Hiking to the Tigers nest

Tigers nest, Bhutan

Possibly the most recognisable building in Bhutan, Taktsang Palphug monastery (commonly known as tigers nest) is the poster boy for all tourism brochures. Perched on the side of the cliff at 3,100m it's a 2hour walk for us up into the clouds. We are the only bus in the car park as we set out at 7am, which is a good thing as we miss the rest of the crowds, some just starting as we are heading away for lunch. Security at the top is tight with a full body search - the only place we come across such thing.

Tigers nest, Bhutan

We are fortunate that the clouds part as we near the monastery, photos of clouds would have been a big disappointment. The monastery itself was rebuilt in 98 after (surprise, surprise) a fire. It's actually difficult to tell its so new and with a ban on photography there will be no photos from any of the monasteries. A similar scene however are the various offerings of food and money; cash is generally very low value notes 1 or 10 BHR (equivalent to 1p or 10p), the food either fruit or packaged goods such as crisps, biscuits & even 2 minute instant noodles. The number of water bowls various from place to place depending on the auspicious number 7 or 8 is common but it can be considerably more. Auspicious is a common theme with auspicious days & auspicious numbers.  

wood carving

From Paro it's a 90 minute drive to the capital city if Thimpu. It's one of, if not the quietest capital cities you might ever find. The only dual carriageway in the country runs through here, but it's full of speed bumps, although this seems unnecessary for the low volume of traffic. For a country of only 700,000 people it is never going to have the biggest capital, but this place is just so peaceful.

After another buffet lunch first stop is the School of Traditional Arts.  Here the students are all in classes replicating the same thing, for example all carving the same relief or sculpting the same figure.  There is also silver work, painting, sewing with much of it taking place unsupervised with us, the tourists wandering in & out & taking photos.

Memorial Chorten

We visit The Memorial Chorten, around which there is a constant stream of devotees circulating, ranging from old men with prayer beads to school children. 
In the evening Jim & I venture beyond the confines of the hotel to find the capital nightlife on a Monday night.  First stop the 'winners pub'. Unfortunately there aren't too many winners in Thimpu, so there's 5 people on the sofa singing karaoke but we get to learn more about the tourist industry from a local reeking guide. Then onto 'Om bar' which is only slightly more populated and has a full sized snooker table.  After knocking some balls around the table for a while it's clear that Bhutan's snooker players are probably about as good as their footballers.

Thimpu