If you plan to visit Pokhara, your timing is crucial. Arriving before the end of the monsoon rains means giving up any trekking possibilities, and the amazing mountains views from the town will be blocked by the constantly clouded skies. Hence, the best season is around September or October. The town is clearly divided into three parts: the Lakeside (Baidam) and the Damside (Pardi) are the most important ones for tourists and run along the axis formed by Phewa Tal (tal means lake in Nepali) and its dam. The biggest district, which has evolved away from the lake into a quite irregular shape, includes the airport, the terminal, the residential, and the commercial areas of the town, and most probably you will visit it only while arriving to or departing from the city.
The Lakeside and Damside, as they are commonly known, are very different in style. The Lakeside is the main center for tourists; it hosts many travel agencies, souvenir shops, guesthouses, trekking equipment shops, restaurants, and a big population of Tibetan Refugees selling handicrafts to the tourists. Please see the Annapuna Circuit entry of this journal for more detailed information regarding the arrangement of your trek. The Damside is more relaxed and offers mainly guesthouses and a local ambience. The distances between the two centers are short; hence, you can live in the Damside and walk to the Lakeside for your activities. To walk between them, walk south along the Baidam Promenade until it begins to move away from the lake, and then turn south to Ratna Puri Road and southwest at Pardi Bazaar Road.
Next to the Phewa Dam, which is slightly north from the last road, are arranged most of the guesthouses in the Damside. Continuing along this road, you will reach the Devi’s Falls (Pataley Chango); if you wish to visit Sarangkot, the best is to cross the bridge over the dam and to continue from there. Midway along the Lakeside is the Ratna Mandir, the Royal Palace, to which there is no access – it makes a good landmark for your first day in town.
North of it is concentrated most of the activity, and you will have a hard time trying to decide where to eat. Puja (blessing), in the southern part of the Lakeside promenade, is a good place for breakfast. Pokhara is a good place for Indian and Tibetan food, and the options are overwhelming. The Punjabi Vegetarian Restaurant offers Hindu food of an amazing quality at reasonable prices; it is by the center of the main road in the Lakeside. Its owners speak enough English to explain the secrets of their delicacies.
If you continue walking north, the buildings dwindle and the place begins to look as a fishermen village – the Baghdad Café and the Ganden Yigey Choling Buddhist Centre are recommended stops in your way; the last one is midway to the hilltop. Few guesthouses operate in this area, and it can compete with the Damside area in its calmness. I stayed at the Giri Guesthouse in the central part of the Lakeside and was completely happy – but there must be at least 50 guesthouses in Pokhara, and most of them offer proper conditions. A big room with a double bed, an attached bathroom, and a fan costs 100NPr per day. Since the buses from Kathmandu arrive in the early afternoon, there is enough time to make a survey before choosing one. Touts wait at the terminal, and letting one of them to show you his guesthouse is a good way to find the somewhat convoluted way from the terminal to the Lakeside.
You will comprehend better the way if you keep in mind that the terminal is just north from the airport and that its southern tip is close to the Damside, while its northern tip is away from the Lakeside; hence advancing east will lead you to the lake. The Pokhara Museum is in the center of the city, along Pode Tol Road, and it offers an humble collection of the region’s costumes and customs. In the northeastern edge is the local university campus, which hosts the Annapuna Regional Museum and specializes on the natural history of the region.