Famous Festivals In Nepal

Nepal has dozens of colourful festivals throughout the year so there`s a good chance your trek will coincide with one of them. Festivals can complicate treks, however, as government offices close and porters disappear back home. Popular mountain festivals like Tiji in Mustang or Tengboche monastery`s Mani Rimdu festivals are very popular with groups, so you can expect local lodges and campsites to be overflowing during these times. Festivals are scheduled in accordance with the Nepali and Tibetan lunar calendar. So they can vary over a period of almost a month with respect to the Gregorian( Western) calendar. 

The most popular festivals along Nepal`s trekking trails include the following. 

• Gyaolpo Losar (February) Two weeks of merrymakers in the Tibetan New Year in Tibetan communities from Dolpo to the Khumbu. Tamangs celebrate their Losar(Sonam Losar) a month earlier. While Magar, Loba, and Gurung communities celebrate Tamu Losar a further month or so before that. 
• Saga Dawa (Nay-June) Celebrates the full moon of Buddha`s birth, enlightenment, and death and is held in Tibetan areas, as well as in Lumbini, the birthplace of Buddha. Tibetan Buddhist monasteries hold special prayers and processions. Outside of Tibetan areas, it's known as Buddha Jayanti. 
• Mani Rimdu (May-June) The most famous Sherpa festival. Mani Rimdu is celebrated for three days at the monasteries of Tengboche, Thame, and Chiwang (Phaplu). On the second day of the festivals, monks perform masks and costumes and perform ritualistic Chaam dances that symbolize the triumph of Buddhism over the ancient animistic religion of the mountains. Sherpas from all over the Khumbu flock to attend the Spectacle. At Tengboche, the celebrations start on the full moon of the ninth lunar month, which normally falls in October or November. As large crowds of Westerners attend the ceremony, both hotel and tent space is hard to come by and the monastery charges for tickets. Similar festivals are held at Chiwang(near Phaplu) in the 10th Tibetan month, typically in the full moon of the fourth Tibetan month which normally falls in May. 
• Tiji Festival (May) Three-day festival in Mustang celebrating the victory over drought and a demon, with monk dances, an exorcism ceremony, and the unfurling of a giant thangka (Tibetan religious painting).
• Janai Purnima (July-August) Upto 20000 pilgrims flock to sacred Gosaikunda lake in the Langtang region during the full moon festival of the sacred thread. Devotees also head to Dudh Kunda in the Solu Region and Gokyo in the Khumbu. Elsewhere in the hills, locals descend upon Shiva temples with a Jhakri (medicine man) leading throngs. 
• Dasain (October-November) This 10-day festival is Nepal`s biggest and much of the country comes to a stop. All creeds and castes participate as a cult to start a trek during Dasain because all of the buses and planes are jammed, and porters are impossible to find in the countryside. On your trek, you will see the bamboo swings and simple Ferris wheels that are erected in every village. 
• Tihar (Diwali: October- November) The festival of lights is the second most important festival in Nepal. Hindus pay homage to Laxmi(The goddess of wealth). Houses are given new coats of paint, hundreds of oil lamps and candles are lit, firecrackers are recklessly tossed into the streets and most houses are packed with men gambling the night away.