Unveil the Wonders of Bhutan

The Monpa tribes are believed to the first inhabitants of Bhutan and Mangde Chhu river basin the first areas of settlement largely due to the Monpa communities scattered along this basin. Often referred to by some as the ‘people of darkness’ given their isolation in the past, they are generally known as the people without religion. Monpa villages are closed knit communities, joint families living and working in groups and practicing a religion which is a blend of animistic shamanism and buddhism. A large number of these families live in small bamboo walled thatch huts with a few larger houses. These serene villages are scattered on slopes overlooking the Mangde Chhu river.The monpas still preserve their unique culture and traditions while adjusting to development that is slowly catching up with them. They wear a unique dress called Paghay and speak a language known as monkha. The ever friendly and happy people of these monpa villages will make any visitor feel welcome to experience their way of life and have a peek into their mysterious past.

Bertey is a quaint fishing village located 45 kms away from Zhemgang town, towards Tingtibi and Gelephu. Situated on a gentle slope overlooking the majestic Mangdechhu river. Bertey village is connected to the Tingtibi town via a 5 kms feeder road. Bertey is one of the Khengpa communities under Zhemgang district, communities that to this day preserve and offers to outsiders a glimpse into the unspoiled rural life of the Khengpas. Known for their bamboo weaving skills and their shamanistic way of religion (Bon Choe), the Khengpas lead by example when it comes to the preservation of the ancient culture of rural Bhutan.  For many years Bertey has remained closed to tourism owing to the nonexistence of religious sites or places of significance that usually attracts tourists but not anymore, ever since the identification of Zhemgang district as a birdwatching hotspot, including sightings of the world’s critically endangered White-bellied heron, birdwatching groups have started pouring in to this once isolated district.Bertey is home to the white-bellied heron, a boon to the community that has brought about many positive developments over the years. Bertey is also known for its locally sourced smoked fish, a much sought after delicacy throughout Bhutan. 

A 3 hours hike from a Jangbi, a monpa community, takes you to the next Monpa village called Phrumsor. This hike will give you an opportunity to see some rare birds such as the great hornbills, Rufous-necked hornbill, and a lot of golden langurs. This village still doesn't have motor road access and electrical connectivity. They use small solar powered light source and mostly use firewood as a source of energy. The main cash crops of these people oranges, cardamom, and maize corn. Phrumzor also provides great chance travel photography with its untouched and raw lifestyle.

428 km towards the south-east from the capital city of Bhutan is Panbang town under the Zhemgang District. One needs to take the bumpy road through the magical Royal Manas Park National Park to get to the nearby districts such as Gelephu, Chhukha and so on. The Panbang town is well known for its merchandised well since it is only 13 km away from India. Due to its favorable climate, the natives of that area are interested in organic farming which is highly encouraged in Bhutan. Apart from organic farming, people also practice chicken farming, piggery, fishery and so on. Panbang town is also facilitated with rafting, biking and an ecolodge introduced by Bhutan Foundation as a Community Based Sustainable Tourism.

Wangsa is one of the villages under Katsho Gewog which is the smallest gewog in the district of Haa, situated at an altitude ranging from 2850 to 3100 meters above sea level. The people of Haa are known as a rugged race thriving on tough rugged landscapes, proud guardians of the unique age old cultures and sacred religious sites. With a population largely dependent on livestock production, the people of these villages rear yak and cattle and grow barley, buckwheat and barley as staple crops.  The village of Wangsa has recently opened up to tourism and boasts of some of the best homestays, amazing day hikes, rich cultural heritage and sacred sites in the country. A must visit for an unique rural experience and local food. 

Chokhortoe is located in the northern part of Bumthang district and is the biggest of the four gewogs in the dzongkhag. The village is bordered by Chumey and Ura gewogs to the south, Trongsa and Wangdue Phodrang districts to the west, Lhuentse district and Tibet to the north and Tang Gewog to the east. With covering a total area of 1,533 km2 and with an altitude ranging between 2, 600 to 5,800 meters, Chokhortoe is the administrative seat and the main urban center of Bumthang district. Chokhortoe is made up of 39 spectacular villages, about 660 households, 7 schools, Jakar Dzong and numerous religious institutions and monasteries; making it one of the most culturally vibrant villages in the country. The gewog’s primary socio-economic activities are farming and livestock along with small businesses and small-scale industries known all over the country for the production of the Yathra (the yak wool textile). The food crops produced in the gewog are wheat, barley and oilseed and the cash crops produced are mainly potatoes and vegetables. This spiritually blessed land consists of some of the most sacred monasteries, holy sites and religious festivals. Some of the most important religious festivals in the country are based here, including the Pedseling Kuchoe, Kurje Tshechu, Tamzhing, Phala Choepa, Thangbi Mewang, Jakar Tsechu, Jampa Lhakhang Drup and the Ngang Lhakhang Zhen. These festivals attract thousands of tourists every year. Choekhortoe can be reached by a domestic airport and the east-west highway.

The winding road east of Trashigang leads along the south bank of the Gamri Chhu, dipping in and out of a series of side valleys to the village of Rangjung, 16km (10 miles) to the east. An elaborate Tibetan-style chorten marks the center of town, while the main religious establishment - the Rangjung Yoesel Chholing Monastery, stands on a nearby hill. The charming town is the gateway to the Sakteng Wildlife Sanctuary (the world's only nature reserve created to protect migoi or yeti habitat), as well as a cluster of smaller sites in the isolated valleys surrounding the town. Rangjung and the surrounding area produce excellent examples of the silk cloth for which eastern Bhutan is famous.

A gigantic cypress tree stands below the village as if to welcome you as you approach the magical village of Chendebji, located at the confluence of Khebachu (male) and Maleychu (female) streams. Chendebji literally means the ‘Valley of Cypress’, a village often humorously referred to as one of the three bjis (Chendebji, Rukubji and Tangsibji) that the 15th Century Lama Drukpa Kuenley, the divine madman, refused to set foot on saying he will not visit places where the three bjis meet. The brightly painted village houses add a touch of vibrant colors to the lushly vegetated landscape that surrounds the village and is more famously known particularly for the large 19th century choeten (stupa) located below the highway five kilometers from Chendebji village, a chorten modeled after the Boudhnath Stupa of Kathmandu, Nepal, and the legend of Nyala Dhuem, a ferocious demon who is said to have terrorized the local communities before she was subdued and laid to rest where the chosen stands today.

Khuruthang town in Punakha is small compared to the other cities in Bhutan and the walking duration for a complete round of the town takes only 15 mins. This commercial hub of Punakha district is located along the banks of Punatsangchhu River and it is just 5 km from the magnificent Punakha Dzong. Upgraded to a town in the year 1998, this well structured concrete settlement has always been the point of various types of businesses including the illustrious Sunday market that has attracted numerous tourists as well as locals over the years. While there, you can take a short visit to Khuruthang Goemba which is situated next to the market area.

Dungkhar means “conch shell” in Dzongkha; the village bears its name because the slope on which it is located winds around like the spiral of that shell. The packed-mud houses spread along the hill with fields, cows and chortens in between. The village has a pleasantly faraway feeling to it. It stands as an outpost 3–4 hours by dirt road from the already remote Lhuentse. Here, life continues as it always has. This village is unique, though — in the middle of town, Dungkhar Ngatshang stands out as a four-story mansion among the local farmers’ simple two-story houses. From this noble house of Dungkhar, the Bhutanese royal family descends. The father of the first king of Bhutan, Jigme Namgyel, was born in this house. Later, he left to become the ruler of Trongsa. His son became the first king of Bhutan, a title that has since been passed along the family line. These days, the house stands empty; the royal family resides several days’ drive away in the capital. Instead, a few monks from Lhuentse Dzong act as caretakers. They show interested visitors around the vacant mansion. On the crest of a hill just below Dungkhar Ngatshang, another beautiful four-story mansion houses the Dungkhar Choejay. This noble family also descends from the ancestors of the royal family and from Pema Lingpa. Family members still inhabit the massive house today, and might be willing to offer a tour of their spacious altar room filled with masks used for sacred dances at the annual local festival.

When entering Ura — the highest of Bumthang's four valleys — the neat three-story houses of the lower village cluster around the village's square lhakhang as if seeking warmth and protection against the valley's bitter winters. Locals throughout Bumthang know the Uraps as hard workers; many adhere to a traditional way of life, rising with the sun, coaxing barley and apples from the land, and relaxing with a cup of ara come evening. Here, life has changed little over the centuries. To wander the village's unpaved streets is to step back in time, making it one of the most fascinating villages in the region. Approaching the village from Jakar, energetic visitors can approach the village on foot from the 3,590m (11,778ft) Shertang La on a trail that leads straight to the village lhakhang, which sits slightly above the rest of the settlement like a gold-topped beacon glinting in the morning light. For a longer hike, one can also tackle the 9km (5.6 mile) Ura-Geyzamchu Walking Trail, an old mule trail that winds through pine forest and highland meadows.

Known locally as Shingkhar, Ura Upper Village sits a few kilometers above the village of Ura itself. The village offers visitors a chance to experience Bhutanese country life at its most traditional, as well as access to a varied handful of hiking trails. With fewer than forty households, Shingkhar remains a tight-knit rural community that has resisted many changes and threats from outside. Most recently, the town defeated a plan to sculpt a golf course from the rolling hills that surround the neat village. This proud preservation of environment and culture gives the village a wonderfully Bhutanese feel.

Around a half hour’s drive down an unpaved road, the village of Shingkhar hides over a mountain ridge. The small village, with only a dozen households, twinkles with pristine tranquility. Not much goes on in Shingkhar except for a peaceful, traditional farming lifestyle. The inhabitants raise cattle and cultivate high altitude crops such as buckwheat. In the center of the village stands the Shingkhar Dechenling Lhakhang. On a hill overlooking the valley, locals are currently building a new temple.

Yongphula in Eastern Bhutan is a sparsely scattered mountainous village situated between Kanglung and Khaling, Trashigang. Yongphula is situated along the East-West National Highway. Yongphula is renowned for the Yongphula Domestic Airport which stands at 9,000 feet above sea level, an airport that links Eastern Bhutan with the rest of the country. The other attractions in and around Yongphula are the Yongphula Monastery, Sherubtse College and the sleepy town of Khaling.

Situated on the west flank of the Black Mountains that separate it from central Bhutan's Trongsa district, Phobjikha Valley is a wide, flat glacial carving of such extraordinary beauty that for some Bhutanese, it is their favorite valley of all. Endangered black-necked cranes take winter refuge here between late October and early March, in an annual migration of hundreds of miles from China's Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. Locals have long revered these cranes as heavenly birds and bestowers of good luck, and the marshy valley floor is abundant in a unique dwarf bamboo that the cranes favor. The Crane Festival, popular with locals and tourists alike, welcomes them back every year on November 11. Thirteen other globally threatened bird species also find sanctuary in this quiet and remote valley, a good portion of which is officially protected area managed by Bhutan's Royal Society for the Protection of Nature (RSPN). Avifauna outnumber the 4,700 or so human residents, and Phobjikha has remained almost entirely agrarian while some other parts of Bhutan race ahead in development. Overhead transmission lines for electricity are forbidden, and calls to devote more valley land to growing its distinctively sweet potatoes have so far been thwarted. Phobjikha is part of Wangdue Phodrang district and is 130 km (80 miles) — about a 5 hour drive — from capital city Thimphu. It's often referred to by another name, Gangtey, after Gangtey Goempa, the monastery built atop a small hill in 1613 by the grandson of Pema Lingpa, famed Bhutanese treasure revealer. The Gangtey Goempa courtyard is the site for both the Crane Festival and the annual masked dance festival, or tsechu, held annually from the 5th to 10th days of the eighth lunar month of the Bhutanese calendar. Just to the north is Kunzang Chholing, a Buddhist college (or shedra) where 300 monks study. Gangtey's high elevation of 2,900 m (9,500 ft) has it blanketed with snow in the winter, but nature walks and treks are popular the rest of the year. One moderate 3-day trek from Gangteng Goempa to Kilkhortang Lhakhang passes through the forests of blue pine, birch, and rhododendron that surround the valley, and the 90-minute Gangtey Nature Trail walk is also popular. Tourists can see the black-necked cranes anytime over the winter from the Crane Information Centre viewing platform near the nesting grounds. The RSPN especially welcomes tourists to stay in the homes of Phobjikha Valley villagers. This “community-based ecotourism” is an excellent way to interact with locals and give them an economic boost that aligns with habitat preservation efforts. If you would like to visit Phobjikha with a homestay, add this profile to your Wish List and tell your tour operator.

As it approaches Bumthang from the west, the road snakes up over the 3,425m (11,235ft) Yotong La Pass before dropping down on the far side into the beautiful Chumey Valley, one of Bumthang's four major valleys. Home of Bhutan's tastiest potatoes and the finest wool yathra, Chumey is a wonderful place to wander at will, stopping at remote hillside lhakhangs and sleepy villages along the way. Visit the valley's Yathra Weaving Centre to see the region's characteristic thick woolen fabric being produced, or explore Nimalung Lhakhang, site of the annual Nimalung Tsechu held each summer.