Detours

ALTITUDE ADJUSTMENT You don't have to strap on hiking boots to get up close and personal with the mountains. Departing from Kathmandu, many local airlines offer early morning mountain flybys along the Himalayan ridge. Buddha Air sends out two 16-seaters every morning, weather permitting. Each passenger sits beside a window, and as the plane nears Mount Everest, the friendly flight attendant brings each flyer up to the cockpit for a direct prospect. Not that Everest's neighbors are anything to sniff at: the hour-long flight takes in no less than five of the world's tallest peaks. A round-trip costs about $100; call (977-1) 542494 or contact one of Thamel's ubiquitous travel agents for ticketing information.

For more adrenaline-fueled encounters with the mountains, try Sunrise Paragliding's excursions out of Pokhara. The six-year-old British-Nepali partnership (see nepal-paragliding.com) offers a range of aerial experiences. Trek or jeep to a mountaintop and then paraglide down with an instructor. The three-day paratrek has you landing in a different village each night. In one of its most popular activities, parahawking, you follow hawks trained to find elusive mountain updrafts for rides that can last for several hours.