Adventure tourism sees growth

Kathmandu, January 4

In recent years, domestic tourism has been flourishing in the country. As per Nepal Tourism Board, each year around five million domestic tourists are travelling within the country for holidays.

Amidst this growing movement of domestic travellers, adventure tourism has been attracting more number of domestic tourists than foreigners in recent days, said Bhupesh Shrestha, CEO of World Wide Adventure, who is currently operating zip-line service in Dhulikhel.

The zip-line at Dhulikhel of Kavre district is 1,100 metres long and extends from Dhulikhel Municipality - 8, Thakle to Panchkhal Municipality - 5, Khawa in Kavrepalanchowk district. The vertical drop of this zip-line service is about 100 metres.

The launch pad of zip-line in Thakle is located at a height of 1,300 metres above sea level and the landing station is at a height of 1,200 metres above sea level. On average it takes one minute and 20 seconds to complete the zip-line ride, depending on rider’s weight and the wind speed at the moment.

The zip-line at Dhulikhel offers three choices of rides — Classic, Superman and Tandem.

With an aim to provide something more thrilling to tourists in the domestic market, World Wide Adventure started Dhulikhel Zip-line from February last year. Since then, the number of domestic tourists visiting the business has been steadily rising.

“Our assumption is that only foreigners love adventure activities, however, looking at the number of domestic travellers that we have been receiving, we can say that Nepalis too are in love with adventure sports,” said Shrestha.

“Although our target was to attract foreign tourists, the number of local tourists is higher.”

According to him, generally 25 to 30 people come for zip-line ride every day and among them there are hardly two or three foreigners. On weekends, though, the number of visitors is higher, Shrestha added. Currently, more than 20 people are directly employed in the zip-line service.

Meanwhile, the company has also set up a mini zip-line and rope course for kids. As the Visit Nepal 2020 campaign has begun, the company has started providing different offers each week for both foreign and domestic tourists. The zip-line service was started with an investment of Rs 50 million.