Bhutan 2014: On the Road To Trongsa

Joan and I are usually not fans of dining outdoors. Often the sun is in your eyes, or it's too hot, or the wind blows your napkin away, or there's noisy traffic at your elbow. This morning, May 7th, was different. The weather was perfect for breakfast on the terrace, under the shade of a table umbrella.

First, a view from our window at the Uma Punakha.

Across the valley the sun's rays were stretching for the Khamsum Yulley Namgyal, a temple built by the Queen Mother, one of the four wives (all sisters) of the fourth King. It's an easy hike from the suspension bridge where our rafts set out yesterday; Joan and I visited the temple in 2005, so not on this trip.

This morning was also a good birding opportunity. We saw a long-tailed shrike and a grey-backed shrike, although they were too distant for a photo. Yes, you must take your binoculars to breakfast. Here is a black bulbul.

Our journey to Trongsa started by driving on the eastern side of the Puna Tsang Chhu, past the New Town of Wangdi Phodrang  (alternatively Wangdue Phodrang). A screenshot from Google Maps is in order:

The old town, and the dzong, clung to the top of the bluff on the eastern side of the river, near the confluence with the Dang Chhu, at the bottom of the photo. The main road from Thimphu follows the western bank of the river, and crosses a bridge to climb to the old town.

It was perilous living atop the bluff, as this picture from 2009 shows. 

Not only was there a long fall, but the buildings were all old wooden structures and highly flammable. Therefore, the government decided to build a new, modern town in a better spot just north. The platting of the new town is easily visible in the Maps screenshot.

And then in June 2012 the dzong, built in 1638, burned to the ground. By good luck the relics kept in this third-oldest dzong in Bhutan had been moved elsewhere because of a renovation effort, and hence were safe. Bhutan has pledged to rebuild the dzong by the end of 2018, and the government of India is contributing at least half the funds.

The people have moved into New Town. It appears, from the road, to be inhabitable but unimaginative, like most planned communities. Additional colors, architectural styles, and some green space would improve it.

We kept going and joined the national highway, leaving the map heading east towards Nobding. There is a huge hydroelectric facility being constructed on the river south of Wangdue Phodrang, and the quarry supplying much of the material is on the national highway partway towards Nobding.

The pavement therefore often goes missing,

beaten, fractured, and scattered by all the trucks.

The government has concluded that there's no point in repaving until the hydro project is finished. I grabbed this snapshot of the quarry entrance as we drove by.

In some places mountain streams crossing the roadway had softened the hard-packed earth. We never became mired, but I wonder about the effect of the summer rains.

At Nobding we took a brief rest and snack stop. We had made quick stops in Nobding in 2005 and in 2009, but never at a restaurant.

It wasn't lunchtime yet, but we had tea and "biscuits" -- both salty and sweet crackers -- in what appeared to be a VIP alcove.

Photos of the past and present royalty hung on the walls. Here we see the third king of Bhutan and his wife. He reigned from 1952 - 1972 and began the modernization process of Bhutan, including freeing the serfs and introducing wheeled vehicles. His death at age 43 from lung cancer is the primary reason that tobacco is highly regulated in Bhutan.

This photo shows the young fourth king. He reigned from 1972 (at age 17) until he abdicated in favor of his eldest son in 2006, having accomplished great feats of careful modernization and the conversion, at his own initiative, of Bhutan to a constitutional monarchy.

This is the view from the restaurant towards Nobding.

We left Nobding and crossed Pele La, a pass at 3420 meters or about 11,200 feet, and then began the long descent towards Trongsa. Shortly before our lunch stop we paused while a truck offered assistance to a taxi that had run off the road.

I took this photo looking down the valley in the direction we were headed. We're not far from the village of Rukubji/Rukhubji, but we'll stop for lunch and a walk first.

Tshering sneaks into the photo of some flowers at our lunch stop, the Tushita Café. This restaurant is new to Joan and me.

Joan checks the bird book while the buffet is being set up; she had spotted a himalayan griffon vulture when we first stepped out of the van. It's a huge bird, and reminded us of the Andean condor.

We tucked into a great buffet. The Bhutanese food is tasty, and we discovered that we could eat with abandon and not gain weight. Joan and I decided it was because the food was prepared simply, and not with quantities of commercial fats and oils. Also, the dinner desserts were mostly fruit.

When we resumed our drive we passed the restaurant that we'd used in 2009. It was jammed with commercial bus traffic.

Joan, Tshering, and I disembarked from the van for a cross-country walk, and Kaka drove on to Rukhubji. First we worked our way downslope to the valley bottom, walking beside fields and over fences with wooden stepladders. Joan and I wore our rain jackets because the low clouds would occasionally let loose a few drops; Tshering had an umbrella.

Walking through Rukhubji was something I might not have had the nerve to do on my own, but with Tshering in the lead and serving as translator, I remained inside my comfort zone.

This building includes among its exterior art a phallus, an invocation of Drukpa Kunley/Kinley, the divine madman of the 15th Century.

There are also vegetable gardens.

At the edge of the village a new building is going up; this illustrates traditional Bhutanese architecture. A master carpenter marks the dimensions and lengths of the timber, and willing hands cut and fit.

As we left Joan and I were being teased by cuckoos that sounded as if they were only at arm's length, but we could never spot them. We broke off the search when a rain shower began to intensify, and in a few minutes were back in the van.

The light drizzle continued. We noticed well-dressed villagers waiting by the side of the road, mile after mile, even in the rain. They were waiting for a glimpse of the Je Khenpo, the head abbot and religious authority figure of Bhutan, who was making his way back from eastern Bhutan. If they were fortunate they would be able to give him some offerings.

The rain  lifted. Later on the road we encountered a troupe of rhesus macaques. (That ID appears to be a better fit than eastern assamese macaques, the other possibility.)

They were unafraid of us, and had obviously encountered people many times before. One had some yellow strings around his neck.

Consider the faces. Someone is in there, watching and waiting to see what will happen.

There was also a youngster.

In Trongsa we stayed at the Yangkhil Resort. Tshering advised us that, although it had been safe to partake of raw foods at the Zhiwa Ling in Paro and the Uma Punakha, now it was time for us chillips (foreign tourists) to eat uncooked food only when we could peel it ourselves. Joan and I also knew that it was time to switch from coffee to tea; this far east, any coffee ordered would be made from instant. This photo, taken the next day, shows the complete grounds of the Yangkhil.

Here was the easternmost extent of our prior travels in Bhutan. Tomorrow we would bash on.

Bhutan 2014: Sangchhen Dorji Lhuendrup and Punakha Dzong

After lunch in Khuruthang we drove up to the Sangchhen Dorji Lhuendrup, a nunnery and temple complex that's only a few years old. Nuns and visiting artisans were bustling around the grounds, picking up trash, planting greenery, erecting poles for prayer flags, and such, because the Shabdrung Kuchoe holiday was in three days (May 9th). The Shabdrung (also spelled Zhabdrung) Ngawang Namgyal first unified Bhutan in the 17th Century, and established the system of parallel civil and religious administration. The tenth day of the third month in the Bhutanese calendar is the observation of his death, which was kept a secret for 54 years to forestall the return of regional warlords. The official pronouncement was that he was on retreat and in meditation.

The nunnery sits prominently above rivers and valleys. This image looks to the east.

Looking west Joan and I saw many burnt trees from a 2012 fire that came perilously close. In this picture nuns are planting more trees in advance of the Shabdrung Kuchoe. The road up to Dochu La is on the far side of the valley.

The central grounds of the complex include not only the requisite temple, but a chorten/stupa patterned after the famous Boudhanath stupa in Kathmandu, Nepal. This aerial image (from Google Maps) shows the stupa near the center.

I neglected to take a picture of the stupa, but here is one of the temple. A minor architectural feature we didn't see elsewhere are the rain chains; rather than being a series of links, they are a series of cups or small pots.

The shrine of every lhakhang (temple) features a large central figure with smaller flanking statues. The focal statue is chosen from the personages most important to the Bhutanese and to the temple sponsors. Probably the most frequent is Guru Rinpoche, known in Sanskrit as Padmasambhava, who brought Buddhism to Bhutan in the 8th Century, converting the deities, demons, ogres, and ogresses of the Bon religion to Buddhism and enlisting them as protectors of the Dharma. On our trip we also saw the place of prominence given to the Shabdrung, the historical Buddha Shakyamuni, the Buddha of the future, Maitreya, and bodhisattvas such as Chenrezig. Here at the Sangchhen lhakhang the central figure is Chenrezig, known in Sanskrit as Avalokiteshvara.

English is taught in the Bhutanese schools, along with the offical language, Dzongka, and both of these are likely in addition to the local language spoken by the family. Some failures of the ear to distinguish sounds are understandable.

Joan suspected that this visit to Sangchhen was suggested by Tshering to "vamp for time." We now backtracked to the Punakha dzong, and indeed, it turned out to be a great time of day to visit.

I took this picture as we crossed the cantilever bridge.

We weren't the only ones on an outing today.

Some visitors were relaxing among the jacaranda blooms.

Bees live here, in hives like beards hanging from the dzong. Individual bees cover the hive, darkening it. They are not disturbed in this Buddhist land.

Before entering the dzong I took another jacaranda photo.

I held back while Joan and Tshering climbed the stairway into the dzong. Tshering is wearing a kabney, a large scarf that's almost a shawl. The kabney is worn by men on special occasions or when entering a dzong. The color of the kabney signifies rank, such as member of parliament, local judge, and so forth. White is for commoners, and only the Kings and Je Khenpo can wear yellow.

If you look closely at the women at the top of the stairs (click to enlarge), you'll see that they are each wearing a narrow embroidered sash directly over the left shoulder, known as the rachu, which serves a parallel purpose to the kabney.

An image of the Shabdrung graced the central courtyard with the Shabdrung Kuchoe only three days away. His remains are still guarded over within the dzong.

Let's zoom in.

Dominating another face of the courtyard is the entrance to the large, multi-story temple of the most important dzong in the religious landscape of Bhutan. Large ceremonies with hundreds of monks can take place here. Tshering used the scenes on the walls therein to give us a rundown on the life of the Buddha.

Then the three of us (Tshering, Joan, and I) decided to do a kora, or circumambulation, of the dzong on the outside. We soon encountered a young man whitewashing part of the wall, suspended in a open-weave rope basket and belayed from above and below. This would not pass an OSHA safety inspection.

Another lovely jacaranda in the back.

We couldn't identify this tree, but the yellow-orange stems are striking close up and at a distance.

We admired this oriental magpie robin during our kora.

After completing the circumambulation we returned to the Uma Punakha for dinner, and to pack for tomorrow's drive to Trongsa.

There are more descriptions and photos of the Punakha Dzong and its extended environs in this post from our December 2009 visit.

First Story!

I'm a happy camper. My first published story has come out, in Isotropic Fiction #12, an e-magazine, available here at amazon.com. No longer available at amazon, so it's on my blog here.

Now to improve my writing. So far I've composed five stories, made a total of 38 submissions, and had one sale. I'm learning a lot about what to do, and what not to do.

Bhutan 2014: Rafting the Mo Chhu

The view from our window at the Uma Punakha on May 6th was worth studying. The small building in the foreground is the spa, behind it, a river -- the Mo Chhu.

The birds are most active in the morning. This black drongo was staring at me.

Our first activity today is rafting on the Mo Chhu. We'll float from just below our hotel to beyond the Punakha dzong, using the Druk Rafting Service.

We took some pictures on the adjacent suspension bridge while the rafting team inflated their rafts. First, one of Joan and me, taken by Tshering.

Then I took one with Joan and Tshering.

Then we discover that we are not the only pedestrians on the bridge.

The first raft is ready, now for the second one.

Ben in his rafting gear.

Tshering was familiar with my model of camera, so sometimes when he was in the better position he'd take a photo. This one is blurred from the motion of the raft, but I can't pass it up. The white-throated kingfisher is a spectacular bird.

It was along the slower, gentler portions of the river that I felt safe pulling out my camera. Sometimes we glided by buildings close to the waters.

This trip, taken before the summer rains, was comfortable, no more than a class 2 watercourse with just a couple of busy parts.

We see as we approach the Punakha dzong that today the monks are out bathing and washing out their robes.

The dzong is surrounded by the jacaranda trees, which we will admire more in the afternoon.

We passed under the cantilever bridge that connects the dzong to the parking areas.

Tshering in his helmet, with the dzong receding in the background. Joan and the front of the raft are visible in his sunglasses.

At the far end of the dzong the Po Chhu joins the Mo Chhu, and the combined rivers become known as the Puna Tsang Chhu. The waters spread out and we drift with the current towards Khuruthang, a town three kilometers or so downstream. Through a gap in the hills we can see the Sangchhen Dorji Lhuendrup lhakhang (temple) and nunnery, which we'll visit after lunch.

We disembarked from the rafts at a rocky beach in Khuruthang.

There is more description of Khuruthang in the middle of this post about our December 2009 visit.