An Invitation to Nepal
March 2027. A Seat on the Expedition.
March 2027. A Seat on the Expedition.
You are invited.
Some places cannot be reached casually. Relationships built over thirty years open doors that money alone cannot. Coffee farms in the clouds. Treks through valleys where few outsiders are ever welcomed. Helicopter flights along the spine of the Himalaya. The shadow of Everest itself.
This is not a tour. It is an invitation to join a professional documentary expedition documenting a story of global significance, alongside a small group of people who value depth over convenience.
The difference between visiting a place and being part of its story.
Nepal. Before the world knows.
Ethiopia. Colombia. Kenya. The great origins are established. The stories have been told.
Nepal is different. Farms at 4,600 to 6,900 feet. Himalayan microclimates. Soil and altitude that rival the best single origins on earth. And almost no one outside the specialty world knows it yet.
But the story is not complete without the peaks themselves. The source of the water, the weather, and the rhythm that sustains everything below. From the terraced hillsides of Nuwakot, through the remote valleys of the Langtang, across the great range by helicopter, and into the Sherpa homeland of the Khumbu. Four worlds. Fourteen days.
A story that will be told. The question is whether you are there when it begins.
March 7 to 8. Two days.
Tashi Tenzing is the grandson of Tenzing Norgay, who with Sir Edmund Hillary made the first ascent of Mount Everest on May 29, 1953. Tashi is a three-time Everest summiteer, an explorer, an entrepreneur, and a philanthropist. His family owns the Nuwa Coffee farm in Nuwakot, where the foothills of the Himalaya produce a coffee that rivals the best single origins on earth.
The expedition arrives by helicopter after flying the proposed Himalayan Wildlife Corridor, a landscape-scale preservation initiative connecting protected areas through the hill country of central Nepal. At the farm, Tashi hosts the group through the terraces, the production facility, and the wet mill. In the afternoon, he leads a visit to one of the schools funded by the Nepal Green Tara Foundation, the non-profit he and his wife Bandi Nima Sherpa founded to fight poverty through education. The foundation has built five schools and two health clinics, sponsors over 800 children, and runs anti-trafficking programs across the Himalaya.
The coffee is the product. The education is the purpose. Tashi built both.
March 9 to 12. Four days.
The expedition enters the Langtang from a remote corner accessible from the Nuwakot side, avoiding the standard trekking routes entirely. Tashi Tenzing joins the group for this phase. The trail rises through terraced farmland, rhododendron forest, and into the higher valleys. Glacial lakes, high meadows, and the geological drama of a landscape shaped by tectonic collision.
The level of support is unlike anything available on standard treks: a full mobile camp, premium expedition tents, separate shower and toilet facilities, a full expedition chef, and total porterage. Guests carry day packs only.
The final night is spent at a lakeside camp in the upper Langtang, one of the most remote and beautiful overnight locations on any trek in Nepal.
Four days of walking through the heart of the valley. The world below disappears into cloud.
Along the spine of the highest mountain range on earth.
March 13. One day.
Altitude Air helicopters lift off from a glacial lake in the upper Langtang and fly east along the spine of the Himalaya. The flight path follows the great range, with Ganesh Himal, Manaslu, and the Annapurna massif visible in the distance. Then the Khumbu peaks rise ahead.
Once the group lands at the Syangboche airstrip above Namche Bazaar, they break into smaller groups for the Everest Base Camp overflight. Each helicopter flies up the Khumbu Valley, over Base Camp, past the Khumbu Icefall and the Western Cwm, and into the shadow of Mount Everest itself.
The group reconvenes at Hotel Everest View for the night.
For many, this will be the single most visually extraordinary experience of their lives.
March 13 to 18. Six days.
Hotel Everest View holds the Guinness World Record as the highest-altitude hotel on earth at 12,730 feet. Built in 1971 by Japanese entrepreneur Takashi Miyahara, every one of its 12 rooms faces Mount Everest. The dining room overlooks Khumjung village, where the monastery displays a scalp claimed to be from a yeti, and where the school founded by Sir Edmund Hillary in 1961 still operates. Below sits Namche Bazaar, the Sherpa capital of the Khumbu, a crescent-shaped town at 11,290 feet where famous climbing families have lived for generations.
From the hotel, the group treks four days through the Sherpa homeland. Phortse, one of the most traditional settlements in the Khumbu. Gokyo, a series of high-altitude lakes beneath the flanks of Cho Oyu. Chola Pass at approximately 17,700 feet. A final camp at Pheriche in the upper Khumbu Valley. The trails pass through communities where Sherpa families have lived for centuries, and the guides are from these communities. The stories are not scripted. They are inherited.
From the ridge above Namche, Tenzing Norgay's legacy is visible in every direction.
March 6 to 19, 2027
Day 1
Kathmandu Arrival
Helicopter to The Terraces Resort and Spa. Welcome dinner.
Days 2 to 3 | The Origin
Nuwa Coffee and the Corridor
Wildlife corridor overflight. Nuwa Coffee farm with Tashi Tenzing. Coffee terraces, production, school visit.
Days 4 to 7 | The Trek
The Langtang
Remote entry from Nuwakot. Four days trekking with mobile camp. Glacial lakes, high meadows, lakeside final camp. Tashi joins.
The Crossing
The Himalayan Flight
Helicopters along the spine of the Himalaya. Everest Base Camp overflight. Hotel Everest View.
Days 8 to 13 | The Khumbu
The Sherpa Homeland
Trek from Namche to Phortse, Gokyo, Chola Pass at 5,400m, and Pheriche. Helicopter to Kathmandu. Farewell dinner at Dwarika's Hotel.
Day 14
Depart Kathmandu
Includes
Excludes
Hosted throughout by Dirk Collins. This expedition involves sustained trekking above 13,000 feet. Prior hiking experience is strongly recommended.
This expedition serves people looking for something beyond the standard Nepal trip.
Beyond the Trek
You have done the well-known routes and the lodges. You are ready for something with depth and consequence.
The Photography Collector
See where the work comes from. Walk the landscapes that become the art on your wall.
The Multigenerational Journey
A family experience across coffee terraces, high valleys, and the roof of the world. The Tenzings built theirs. You begin yours.
The Once-in-a-Lifetime Seeker
Some combinations cannot be assembled twice. The people, the access, and the timing are singular.
The kind of journey that requires an invitation, not a booking.
What separates this from everything else.
No operator links a high-altitude coffee immersion, a remote Langtang trek, and a Khumbu traverse in a single 14-day narrative arc with helicopter transfers connecting each phase. The itinerary itself has no precedent.
Tashi Tenzing, the grandson of Tenzing Norgay and a three-time Everest summiteer, does not lead commercial treks. His presence on this expedition, at his family's coffee farm and on the Langtang trek, is a personal commitment that cannot be purchased through any operator.
The helicopter transfer from the Langtang to the Khumbu, flying along the spine of the Himalaya, has no commercial equivalent. Standard Khumbu treks begin with a flight to Lukla. This expedition arrives from the west, by helicopter, with the entire range unfolding through the windows. The Everest Base Camp overflight on arrival day is not a scenic tour. It is an immersion in the most iconic mountaineering landscape on earth.
The real question is not the cost. It is whether an experience at this level exists anywhere else. It does not.
This expedition documents coffee, people, and landscapes connecting three national parks, including Everest. Farmers choosing high-altitude coffee as a livelihood. Communities building economic opportunity through preservation.
This is not charity. It is a business model that works. A portion of the proceeds from every seat goes to the Mountain Preservation Foundation, and your participation connects directly to the Himalayan Coffee and Wildlife Corridor initiative.
Every seat is by invitation only. The structure is built around how you want to experience the journey.
$39,500 per person
Reserve your seat
Dirk Collins hosts and produces the expedition. Co-founder of Teton Gravity Research, and for thirty years a producer and director of films, television, and brand work for HBO, National Geographic, Disney, Rolex, and Red Bull. Seven continents, more than thirty-five countries, and a specialist in aircraft logistics and remote operations.
He is the one other filmmakers call when the location is the hardest part of the shoot. Expedition and aerial producer on Everest: The North Side, Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin’s account of Jim Morrison’s first ski descent of Everest’s north face, from National Geographic and Disney. Aerial producer on TGR’s HBO series Edge of the Earth. Two National Geographic and Rolex Perpetual Planet expeditions, including the one that placed the highest weather station in the Southern and Western Hemispheres on Tupungato in Chile.
But what makes this expedition possible is not one person. It is the network. Tashi Tenzing, grandson of Tenzing Norgay, opens doors in Nepal that no operator can access. Jiban Ghimire, the fixer's fixer, builds the infrastructure from the ground up through Shangri-La Nepal Trek and Altitude Air. The Nuwa Coffee farm team hosts the agricultural immersion. Helicopter pilots who have flown Everest expeditions for decades handle every transfer. These are the same people Dirk calls when producing films and television for the world's most iconic brands. The same relationships, the same access, the same standard of trust built over decades of working together in the field.
Every guide, every pilot, every host on this expedition is someone who has been tested on real productions in real conditions. They grant access, provide safety, and move ten people through environments that few others can reach. This is what a professional expedition team looks like.
Seats confirmed. Balance due January 16. Onboarding begins.
The expedition. Two weeks in Nepal.
Content delivered. Ready to share.
Your story. Yours to tell.
The window is brief. The story lasts.
Planet 5 runs only a handful of expeditions each year. Each one is built around the people who join it.
This invitation is personal. Ten seats, March 6 to 19, 2027, $39,500 per person. A $10,000 deposit holds your seat today. It is fully refundable for 14 days, and refunded in full if the expedition does not reach six guests by January 15, 2027.
Reserve your seatexpeditions@planet5media.com
"Some journeys change how you see everything after."
Reserve a seat
March 6 to 19, 2027, with Dirk Collins. $39,500 per person, double occupancy. Ten seats. A portion of the proceeds goes to the Mountain Preservation Foundation.
The deposit applies in full to your seat. Fully refundable for 14 days, and refunded in full if the expedition does not reach six guests by January 15, 2027. After that it is transferable to another traveler or a future Planet 5 expedition. Balance due January 16, 2027. Secure payment by Stripe.
Prefer to wire, or have questions first? expeditions@planet5media.com
Nepal · March 2027
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