Japan, Japan, Kyrgyzstan, Taiwan, Vietnam and Sapa, Malaysia.
Dochula Pass is a road pass at roughly 3,100 metres on the route linking Thimphu and Punakha in western Bhutan. It is worth a stop for two reasons: a ridge crowned with 108 memorial chortens, and, when the cloud lifts, a long line of snow-covered Himalayan peaks to the northeast. This guide explains what you … Read more
Mount Kinabalu rises out of the rainforest of Sabah, in the Malaysian part of Borneo, to 4,095 m. It is the highest mountain in Malaysia and one of the highest in Southeast Asia, and it does something few mountains of its size do: it can be climbed in two days, on a maintained trail, from … Read more
Sapa sits at about 1,500 m in the far north of Vietnam, a former French hill station in the province of Lao Cai, a few dozen kilometres from the Chinese border. Above it rises the Hoang Lien Son range, and above everything else rises Fansipan, at 3,143 m the highest mountain in Vietnam and in … Read more
Taiwan is not the first place most trekkers think of when they picture East Asia’s mountains, yet the island has more than 250 peaks over 3,000 m, packed into a landmass smaller than Switzerland. The highest of them is Yushan, “Jade Mountain”, at 3,952 m. It is the highest summit in Taiwan, higher than Mount … Read more
The Kumano Kodo is not one trail but a web of pilgrimage routes that has threaded the forested Kii Peninsula, south of Osaka and Nara, for more than a thousand years. Of these routes, the Nakahechi is the one most walkers choose. It is the “imperial route”, followed by retired emperors and their courts from … Read more
Kamikochi is a valley at 1,500 m in the Hida range, the northern of the three ranges that together are called the Japan Alps. The Azusa River runs through it, so clear that trout are visible from the bank, and the peaks above it rise steeply to more than 3,000 m. Private cars have been … Read more
Kyrgyzstan is a country of mountains. More than 90 percent of its territory lies above 1,500 m, and the Tian Shan, the “celestial mountains”, run through it from the Chinese border in the east to the Fergana Valley in the west. For trekkers, the range that has drawn the most attention is the Terskey Ala-Too, … Read more
