“Bhutan is a beautiful place. High-end tourists love it.” – Kai Bird
Bhutan, the last of the Himalayan kingdom – there’s nowhere on earth quite like
it.
Read this post to know how to get underneath its skin…
1. Enter the Tiger’s Nest
The Tiger’s Nest Monastery (Taktsang Lhakhang) is Bhutan’s Machu Picchu. It clings to a sheer cliff face, is based 900 hundred meters above the Paro Valley, and can be considered it’s Taj Mahal. It is the cliff-face that had launched a thousand postcards. You will see it featured on every website, brochure, and book about the country. But it doesn’t feel overrun, thanks to Bhutan’s restrictions on its visitor numbers. And of course, that could also be a rocky track to reach and down to the lung-bursting trek up a steep slope. Guru Rinpoche chose this vertiginous cliff, which is only 10km north of Paro, as a meditation site. According to legend, he arrived here on a flying tiger.
2. Score a bullseye
Archery is Bhutan’s passion and its national sport as well. You’ll find multi-colored throngs of men wearing patterned ghost which are traditional men’s’ robes. They take turns to shoot arrows at a tiny sliver, which is a target positioned at a whopping 140 m away. This sport is done on the hills and across the fields and stadiums all through the country. Residents of the neighboring village heckle around them and cheerleaders, who are groups of women wearing traditional silk outfits, sing and dance in circles alongside them. They even offer derision to the opposition and words of encouragement to their team.
3. Search for a yeti (and other elusive creatures)
Bhutan has its fair share of legends and myths, and so should it as befits a Himalayan kingdom that is cut off for centuries from the rest of the world. The most famous to the locals is the Yeti or the Migoi. Despite being declared to the public by the likes of Reinhold Messner that what people are actually seeing is a Himalayan bear, this mythical creature still holds a strong part of the local culture. Every villager you encounter will tell you a tale about a close encounter with a big and hairy yeti, and even give you advice on how to escape one.
4. Trek into the unknown
Bhutan is considered the gold standard for trekking in the Himalayas. It is free from the tourist hordes that descend upon Nepal and is snuggled up against some of the world’s highest mountains. Bhutan offers something for trekkers of all levels, be it a challenging 25-day hike that traverses half the country, or a gentle trek through the ancient rhododendron forests.
5. Dance with monks at a Tsechu festival
If you ask any Bhutanese about the highlight of their year, they will tell you that it’s the Tshechu. It is a large social gathering which depending on the region, is held on the tenth day of any particular Tibetan lunar month. It is a chance to catch up with friends belonging to remote and outlying villages, and the time of ceremonial dances and brisk trade. Paro Tshechu is considered the most colorful and spectacular and is held during every spring in the Paro Dzongkhag. The Cham dance is the highlight of any Tshechu. This is where monks don elaborate costumes and fearsome masks to perform energetic routines to the raucous traditional music. Each dance you see is considered a form of meditation, albeit a lively one. It denotes a moral message, particularly to show compassion for sentient beings.
So come to the land of hidden treasures…come to Bhutan!
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