Bhutan - Nov 2011

Tiger's Nest

For our 10th Anniversary trip, we wanted something really special.  We loved our trip to Nepal six years ago, so we did some research on similar places.  We finally settled on Bhutan, "The Land of the Thunder Dragon" which while not well known, is quite famous for being listed in some places as one of the happiest country in the world, and measures Gross National Happiness instead of GDP.  What's not to love?

Accommodation:
Hyatt Bangkok - Back again!  We loved this hotel last time (free on points!) so we came again.  This time the general manager of the Hyatt in Denver had arranged for us to get an upgrade - so we showed up to a wonderful suite (room 1722).  

Amankora - Aman resorts owns five lodges in Bhutan and we went to four of them.  We found the hotels after looking on the Backroads web site and found that several of their overnights were at Aman.  The hotel coordinates the entire trip (including a guide and a driver) and is all-inclusive.  After we had booked this trip, we "test drove" Aman at their Jackson Hole location - which was glorious.  The rooms are mostly the same with a large bedroom and bathroom made completely of wood and decorated in a minimalist style.  The showers are our second favorite (the first being at a safari camp in Namibia) - the water comes from the ceiling and falls down on you like rain.  The architecture is in keeping with the local area -- using wood, colors, and stones as each valley does.  The service is exceptional - with more than a 6 to 1 staff to guest ratio, they are totally dedicated to customer service.  

• Punakha - The main house of the lodge belonged to the royal family and became part of the Aman hotel in 2005.  The style of the building is traditional for the area with carved wood and colorful paintings on the outside.  In the main house is a dining room on the first floor and reading / lounge rooms for guests on the second floor.  There are only 8 rooms here.  

Aman Punakha

• Bumthang - The structure of this lodge is more modern with tall, white stone walls.  There is a large dining room with a long table that seats all of the guests.  While there are 16 rooms at this hotel, only two of them (including us) were being used so we had our meals at smaller tables in the large lounge room.  Outside, there is a fire pit that they lit at night where had a drink and gazed at the stars.  One of the evenings, they had a cultural dance where the local women came and sang.  After 3 dances, they encouraged audience participation so we got up and did a few dances with them (the steps were rather basic).  Keith looked like he was in pain as he is not a fan of cultural dances!

Aman Bumthang

• Gangtey -This lodge is perched on a hill overlooking the wide valley.  It is largely made of light wood with tall glass windows in the lounge/dining room to soak in the views.

Aman Gangtey

• Paro -This lodge is the largest of the chain in Bhutan with 24 rooms.  It is outside of town with great views of the surrounding mountains.  The building is stone and wood and the style is similar to the other hotels.

Aman Paro

Activities:
Getting There
Our flight schedule was Raleigh to Chicago to Hong Kong to Bangkok (with a two night stay in Bangkok to get time zone adjusted) and then on to Bhutan.  It was quite an adventure just trying to get there.  The level of service you get with airlines these days is up there with the IRS and certainly takes some patience and a good attitude.  At the airport in Raleigh, the American Airlines agent was having trouble getting our boarding passes to print as her printer kept jamming.  While we had our tickets to Chicago, she could not get any of the remaining legs to print.  Her solution to this was to have us wait until we got to Chicago to have one of the agents there do it for us.  We suggested that she step to another computer to do it but somehow that did not seem like something she could do.  We then suggested that we have another agent at the desk do it and her response was "well, I guess you could try that".  Interestingly, she was the one assigned to the First Class check-in line - nothing like putting up the best for your best customers.  So, we stepped aside and sure enough the next agent was able to help us.

We arrived at the gate to find that we were in Zone 4 for boarding but since Keith has Gold status, we should have been in Zone 1.  Since we were carrying on our luggage (as we vowed after our trip to Thailand when my luggage was lost to never check on again), we were nervous about getting our bags on the plane.  Keith asked the agent at the gate if she could reprint it and while she could clearly see in the system that he was Gold, her response was "there is nothing I can do, the system will not allow it".  He even suggested to her that she write Gold on the ticket but that was not acceptable either; nor would she just let us board with Zone 1 by remembering our faces.  We had visions of the movie Meet the Parents when the agent would not let Ben Stiller board until his zone was called even though there was no one left in the gate area.  To top it off, one of the agents was being a luggage nazi and pulling aside anyone who had luggage that looked a little larger.  Thankfully, she was preoccupied chastising someone so she did not notice us when we slipped by.

We had about a 5 hour layover in Chicago so we went over to the international terminal to relax to a nice lunch and a glass of wine.  When we arrived there, we found out that their was only a small food court so our leisurely, romantic lunch consisted of a gyro and a small pizza from Uno's.  Once at the gate, the agent walked over to us and decided to weigh our luggage.  She told us that it was too heavy and would need to be checked -- you can imagine the fear in our eyes as she said this as we knew that fate would not be on our side.  What we could not understand is that she did not weigh anyone else's luggage.  So, skeptically and begrudgingly, we gave up our luggage (as if we really had a choice) and hoped for the best.

On the plane from Chicago to Hong Kong, the person who was sitting behind us reeked of alcohol.  The flight attendant came over and asked if he had taken a glass of champagne from business class.  As he sheepishly handed over the glass, he spilled it everywhere making the smell even worse.  The flight attendant then told him that they could not serve him any alcohol on the trip.  Before we could even take off, he threw up about four times in the sickness bags.  The guy who was sitting next to him found another seat and so as appalled as we were, we realized that this was a smart move on his part as the drunk guy now had a whole row to himself!

When we finally got to Bangkok, we stood at the luggage carousel biting our nails with visions that our bags were in Alabama.  Much to our (happy!) surprise, both of our luggage showed up.  So, we quickly went on to catch a taxi to our hotel.  The cab driver, driving a hot pink cab, had not shut the trunk properly and so we laughed that it would be funny if we lost our bags to the highways of Bangkok after all this time!  Thankfully, the travel gods were on our side and we (and our bags) arrived at the hotel safely.  At this point, we got to the hotel at about 1am Bangkok time which for us was noon so you can imagine that our sleep clock was quite messed up.  So, wide awake, we decided to order a bottle of wine and relax to email and reading our Kindles.

Bangkok

Dinner at Sirocco

We arrived in Bangkok in the middle of the massive flooding - we could see the flooding as we flew in and there were sandbags all over the central business district in case the water went higher.  The goal of our time in the city was really just to get time zone adjusted and give us wiggle room in case we had problems with flights.  So, we mostly spent the day in the hotel: breakfast in the club lounge, watching Bad Teacher and Cars2 on the iPad, and having a Thai massage at the hotel spa (which was totally relaxing).  We had dinner at the famous Sirocco restaurant (see description below).

Bhutan - Punakha
It was a 4:15 am alarm that work us up to get to the airport for our flight to Bhutan.  We were met at the Drukair check in by an Aman representative who had already arranged to get us good seats on the flight.  A quick shot through security put us at the gate nice and early.  The biggest surprise was that as we pulled away from the gate, the captain started explaining that the flight was to Dhaka.  We exchanged a look of panic, quickly referred to the airplane magazine, and eventually figured out that we had a stop through Bangladesh.  The flight was quite easy and we ended up in Paro at about 11am.

Outside security we met our guide Namgay and driver Sonam who would be with us for the whole trip.  It was a 4 hour drive to Punakha, but we stopped via the Aman in Thimphu (the capital of Bhutan) to have lunch.  Before heading out, we stopped by the bank to change some money - the bank did not seem to have a single computer and was something out of a western movie.  The guide pointed out a few sights along the way, including the Fort in Thimphu, a bronze statue of Buddha standing over 100 feet tall and a temple built by Bhutan's Iron Bridge Builder.  The drive took us via Dochu La pass, though with the rain and clouds we could not see anything.  The roads were windy so we both opted for a nap for the rest of the way.

We arrived at our hotel around 4:30 pm and relaxed in our room for a couple of hours, reading, before we went to dinner in the hotel.  We were pleasantly surprised to find that they had set up a table for the two of us in a private room with flower petals on the table that spelled out "Happy Anniversary".  So, we had a romantic dinner, enjoying Bhutanese cuisine (curries) and a nice salmon dish.  We retreated to our room to sleep and within minutes, 3 hotel staff were at our door with an anniversary cake for us to share.  Since we were both stuffed, we saved it to graze upon the following day.

One of the highlights of Punakha was visiting the famous Punakha Dzong on the banks of a river.  It is half administrative and half temple, and supposedly contains the remains of Bhutan's first ruler Shabdrung Nawang Namgyal.  It is also the winter residence of the monastic order's leader and his entourage of monks.  The painting on the temple wall included the story of Buddha which our guide interpreted for us.

Punakha Dzong

Local Farmers

Other highlights of our time in Punakha included a hike to the Khamsum Yuelley Namgyal Chorten temple (built 7 years ago by one of the queens - the king has 4 wives, all sisters), a walk through a village to a fertility temple (Chime Lhakhang) built by the divine madman (who claimed that he was powerful based on the size of his genitalia), visiting a nunnery (Sangchhen Dorji Lhuendrup Lhankhang) which was built by the father of the 4 Queens (where we actually saw the father who was visiting that day) and visiting a monastic school.  We also had a picnic lunch high above the valley, biked down a steep windy road and cycled along the river back to our hotel.  At the fertility temple, we were 'blessed' by what is claimed to be a remnant of the madman's genitalia (really just a 10 inch carved wooden stick) and since we do not want children, we were blessed to have a long and happy life (which we would claim can be accomplished by not having children).

Punakha Fertility Temple

Bhutan - Bumthang
The drive to Bumthang was quite long - it was supposed to take about 8 hours but at one point we had to wait 1.5 hours for the road construction crew to finish their work so it took us about 10 hours to get to the hotel.  We stopped along the way to stretch our legs by taking in some of the views as well as visiting a few of the sights, including the Trongsa Dzong which is the ancestral home to Bhutan's monarch and is now inhabited by many monks.

Trongsa Dzong

Given the long drive, we decided that we did not want to be in a car the next day so we hiked and biked all day visiting the sights around Jakar which is the town in the Bumthang valley where we stayed.  Along the way, we visited several temples including Jambay Lhakhang (built in 659), Kurjey Lhakhang (where there is a body print of Guru Rinpoche), Kurjey Drupchu and Tamshing Lhakhang (where there is a 25 kg suit of chain armor that you wear while walking around the temple 3 times to forgive all of your sins - Keith did it and is still not absolved of all of his indiscretions).  We ended the temple excursion with a tour of the rather small Panda Brewery, owned by a Swiss guy, where they make a great weissbier (only ~75,000 bottles a year).  It was fascinating as everything they do there is manual, from the bottling to the labeling and packing.

Kurjey Lhakhang

Villagers Hoisting Prayer Flag

The following day we explored the nearby Tang valley which is quite beautiful with surrounding mountains and hills.  We hiked up a hill and visited the Ugen Chhoeling Palace which is now a museum containing artifacts of local traditions and how the people live.  After we hiked down, we had a nice picnic lunch along the bank of the river and then we stopped by to see the Mebar Tsho (known as the burning lake) which is where scriptural treasures from Guru Rinpoche were discovered.  It is considered one of the many important sights in Bhutan and thus was adorned with prayer flags and small ornaments.  On our drive to the burning lake, we stopped by a local village to watch them hoist up a prayer flag which is about 75 feet tall.  There were about 15-20 men from the village trying to get the flag up, each with their own opinion on how to best accomplish this feat.  It was fascinating to watch as they used wooden blanks and ropes to try to steady the flag as they slowly pushed it up.  Our guide told us that it is quite dangerous as often the flag will fall down, snap in half or pop out of the ground where they are trying to secure it.  Since the process can take up to 3 hours, we couldn't stay to see if the mission was accomplished.  On our way back to the hotel, we walked around the Jakar Dzong which is a large white fort, perched on a hill overlooking the town.

Tang Valley

Bhutan - Gangtey
The drive to Gangtey took about 5 hours but took longer with a few stops along the way.  In Trongsa, we visited a museum which used to be the watchtower for the dzong.  We also stopped to have a picnic lunch on the grounds of one of the stuppas - we relaxed, read and watched a few of the elderly woman from the village saying their prayers as they walked around the stuppa 108 times (this number is significant in  Buddhism).

Longtey Hike in Gangtey

This valley is known for the black neck cranes that migrate there every winter from Tibet.  We had a wonderful day exploring the valley by going on the 5 hour Longtey hike, starting at in the Longtey farming village and crossing over a pass with great views of the valley below.  Along the walk, we saw some of the cranes although not close enough for pictures.  We also got to witness some of the farming practices up close as we hiked through some of the villages.  We ended the hike at the crane information center which was not very informative.

Gangtey Valley

Potato Shed Dinner

We had quite a treat for our evening meal as we enjoyed a very romantic dinner in the potato shed - we know it doesn't sound romantic but it truly was.  The shed is made of stone and inside, it was lit up with about 75 candles.  There was a table with bench seating along with blankets and hot water bottles if we got cold.  We were served with local bread, dumplings and a 6 course Bhutanese curry dinner, followed by desert.  The meal was very flavorful and the experience unforgettable!

Bhutan - Paro
It took us about 6 hours to get to Paro from Gangtey, stopping again at the Dochu La pass, this time with amazing visibility.  Near the top of the pass is the Dochu La Hotel, where we used a private room for lunch and used the powerful binoculars to see the mountains in the distance, including the highest peak in the country -- Gangkhar Puensum at 7541 meters.  Less than a kilometer from the pass is a set of 108 chortens that were built in 2005.  

Gangkhar Puensum Mountain from Dochu La Pass

Paro valley is probably the most beautiful as you are closest to the Himalayan mountains so you can get some stunning views.  It is also famous for the location of its most visited site -- Tiger's Nest (also known as Taktsang Palphug Monastery). We got up early to hike Tiger's Nest which takes about 4 hours in total round trip.  The hike was steep in some places but not too difficult.  When you get closer to the top, there are 723 steps to take to get to the final point.  Along the way, you see different views of the temple and get amazed that they could build a structure like this on a steep cliff.  The temple was originally built in the 1600's but it burned down in 1998 so the villagers were required to help in the rebuild which took 4 years to do.  Inside the temple are large, bronze statues of Buddha and Guru Rinpoche as well as the cave where the guru supposedly meditated for 3 months after flying across Bhutan on his tiger to subdue the demon of the valley.  The cave is only opened once a year for people to see so we only got to see the top of it.

Tiger's Nest

Paro Dzong

Following the hike up to Tiger's Nest, we visited the Paro Dzong and the Kyichu Lhakhang temple, which is said to have been built on the same day as the oldest temple in Bumthang along with 106 other temples that were built in 659 on the same day in Bhutan, Tibet and Nepal by King Songtsen Gampo.

In the evening, we enjoyed a 'hot stone bath', accompanied with champagne, followed by a one hour massage.  The hot stone baths are popular and involves a square tub that is cordoned off on one end where they roll in red, hot stones that is used to heat the water.  The also put some herbs in the water, said to help you heal.  It was definitely a fun experience and worth doing once.

The highlight of the valley and the trip was our 6.5 hour hike starting at Chelela Pass (at 3988 meters), hiking up to about 5,000 meters to one of two sky burial sites for the valley.  The views of the surrounding Himalayan mountains were stunning and probably the best views we've ever had on a day hike.  You could see 360 degree around and we even saw a mountain in India.  We ran into a few other guides from the hotel and hiked part of the way with them.

Chelela Pass Hike

Sky Burial Site

At the sky burial site, there was an 8 year old who had been placed there the day before but fortunately, one of the guides ahead of us saw it first and with the warning, we chose to hike around it and not take a peek.  Sky burials are common in Bhutan, mainly for children younger than a year old as it is considered the best way to bury someone.  For the sky burial, the deceased is tied up, spread eagle, on the mountain and is left for the vultures to eat.  If the vultures do not come within a few days, the caretaker then spreads butter and flour on the body to entice the vultures.  The fact that there was an older child up there was unusual and surprising for the guides.  The rest of the hike took us across a few more 'hill tops' (as they are only mountains once you hit over 6K in meters) and then down through the forest to one of the valleys where we were picked up by our driver.

Thailand, London, and Home

Dinner at Vertigo

Our flight home stopped via Bagdogra India - arriving in Bangkok at about 5 pm.  We quickly passed through immigration, picked up our bags, and then headed into town to have dinner at the Vertigo restaurant atop the Banyan Tree Hotel.  It was quite the ride to town, with a taxi driver who was either super tired or a little drunk (or both).  We made it to the hotel just in time for our 7 pm reservation - though Keith had to do a quick change in the hotel restroom so he was presentable.  We were back to the airport by 9:30 pm, in plenty of time for our flight to London.

We both slept well on the flight to London, where we arrived at 5:30 am.  We headed out through customs as we were to meet our friend Charlie at 6:20 am - alas we never saw him as he had slept in!  We headed back into the terminal and caught our direct flight to Raleigh, where John picked us up from the airport to get to the house by 5 pm. 

Observations:
Geography/Scenery - The area reminds us of a mix of Switzerland (with rugged snow-capped mountains and cute farm houses with beautiful paintings on the walls) and Peru (with deep, steep, lush valleys and sheep and yak dotting the hillside).  We were amazed at how clean everything is - we were expecting to see some of the trash and dirt that you find in Nepal or India.  On the steep hills, they have created terraces for farming which makes the hillside even more beautiful.  

Culture - The country still practices many of their traditions.  The people are required to wear their customary clothing (Gho for men and Kira for women) when they are visiting the temples and ancient sights and many of them wear this on a daily basis.  The main source of income is farming and thus many of the families still live together as three generations to help with the crops.  Buddhism is the only religion practiced and it is deeply rooted in their daily lives, praying and visiting the temples to make their offerings.  Prayer flags surround all historical and religious sights and tall white prayer flags are seen on the hillside to commemorate the deceased.

Route - Bumthang airport is due to open in Dec '11.  Once it does, we think the best option would be to fly into Paro and immediately fly to Bumthang, then work your way back to Paro via the road.  This would eliminate ~12 hours of driving.  

Restaurants:
Sirocco - Perched on top of the 64th floor of the Lebua Hotel in Bangkok, this restaurant is listed as one of the top 10 rooftop restaurants in the world and with good reason.  It has stunning 360 degree views of the city of Bangkok and the food is amazing.  The restaurant became ever more famous with the scene in Hangover II when the actors were at the rooftop restaurant meeting with the crime figure, Kingsley.  We kicked off the evening with a drink at the Sky Bar and then sat down for dinner.  Keith started with the pork belly appetizer and had the Waguu beef for an entree.  Shawna started with the Alaskan crab and ravioli appetizer and had the scallops and crab ravioli for an entree.  We shared the molten chocolate cake with a scoop of cinnamon ice cream for dessert.  Both of our meals were really tasty - we highly recommend going here!

Amankora - All of our meals while in Bhutan were at the lodges (or picnics provided by the lodges) as the meals and drinks were included.  Every meal had a choice of either Bhuttanese food or Western food so we switched between the two throughout.  Bhuttanese food is mainly rice with a variety of curries.  Chili peppers is a common ingredient and thus the food has a nice spice to it.  The Western options included grilled fish, beef or some type of pasta.  All of the food was very tasty.

Vertigo - On our way home, we had a 8 hour layover in Bangkok so we opted to head into the city for one last dinner.  This restaurant is located on the 61st floor of the Banyan Tree hotel.  We thought this was a more romantic venue than Sirocco - with the top somewhat reminiscent of a boat.  While the menu did not seem totally creative, the food was excellent: we started with the Lobster Spring Rolls and a Mediterranean Salad, shared the beef ribs for our entree, and had a wonderful mango dessert.

For more photos of this trip: