Accommodation

Home stay

We slept every night except one in a house. The exception being a small shelter when one of us was sick and we couldn’t make it over the pass. 

In the houses we sometimes got a room to ourselves, sometimes we were on the floor with the family and sundry animals (and insects). It was good to have a mattress and a sleeping bag, though not absolutely essential if you are prepared to rough it and risk some uncomfortable nights. Sometimes we had a mattress and a quilt. You’d have to be very weight averse to take absolutely nothing with you.

The first thing that you need to do when you arrive in the village where you hope to spend the night is find a place to stay. Given our limited language skills this was mostly conducted with gesture, though it took us a while to get this right. Place your hands flat on your ears and lean your head over to indicate sleeping. If you place both hands together (as we did initially) it looks to Nepalis rather like a weird greeting (Namaste). 

Sometimes people will ask you to come to their house, at other times my daughter would approach a group of women and ask them herself. Ultimately we were always successful. Patience and a ready smile will get you through.

Camping

We didn’t take a tent, and didn’t really need one. A camping trip would have been a very different experience. My tent is only about 750g so this would not be a significant weight issue (given that I already had cooking gear and a mattress) more a change of style. 

We would have been both more independent, more secluded, but also less in contact with people and would have missed seeing how they lived. I’m not sure about the relative safety aspects. I doubt that there are many wild animals (large cats or bears) that would be a personal threat but certainly there might be a few creatures out there who would be interested in your food. In these situations I usually hang food up between two trees (assuming there are trees) using a long cord. 

On the plus side it vastly increases your flexibility and might even encourage you to go a bit further afield and off trail for a nice viewpoint in the morning. There are safety issues. Humans being the major threat, and I’d be very cautious about when and where I did this. Basically I’d either do it publicly within the protection of a household, or be well out of sight when I go off trail to find a spot for the night.