We had a hotel breakfast of muesli, cabbage, and made-to-order omelets, which was good. We left for Tiger’s Nest at 8 a.m. It was a 45-minute drive or so to the base camp. There were lots of people with ponies for rent to take you halfway up.
It was a beautiful morning: not quite cold enough for a frost, but sunny and little wind to begin with. We were one of the first groups of tourists headed up. It took about an hour to hike up to the cafeteria, which was about halfway up. We had tea at the cafeteria. The hike to the watchpoint was steady and good, but getting to the monastery required hiking down to a waterfall and then back up, about 700 steps in all. The views were great throughout.
We lit a butter candle and peered into the tiger’s nest cubby. The hike and the view were more amazing than the time in the monastery. The hike back up from the waterfall was a little brutal. We were spent by the time we got to the cafeteria. The chilies and potatoes were very spicy; the meal was a buffet for about $5. Choki said he didn’t like it, but we thought it was good, especially since we were so hungry. The wind had really picked up on our descent and the dust was really flying on the path. That was plenty of hiking. We stopped and watched some amateur archery on the way back.
We had to walk across a temporary bridge (2 boards) over the Paro River.
We ducked behind concrete barriers as arrows whizzed past. The targets were 145 m apart, and the archers were using compound bows. We spent 100 Nu on 2 ice cream bars and a terrible snack. We veg’d out at the hotel for a while because we were beat. There were two short power outages during that time. We went out for dinner with Choki and Dorji to a restaurant in Paro. The food was decent, nothing super remarkable.
It was a beautiful morning: not quite cold enough for a frost, but sunny and little wind to begin with. We were one of the first groups of tourists headed up. It took about an hour to hike up to the cafeteria, which was about halfway up. We had tea at the cafeteria. The hike to the watchpoint was steady and good, but getting to the monastery required hiking down to a waterfall and then back up, about 700 steps in all. The views were great throughout.
We lit a butter candle and peered into the tiger’s nest cubby. The hike and the view were more amazing than the time in the monastery. The hike back up from the waterfall was a little brutal. We were spent by the time we got to the cafeteria. The chilies and potatoes were very spicy; the meal was a buffet for about $5. Choki said he didn’t like it, but we thought it was good, especially since we were so hungry. The wind had really picked up on our descent and the dust was really flying on the path. That was plenty of hiking. We stopped and watched some amateur archery on the way back.
We had to walk across a temporary bridge (2 boards) over the Paro River.
We ducked behind concrete barriers as arrows whizzed past. The targets were 145 m apart, and the archers were using compound bows. We spent 100 Nu on 2 ice cream bars and a terrible snack. We veg’d out at the hotel for a while because we were beat. There were two short power outages during that time. We went out for dinner with Choki and Dorji to a restaurant in Paro. The food was decent, nothing super remarkable.
No comments:
Post a Comment