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Published: November 11th 2006
After a first night in the country I wake up to a gloomy and cold Thimphu. Packs of dogs did their best to keep me awake during the night, but will have to try better if they wish to succeed. I didn't really go to bed last night, but collapsed on my bed with the lights still on and the TV force feeding me with the world news, the last I would hear for quite some time. Tshering is picking me up at 7.30 so everything has to be done in a hurry. Anyway, we both have a lousy track record for being late, and around 8 we've finally completed the checkout of the hotel and I meet Mr. Dorji, our driver who is to accompany us for the rest of the trip. Can't remember his exact age, 26 or so. Originally from Gelephu on the Indian border far to the south he traded ten years of cow herding and followed his sister to Thimphu where he got a job as a truck driver. Now he's bee driving tourists around the country for the past two and a half years.
His first mission is to take us to the next
major city to the east, Wangdue Phodrang, or as it is often shortened, Wangdi. To get there you drive southeast out of the Thimphu valley, pass through Simtokha and then follow the snaking highway northeast as it climbes to yet another high mountain pass at Dochu La. Then you climb back down into the lower and much warmer Punakha valley, a giant valley stretching from Gasa in the north, the Punak Chhu river continuing south through Punakha, Lobesa, Wangdi all the way to the plains at the Indian border. The distance to Wangdi is roughly 65 kilometers or so.
After filling up the car at 50 ngultrum per litre (50 ng is roughly one dollar) and attracting the attention of a police officer after making a wrong turn into a one way street we're finally on the way. The old road to Simthokha clings to the southern mountain side and is slowly being replaced with a giant multi-laned highway complete with steet lights down by the river. If you want to experience traffic jams during your stay in Bhutan this is the best option, as the narrow provisional bridge leading to the highway can only accomodate for single lane
traffic, and long queues build up here during rush hour. The new road is hardly opened and already has lots of large potholes, Tshering laments.
Some five kilometers down the road we arrive at Simthokha, still kind of in the Thimphu suburbs, where two valleys interconnect and the first of our target dzongs is located on top of a suitably strategic hill. Of course, the official reason the dzong is located here is to guard over the place where a demon once disappeared into a nearby rock. Disregarding the early military dzongs that were around already in the 12th century, the
Sangak Zabdhon Phodrang dzong here in Simtokha is often regarded as the first major dzong in Bhutan, and the first one to house the combination of provincial administation and a monk body. It is said to be the first dzong constructed by
Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyal, the first king of the country, sometime in the 1630s. Right now the dzong is in a sorry state, in the middle of renovation. You can get an idea of how beautiful it will look when it will be completed, but on this cold and humid morning a quick walkaround and snapping some
Sangak Zabdhon Phodrang
Literally the Palace of the Profound Meaning of Secret Mantras, or if you're lazy, just refer to it as Simtokha dzong.pics is enough.
Twelve kilometers down the road, or rather up, as the climbing towards Dochu La has slowly begun we have to stop at the checkpoint in Lhongtsho for more travel permit inspection. If you have come to Bhutan and find yourself wanting to go beyond Thimphu you will need to have arranged a restricted area permit in advance, otherwise your tour will stop here. After Lhongtsho it is just five more kilometers to go until we reach
Dochu La mountain pass at about 3100 meters. Dochu La is considered one of the best places to spot the Himalayan mountains, and on a clear day a number of peaks close to or beyond 7000 meters can be visible from here. However, clear weather must be considered a gift from the gods, and today we certainly did't accumulate enough merit, as the entire pass is shrouded in chilly clouds.
The other major attraction of Dochu La is a large circular hill sitting in the middle of the road, loaded with
chortens, 108 of them to be precise, forming the shape of a large
mandala. A chorten is basically a building stuffed with holy relics and or thousands upon
Simtokha dzong
Main entrance to the dzong. Notice the original white and red colours of the section which has not yet been restored. The mud and stone walls and woodwork will be painted in these colours once finished. thousands of written prayers on small notes of paper. These particular chortens are of the typical square Bhutanese style, unlike Tibetan or Nepali stupas which are typically rounded. Seeing the number of tourists who transit through here on their way to Punakha, Trongsa and beyond, there is of course a café with attached souvenir shop next door, equipped with a telescope for your mountain viewing pleasure.
Beginning the climb down again we suddenly come out of what feels like some sort of twilight zone, as the road slopes into the Punak Chhu valley the clouds release their grip and start to move back up into the sky where they belong, and even though the overcast remains above our heads the world around us suddenly appears to have colours again. And what colours! Green and yellow rice terraces cling desperately to earthen brown cliffsides steeping down into a cold blue river. Little white specks of farmhouses break up the landscape, and closer inspection of the hillsides reveal a religious institute situated so high up on the other side of the valley that it must be a days work just getting there. We roll into the little village of Thinleygang where
Simtokha dzong
Restoration in da house! one of Tshering's sisters live, and make a short break here before riding the last 10-15 kilometers to Lobesa. That's right, we're actually not continuing to Wangdi until tomorrow, for now we will make our base camp at Hotel Y.T. in Lobesa, one or two kilometers out of Wangdi. We complete check in and I get a large room with wooden beds and a nice bathroom all to myself. There is time for a quick excursion before lunch so we get back in the car and drive a short stretch down the valley.
Jumping out of the car we move on foot towards the
Chimi Lhakang, a small temple on a small hill just by the river. To get there you will need to walk through the villages of Pana and Yoaka and their rice fields. Rice fields are partially submerged in water and you walk and/or balance your way through on small muddy pathways between them. The Chimi Lhakang temple was constructed by
Drukpa Kunley, or the Divine Madman, the better known name of this popular figure. He is infamous for his pursuit of women and wine, and you will typically see him accompanied by one or the
Dochu La mountain pass (3.150 m)
108 chortens have been constructed here, in the shape of a large mandala. In keeping with buddhist practice, the road has been split so that you can pass them on your right. other (or both...) on traditional temple paintings. His unorthodox methods were, he claimed, meant to spread the Buddhist teachings in a more popular form. He also did his fair share of subduing evil demons, and his burning erection served him well in his actions (Sounds like an early recording of STD to me...). You will now see plenty images of his phallos on houses across the country, helping to fend off evil spirits, and if you go visit his temple the monks can offer you a blessing from a wooden dick...
After visiting the lhakang (and declining a blessing) we're back at the hotel for lunch. The staff have prepared a nice buffet of nice and harmless tourist diet of red rice, pork, cooked vegetables, chapati and daal lentil soup. As is the norm here in Bhutan the guests eat in the restaurant, while the staff hide away in the kitchen fed like dogs. Typically they'de be eating ema datsi, the chili & cheese mix of Bhutanese fame. Typically blazing hot, especially when those smaller chilis are put in use, I've yet to meet a Bhutanese who does not like it, even though they confess it can be hard
for them to eat as well.
There's a lot of tourists coming in for lunch, mainly larger groups of Americans, Germans and some French. I am told I need to move out of my double room and the staff will shift my gear into a single room. Where Tshering and Dorji will stay isn't quite certain yet. During high season it is not uncommon for the guides and drivers to be sharing rooms or sleeping on makeshift beds in hotel restaurants or even in the vehicles. During lunch Tshering has been making inquiries about how to get to the village of Chhuzomsa, where we are going to look for the
ropeway to Tashila, and he has managed to get the proper bearing. We jump into the car in the parking lot outside of the hotel which is now flooded with cars, minivans and small buses, requiring some puzzle skills to navigate our way out. Then we drive on towards Wangdi and immediately the impressive
Wangdue Phodrang dzong comes into view further down the valley.
This dzong was also built by the Shabdrung in the 1630s and it sits on a perfect hillspot overlooking the Punak Chhu river and
Some of the 108 chortens at Dochu La
The clouds were literally rolling in while I was composing this photo. the roads leading towards Trongsa in the east and Sarpang on the Indian border in the far south. The road to Wangdi passes a large bridge, and again there is a checkpoint here to restrict traffic flowing into the country. The road then hugs a very steep mountain side as it leads back along the river climbing up to the city of Wangude Phodrang. This particular stretch of road had been marred by an unusual amount of accidents, but since last year there are now eight Tibetan style stupas built alongside the river to aid in subduing the evil spirits believed to plague this area. The situation has reportedly stabilized very quickly after the chortens were built, and it is said that no traces remain of neither cars or drivers going over the cliff and into the water, both having mysteriously vanished.
Following the main street arching through downtown Wangdi in a crescent shape past the large marketplace we are again on the countryside road leading towards Trongsa. The village of Chhuzomsa is located some eight kilometers up the road. Its claim to fame is the mountain cable car leading to the village Tashila high on the opposite side
of the valley, built to transport goods to the village and ferry logs down the hill to the sawmill located here. However, villagers may also ride on the contraption, and it is often used by the monks from a nearby monastery. There are two cars, or actually, wooden boxes, dangling on a pair of cables going up and down respectively. There is a new departure roughly every 30 minutes, and typically a queue of villagers and monks with luggage waiting to cram themselves in. When we arrived we went to see one of the managers of the sawmill, and she was very reluctant to allow us to ride to Tashila. She was mainly concerned with the negative outcome in case there would be an accident. The logic followed a "it doesn't matter if a few locals fall out of a wooden box some 100 meters above the ground, but if there is a foreigner involved there will be trouble"-philosophy. However, so far there had never been any injuries or accidents involving any passenger, but they were clearly not up to the idea.
Tshering kept doing his sweet talking and finally we were allowed to board, but first we were
That's not a lake, THIS is a lake!
On the way from Dochu La me and Tshering suddenly started to talk about lakes. I wondered if there are any big lakes in Bhutan and as it happened we were just passing in the vicinty of one of them so we asked Dorji to take us there. As you can imagine I was quite disappointed... given a piece of paper and a pencil and asked to put our signature to a confession stating that we would be solely responsible in the event of trouble. Why not, bring out the indemnity forms, I'm starting to get used to them by now. However, all this talk had made me kinda hesitant about sending two fathers along in the box... Anyway, in the end we had to pay up some 750 ngultrum for our return tickets, villagers would pay far less than this of course. Then we had to wait around for the ropeway to bring down the next load of wood. We got back into the car and drove down to downtown Tashila and waited it out in front of a bar cum restaurant cum general store. This is something you'll see a lot in Bhutan; practically every commercial building has a rectangular sign above the door informing the reader about the name of the place, typically named after the owner, the specialty of the establishment and in case you forgot, the name of the town and country in which you are located...
Dorji was the first to spot the cable car coming down the mountain
Sunshine at midnight?
Day or night? Hard to tell in the twilight zone inside the cold and humid clouds. and took us out of the discussion about Tshering's plans for investing in a car for his family and we rode back to the logger camp. When these type of bigger investments are discussed you will invariably hear the word "lax" being mentioned; which translates to 100.000 ngultrum. Anyhow, back at the logging camp the workers were busy shifting a contraption carrying wood for one of those little red dangling wooden boxes. Some make shift benches were put inside and then they started to fill the box. A total of seven passengers and some luggage was squeezed inside, a reluctant eight wannabe passenger had to climb back out again and wait for the next ride. As we finally got going the time was already past four in the afternoon and the daylight already began to fade. A diesel engine started to roar and we were set in motion, dangling high over the river in just a few seconds time. The total climb to Tashila is 1200 meters and the ropeway goes in a straight line towards the village, passing above two or three hills and passing the long stretches between them suspended high above the valley.
Below us the
The rice terraces at Thinleygang
It was quite the relief emerging into a warm valley after driving inside the clouds of Dochu La. golden and yellow rice terraces are ready for harvest, but no one is around. A few farmer kids are waving enthusiastically from their houses, and small flocks of birds pass by beneath us. Tshering points to a farmhouse high up on a hill and explains that this used to be his father's house. The villagers that ride with us explain that you can reach a monastery walking on foot from Tashila, but that the walk will take about an hour. With the limited daylight we have available this is sadly not an option. *KA-CHUNK* At regular intervals we pass the wooden poles from which the cable is suspended, and every time the entire box trembles and poor Dorji grips the side of the box harder and closes his eyes. A number of these poles have been reinforced with new beams and some of them look to be in absolutely awful condition. We later learned that the ropeway would be taken offline just a few days later for maintenance. It sounds like a sound idea.
About halfway we encounter the box coming down from the village loaded with people waving to us. From here the ropeway passes the last and
widest gap between the hills, from where you can look down on the treetops looking like small bushes in a large garden. The hill in front of us is quite steep and the car starts gaining altitude very rapidly. Again we are moving into the hilly clouds that cover the valley. Dorji and a villager have spotted a deer below the cable car and the villagers tell us that a tiger has once been encountered here. All we find except the deer are some anxious cows jumping out of the way when our dangling box approaches them. When we reach Tashila and the end of the line we can see a few houses and a small field covered with wood. Our fellow passengers get off and continue home on a tractor while we wait a while for the car to start its descent again.
There are no passengers waiting to ride down to Chhuzomsa so we can spread out a bit. The view from the cable car certainly is spectacular. Green mountains and hills in every direction, and where the slopes allow for it, small white farmhouses and terraces have been built. We can see a larger one story
building on top of a mountain, Tshering explains that it is a school, practically out of the way of the rest of the village, and all the kids will have to walk uphill quite a bit to reach it. Again we meet the other boxcar, this time going up, loaded with monks. My fellow passengers have conquered their fears a bit and try to grasp the branches of nearby trees passing below us. When we are back on the ground there is quite a line of passengers ready to go and I wonder if all of them will be able to ride home today or if they will be forced to walk, something they probably do not look forward to.
Solid ground under our feet again we say goodbye and drive back to Lobesa and dinner at the hotel. I check in again and this time get a small square room just next to the restaurant building. The first thing we see when we switch on the light is a monster sized cockroach that crawls into a whole in the wooden floor. Nice... this light will not be switched off tonight, that's for sure! It is a servicable room,
but not really a place you would want to stay in for more than a night. After a quick shower and almost falling asleep on top of the bed again Tshering wakes me up for dinner. The staff has prepared a new buffet, but this time they have set the tables for the different groups. In fact, they have set two long tables in one end of the room which are now full of two or more loud American groups already into their starters. Then there are two more large tables which are empty, and in the opposite side of the room there is a small table set for one guest. I didn't know I smelled that bad... The dinner is really good, grilled chicken, seaweed rice, spicy vegetables, daal lentil soup, naan bread and green tea. However, the atmosphere isn't exactly the coziest I have been to and I quickly finish my meal to get out of this alienating experience. Back in my room I contemplate what to do about the cockroach menace, but in the end switch off my light and hope that they'll stay away from me...
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Nessa
non-member comment
funny cable!
Hey Mr. Rehn....it's really a funny cable cart...i really feel challenge to experience it!!!! It looks great and makes great heartbeats!!!