Buses and jeeps to Jumla and Mugu: the Karnali Highway road

Almost every road journey into Jumla and Mugu runs on one road, the Karnali Highway. It carries the buses, the trucks and the private vehicles. This page covers road transport on that corridor: buses, fares, journey times, crashes and closures. The road itself is in the Karnali Highway guide, and the rest of the access routes are in the getting there hub.

The road the buses use

The Karnali Highway directly connects Surkhet, Dailekh, Kalikot, Jumla and Mugu¹. It runs 505 km from Jamunaha to Hilsa⁸ and links Jumla with Birendranagar, the Karnali capital⁸. A banner on the Department of Roads home page points “straight to Kalikot and Jumla” along the Karnali Corridor¹³. A public bus also runs from Surkhet to Gamgadhi, the Mugu district headquarters³.

The surface has a history. The highway was blacktopped with Otta Seal technology in fiscal year 2019-20, with World Bank funding, and the sections break down like this¹:

In a report of 9 July 2026 around 80 percent of that blacktopping had peeled away¹.

Direct buses from Jumla and Humla

A direct bus service from Jumla to Kathmandu was launched on Friday 24 April 2015 to mark Loktantra Day, with a first bus carrying eight passengers². The launch report said it would reach Kathmandu after 36 hours over a distance of about 830 km².

Humla also has a direct bus to the capital. In January 2026 Kantipur reported on the Humla to Kathmandu direct bus and what it meant for passengers⁵. A Humla traveller quoted there said the fare alone used to cost more than 7,000 rupees to reach Surkhet⁵. In January 2025 Kantipur reported that Humla riders paid 6,500 for a 334 km trip⁹.

In November 2012 the Karnali Transport Operators’ Association Jumla set the long-route bus fares and had raised them more than once, and the increase hit the general public hard⁴.

How long it takes

An engineer quoted in the Kathmandu Post on 9 July 2026 said that under engineering standards the 232 km journey from Jumla should take about six hours, but that travellers are often forced to spend up to 24 hours on the road¹. The same report names narrow roads as one of the reasons the highway is difficult¹.

The direct Kathmandu bus was reported at 36 hours at its April 2015 launch².

Rara Lake is the end of the road on this side. It has no connection to the national road network and is reached on foot from Jumla³; the nearest airports are Talcha in Mugu and Jumla Airport³.

In its report of 9 July 2026 the Kathmandu Post said police had banned vehicles from operating on the highway at night¹.

Accident record

Police data in the 9 July 2026 report show the highway accounts for nearly 56 percent of all road accidents recorded across Karnali Province¹. The Karnali Province Police Office counted 917 people dead in accidents on the highway since fiscal year 2014-15¹. Police recorded 4,002 road accidents in Karnali Province over the past decade, with 1,637 deaths, and 34 people were killed in 113 accidents on the highway in the fiscal year then current¹. Authorities attribute the rising number of accidents to a combination of factors, including narrow roads and overcrowded vehicles¹.

Police identify the stretch between Dahikhola in Dailekh and Galjebazaar in Kalikot as the most dangerous section of the highway, with 98 accidents over three years that killed 35 people¹. Two crashes are named in that report:

Kathmandu to Nepalgunj by road

The road from Kathmandu to Nepalgunj follows the Mahendra Highway, and the Department of Roads’ 2017/18 strategic road network statistics list the sections below¹⁰.

Kohalpur is 428 km west of Hetauda, and a branch runs 13 km south from there to Nepalgunj¹¹. The full run west is in Kathmandu to the far west by road, and the town itself is in the Nepalgunj guide.

Safety measures on the highway

A World Bank results story records that 73,000 metres of crash barriers were installed on eight Strategic Road Network roads, totalling 700 km, between early 2016 and mid-2017¹². Kalyan in Surkhet and Gadgadeni in Jumla were among the high-risk sections that received them¹². The World Bank estimates the barriers may save 3,456 lives over 20 years, on GRSF projections¹². A Surkhet-Jumla bus driver quoted in January 2020 said drivers feel at ease on roads with barriers¹².

Landslides and closures

In the 9 July 2026 report a Jumla Road Division officer said there is a constant risk of landslides throughout the highway, and that most of the maintenance budget is spent dealing with them¹. Nearly Rs670 million had been spent on maintenance over the three fiscal years to the July 2026 report¹. The Jumla Road Division Office terminated 16 long-delayed highway contracts¹.

Two closures show how it plays out in the rains. On 17 August 2025 landslides blocked the highway at Gaganekhola and Bihani in Kalikot, at Khidki Jyula in Dailekh and near Nagma on the road to Mugu, and vehicles heading to Surkhet via Kalikot were stranded at several locations⁶. On 27 August 2025 the Surkhet to Jumla section was brought to a standstill after a road collapse at Kalikhola in Kalikot, and authorities urged travellers, including tourists heading to Jumla, to use alternative routes until repairs were completed⁷.

Both closures were reported in August 2025^6,7. The wider pattern across the western highways is in monsoon road closures, and the best months to avoid the rains are in best time to visit west Nepal. For the district at the end of the road, see Mugu.