Good Bye and Kadincche, Bhutan!

The Punakha Dzong

 Punakha - they grow barley, wheat etc.  later also rice

After we returned from Haa, we drove to Punakha, which is the province immediately east of Thimphu. Tsewang had already last summer suggested we include this in our itinerary, but we didn’t as you pay a high daily rate to come to Bhutan. We had prioritized the trek. Coming here after all, is probably the only positive in Craig’s mind, after abandoning the trek.

Our last few days in Bhutan

Craig has attached a link at the end, with 360 degree pictures he discovered he can take on his phone.

The weather continued drizzly, cloudy, and cool, with a little sun for short periods. This made not being out on the trek easier to accept. In the past, many people, especially the villagers, had summer homes, and pastures, in Thimphu, and winter homes in Punakha, as it is at a lower elevation.
The Dzong here is beautiful. Dzongs are large structures, or compounds with several different buildings. They are used as administrative centers for the districts, and they all include temples, and housing for the monks.
The Bhutanese, like I remember also the Nepalese, repaint, or touch up everything when the colors fade. The Punakha Dzong is recently renovated, and the most beautiful of the 3 we saw.

Tsewang had learnt about the value of conservation from foreign friends, and contacts, and has been involved in trying to preserve antiques here. Am afraid he was not too impressed with the current efforts to this end, despite 9 young monks having been trained in conservation through his contacts and initiative. He is hoping to establish a small museum next to the temple in Haa, when he retires.

Old bad deities were conquered in Punakha by the ‘Divine Madman’ in the 1500s. He did so using his penis, and to most of us westerners, it’s pretty weird to go here. Will include a couple of
graphic pictures. Seems to me the Bhutanese are far less concerned than we are about openly discussing, and displaying what at home definitely would be found in ‘adult stores’. Presumably this is because they honor this Lama’s accomplishments.

After Punakha, we did day hikes from the hotel, often to temples high up in the hills surrounding the city. Many of these temples can only be supplied by pack horses, and you have to walk there via steep paths.
Tsewang reads the weather much better than the forecasters, as we escaped the rain 99% of the time, despite a poor forecast. We even saw the sun!

His wife’s nephew is a monk at one monastic school we visited. This teenager attended  regular school x 8 years, and now has several years of Buddhist studies ahead of him. Not all monks who enter the monastic schools finish, and some of the ones who leave, can function as ‘lay monks’ in more rural areas. Tsewang said it’s mostly people with fewer resources, or those who don’t know to value education, who send their boys to monastic schools from the start. Nowadays, the regular schools offer a modern education of a much higher standard than these. Tsewang would like the monastic schools to also include a more general curriculum ASAP.
At each of the 2 monastic schools we visited, we saw boys who were reincarnations of lamas. They are given special instruction.

All in all, we very much liked our visit here! And this is in large part due to Tsewang being such an experienced, and knowledgeable guide. Up ‘til now, we always winged things traveling, and will likely continue to do so. But we have learned the value of a good guide, when visiting a place you might want to learn more about than what you experience on a bike, or walking by yourself. So thanks again, Muffy - both for being our guide in Chiang Mai, and for recommending Tsewang!

Until now we have been incredibly lucky weather-wise since we left home. Seems our luck has run out, as the forecast for Leh, Ladakh, in the Indian Himalaya, is a winter-one, and for Agra, with the Taj Mahal, a dangerously hot one.
We are descending into Delhi as I write this, and will discuss options with our new guide here.
Bhutan photospheres