The seven monument zones of the Kathmandu Valley

When UNESCO inscribed the Kathmandu Valley on the World Heritage List in 1979, it did not pick a single monument. It drew boundaries around seven groups of buildings that together tell the story of the valley's art and faith, from the Licchavi kings of the first millennium to the Malla kings who rebuilt the three royal cities between the fourteenth and eighteenth centuries, and the Shah dynasty that united Nepal after 1768.

The listing was never easy to manage. These are crowded urban areas where people build houses, run shops and hold festivals. Uncontrolled new building led UNESCO to place the site on its List of World Heritage in Danger in 2003; it came off the list in 2007 after new management rules. Then, in April 2015, the Gorkha earthquake brought down or damaged many temples in all seven zones. Most have now been rebuilt, often with the old methods and materials.

The seven are best understood in three groups: the palace squares of the three old kingdoms, the two great stupas, and the two great Hindu temples.

Also called Hanuman Dhoka, after the stone Hanuman statue that Pratap Malla placed beside the palace gate in 1672, this was the royal centre of Kathmandu. The Hanuman wears a red cloak and his face is covered in red paste from centuries of offerings. Inside the palace, Nasal Chowk was the courtyard where Shah kings were crowned. The tall Taleju temple, built by Mahendra Malla in 1564, towers over the north side and opens to Hindu devotees only once a year, on Maha Navami during Dashain.

Look for the fierce black stone Kal Bhairav, the white Bhairav mask that pours rice beer during Indra Jatra, the nine-storey Basantapur tower added by Prithvi Narayan Shah after his conquest, and Kumari Ghar, built in 1757 as the home of the living goddess. The rebuilt Kasthamandap, the pavilion that legend says was made from the wood of a single tree and gave the city its name, stands on the square's south-west corner.

Patan, called Yala in Nepal Bhasa and Lalitpur in Nepali, has the most complete of the three squares, and many visitors' favourite. The stone Krishna Mandir, built by Siddhi Narasimha Malla in 1637, carries carved friezes of the Mahabharata and Ramayana along its upper floors, and fills with devotees on Krishna Janmashtami. Opposite stands the old palace, three courtyards in a row.

Keshav Narayan Chowk now holds the Patan Museum, one of the best museums in South Asia for Hindu and Buddhist bronze sculpture, restored with Austrian support. Sundari Chowk contains the Tusha Hiti, a sunken royal bath lined with carved stone deities. Patan's temples were badly hit in 2015, and the Kathmandu Valley Preservation Trust led much of the rebuilding here. Beyond the square, the Golden Temple of Kwa Bahal and the terracotta Mahaboudha are both short walks away.

Bhaktapur, or Khwopa, was the capital of the whole valley under the early Malla kings, until the kingdom split in the late fifteenth century, and is now the best preserved, partly because of a German-funded restoration and sanitation project that began in the 1970s, and partly because the city charges visitors a fee that pays for upkeep. Its Durbar Square holds the palace of fifty-five windows and the gilded Golden Gate of 1754, which leads to the Taleju shrine, closed to non-Hindus.

Bhaktapur's heritage zone is really three squares. Taumadhi has the five-storey Nyatapola, built by Bhupatindra Malla in 1702 and the tallest temple in the valley, which survived both the 1934 and 2015 earthquakes. Dattatreya, the oldest square, has the Peacock Window and the woodcarving museum. In between lies the potters' square, where clay dries in the sun.

Swayambhunath sits on a wooded hill west of Kathmandu. Its name means self-arisen, from the Swayambhu Purana story of a light shining from a lotus on the lake that once filled the valley. The stupa's painted eyes look out in four directions, and the hill is crowded with smaller shrines, both Buddhist and Hindu, including the shrine of Harati, protector of children. Its many monkeys gave it the name monkey temple.

Boudhanath, about 7 km east, is one of the largest stupas in the world. Tibetan Buddhists call it Jarung Khashor. After 1959 Tibetan refugees settled around it and built dozens of monasteries, so it is now the centre of Tibetan Buddhism in Nepal. The dome cracked in the 2015 earthquake; the spire was taken down, rebuilt with community donations and reconsecrated in November 2016. Come at dawn or dusk for the kora.

Pashupatinath, on the Bagmati near the airport, is the most sacred temple of Shiva in Nepal and one of the most important in the Hindu world. Only Hindus may enter the main courtyard, with its gilded roofs and great bronze Nandi bull. Everyone else watches from the terraces on the east bank, looking across at Arya Ghat, where families cremate their dead. On Maha Shivaratri in February or March, sadhus and pilgrims fill the whole complex.

Changu Narayan, on a ridge about 22 km east of Kathmandu, is the oldest of the seven in tradition. Its courtyard pillar carries an inscription of King Manadeva dated 464 CE, the oldest dated inscription found in Nepal. The two-roofed Vishnu temple was rebuilt after a fire in the early eighteenth century, but the courtyard is full of Licchavi-era stone sculpture, including Vishnu striding across the universe and a kneeling Garuda.

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Give each zone at least half a day, and match it to the right hour: stupas at dawn and dusk, squares in the morning. Group them by geography to beat traffic: Pashupatinath and Boudhanath are about 3 km apart; Bhaktapur and Changu Narayan pair naturally on the way to Nagarkot.

Dress modestly, walk clockwise around stupas, remove shoes where asked and do not touch offerings. Photography is fine in the squares, but not of the Kumari, inside many shrines or of cremations at close range. A licensed guide makes the difference between a set of buildings and a set of stories, and handles tickets as well.

Finally, give yourself time to look at the small things between the famous buildings. The stone water spouts called hiti, still used for washing in some neighbourhoods, the carved roof struts showing gods, animals and sometimes couples, the little Ganesh shrines on street corners that get fresh red powder every morning: these are as much a part of the heritage as the temples, and they are why UNESCO listed whole zones rather than single monuments. Come back to one square at a different hour from your first visit, and you will usually find it doing something new.