jungle and bush walking are similar to Champadevi hill hiking. The trail of Changunarayan hill hiking is not wilder like Champadevi hill.

2.   Natural scenery

Both of them are beautiful with mountain, hill, village and jungle walk. Wide range of the mountain while hiking will certainly look awesome from either Changu hill hike or Champadevi hiking.

But the wilderness of Champadevi hill worth dense jungle en route has many birds and there are chances of sighting many birds and few animals. Whereas in Nagarkot to Changunarayan hill hiking; hiker will hear the chirping of birds but lesser than in the jungle of Champadevi hill hiking.

Pharping village is 16 km south from Kathmandu city, which takes about an hour drive to reach there. The road that leaves for Pharping makes you feel you’re already going for something interesting, refreshing and away from the hectic city life of Kathmandu. We will pass by Dakshinkali temple which is one of the holiest temples devoted to Hindu goddess kali. Daskshinkali temple is located on the way to Pharping and this temple is unique from other temple in Nepal, it is because of its location by the side of river and near cremation place of Hindu. If you want to visit Dakshinkali temple go before you climb to Champadevi hill. Pharping itself is one typical village of Newar ethnic people of Nepal, so you can see and experience Newari people’s way of life and culture. There are many Buddhist monasteries in Pharping area. This village of Pharping is famous for Buddhism because of its history from 17th century. Guru Padmasambhav meditated in this village. The place where Padmasambhab meditated is still allowed to visit for locals, cave where he meditated is called ASUR cave. This cave and the surrounding many monasteries have history and story by then. You can also visit that monastery before climbing the Champadevi hill. Champadevi Hiking starts near the hattiban resort in Pharping.

• The Champadevi Trail

As you move towards the Champadevi hill from Pharping you will pass through a small village with views of beautiful monasteries and the Buddhist vibe just below the foothills of hills is astonishing. Higher up, the forest gets dense with pine trees and the hiking trail moves deeper into wilderness of nature. The Champadevi hiking trial clears up with beautiful stony trail and with wide range of mountains like Mt Everest, mt Ganesh Himal, mt Mt Annapurna, Mt Langtang, Mt Jugal, Mt Gaurishanker etc. all around shines up. Just below the Himalayan range, you can see the Kathmandu valley touching the horizon.

• Relax at Taudaha after Champadevi Hike

Take photos, relax, and enjoy the fresh air before you return to Kathmandu valley from your Champadevi hike. The hike up to the top takes about 3 to 4 hours, in general. You can return back much quicker than that. While returning, we will take the path that comes down to join Taudaha. Taudaha is considered one of the freshest lakes (among many lakes in Nepal and thousands of lakes in Nepal) near Kathmandu valley, and it has a story of history that Kathmandu became human settlement from pond valley, after letting out water from this place. It has many mythological stories about its origin. Local guide from Nepalgram will describe you about all the myths and interesting stories. Taudaha is such a beautiful place to relax after a hike and grab chilled beer or cold and fresh water with different species of fishes found there, local food in the local place.

For details, do not hesitate to contact us directly in Nepal, remember all the package of Nepalgram are customize-able.