Snow Leopard Trek Pvt. Ltd. is a fully established company in operation since 1985 and registered in September 1987 with the Department of Tourism/Dept. of Industry and Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation of the Government of Nepal as a travel / adventure tour company based in Kathmandu, Nepal. Snow Leopard provides trekking, mountaineering, religious and cultural trips, sporting activities, special interest programs, incentive and city tours in the various Himalayan regions of Nepal, Indian, Bhutan and Tibet. We strictly adhere to the principles of eco-trekking. Thus, this company has been the only agency in Nepal to receive the coveted "Abraham Conservation Award." - given to a tourism agency in Nepal (on 5TH June 2000) by World Wildlife fund (WWF).
Snow Leopard Trek is manned by a team of 25 full time professional Sherpa mountaineers, guides, cooks and other field and administrative staff who receive regular training in courses related to mountain tourism services such as selection of tourism destinations, trekking routes, management of outdoor camps and eco-trekking related subjects such as high altitude sickness and its treatment and simple first aid. The trekking cooks are trained to prepare a wide variety of Nepali, Chinese and Continental menus suitable for trekkers at high altitudes. Emphasis is given in preparing meals with special attention to health, hygiene and sanitation during cooking. All vegetables, fruits and utensils are treated before preparation and consumption.
Today Snow Leopard Trek Pvt. Ltd. is well known in Nepal and overseas for its reputation in providing high standard adventure tour services with great reliability and professionalism catering complete services of camping accommodation and all meals during trekking along with services of trekking guides, Sherpa, cooks & kitchen staff and porters.
Snow Leopard is well experienced and equipped in handling package holiday products and services such as airport transfers, hotel reservations, cultural tours, river rafting, jungle safari, paragliding, bungee jumping, ultra light flight, Canyoning, and trekking and climbing to the different exotic Himalayan regions of Nepal. Today this company is proud to be known as one of the oldest agencies that have specialized in handling special interest programmers such as Shamanism, ritual and spiritual programmers in Nepal besides its other regular outdoor adventure holidays in India, Bhutan and Tibet.
Snow Leopard Trek is run by a family of Sherpa who have been engaged with the mountaineering and trekking trade for almost two decades. Owner and Managing Director, Yankila Sherpa has a high repute in the trekking industry. Mrs. Yankila Sherpa has been associated with the Trekking Agents Association of Nepal (TAAN) – the only national body of trekking agencies in Nepal with 350 tourism entrepreneurs as its members. She was the 1st Vice President of TAAN for two terms (1992-1996). She was then elected unopposed as the President of this Association with 99% male tourism entrepreneurs as its members. At present she is an advisor of the TAAN executive body.
In recognition of her work in tourism and women empowerment, she was nominated by the Government of Nepal as a member of the Upper House of the Parliament of Nepal, a position she served from July of 2001till April 2006. Further, in recognition to her contribution towards the development of tourism in Nepal, Yankila Sherpa was appointed the State Minister of Tourism and served as a Cabinet Minister of the Government of Nepal in 2005/2006.
Besides her above contributions, Yankila is also past President of the Federation of Women Entrepreneurs Association of Nepal (FWEAN), a non profit, non government organization comprising of women entrepreneurs who share a common vision of helping other less privileged women to become entrepreneurs by providing skill training, micro credit and also helping with marketing. Helping the poor and illiterate women of the remote mountain regions of Nepal to become financially independent gives Yankila a great sense of satisfaction as she is not only a successful tourism entrepreneur but is also involved in helping other poor women of the remote villages of Nepal.
Yankila is the current Vice President of Trans Himalayan Environment and Livelihood Programs (T-HELP). This organization provides advocacy and generates awareness on environmentally friendly and sustainable tourism practices. The organization also undertakes capacity building of women and the poor indigenous mountain communities of the Himalayan region and promotes sustainable and environmentally friendly agricultural practices. At Present, Yankila is also advisor to the Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA). As part of its Corporate Social Responsibility, Snow Leopard Trek uses part of its proceeds to periodically sponsor the education of marginalized children from mountain communities at the Alpine Valley School in Kathmandu, Nepal.
Snow Leopard saw its greatest successes during 1992-1999 specializing services for School Children’s trips for Lincoln School the biggest International school which used Snow Leopard for almost all its school children outdoor trekking trips, We also work with a lot of the western expatriate communities living in Kathmandu, Delhi and Dhaka.
Snow Leopard has also been operating all land services for conference and incentive holiday packages to business houses from many countries. Snow Leopard now has its own office building complex.
1987-1989: During this initial period of its establishment Snow Leopard was catering trekking services only to clients of local tour operators based in Kathmandu. It was only about 200 foreign tourists that we catered per year. During this period we operated with 2 full time office staff and about 10-20 part time field staff. During this time we also depended solely on walking clients and backpacker and budget tourists besides clients of local travel agents. We mostly operated teahouse treks rather than camping treks with these local clients.
1990-1992: This period saw steady growth in business with Snow Leopard as Mrs. Yankila Sherpa took over as full time Managing Director in-charge of marketing and operation. During this phase we have been able to access directly to foreign tour operators in Germany, Australia and USA. Snow Leopard also established a Representative in Deutschland: Mr. Hans-Dieter Schuster, in Senden, Germany.Our staff members increased to 5 full time office staff and 50 part time field staff.
1993-1995: This period saw drastic growth in the overall tourism industry of Nepal as a result Snow Leopard was not only expanding the number of its destinations regions in Nepal but providing highly commended holiday packages in Tibet region of China and Ladakh region of India outside our own country. Catering to approximately 400 foreign tourists per year Snow Leopard upgrades her entire trekking and climbing equipment and also started giving intensive technical training to all important field staffs in climbing, mountaineering and trekking in general. By this period we were catering to approximately to 400 tourists a year. We were also employing more than 400 field staffs including porters annually.
1996-1999: During this phase the trend of tourism growth in Nepal had seen the urgent need to offer specialized products and as Snow Leopard is a woman owned/run company, we started designing special women’s only trips, school children’s trips and special ritual trips. This brought great success as we catered to women’s only groups from the United States, Australia and Germany. During this period we established relations and signed business contracts with “Outdoor Vacation for Women over 40” – a famous tour company based in Boston, MA, USA. We signed business contracts with Mitra Malaysia of KL, Malaysia, Blazing Outdoors Adventures (BOAC) of Singapore, besides operating for our regular smaller agents in Europe, US and Australia.
2000-2008: Snow Leopard has specialized in special interest programs such as Shaman tours, education tours for school children and scouts, incentive tours for conference programs, religious packages, community development related activities in trekking etc. In spring 2008, Snow Leopard trek successfully organized a German Medical Congress for almost 300 medical doctors from Europe and America that participated in a two week long conference in Kathmandu and Pokhara. Snow Leopard also organizes educational tours for students of British schools such the British School in Darham.
Snow Leopard Treks (P) Ltd.
Naxal, Kathmandu, Nepal
P.O. Box: 1811
Tel: 977-1-4434632, 4434619
Website:www.snowleopardtrek.com
