4/27 -- Explore Gangtey

Three ladies hoeing their potato field, visible from our window
when we got up this mornng

We set out for the Gangtey Goepa Monastery, established in the 1600s on a local hill top. We visited with some of the monks and were taken into a back sanctuary with 995 5- or 6-inch tall statues of one of the reincarnations of the head of the monastery, each wrapped in a robe. There used to be 1000 of them, but when they were inventoried during the transition from one leader to the next, 5 were missing. We wondered about the robes and were told that the statues should not be naked in the presence of the Bhuddha statues (though my guess is that the statues were cast with clothing in the design) .

Scarecrow seen along the road to the monastery

Above and below: view of the village and farmland from the
monastery.

Most of the dogs here look uncared for, but this puppy seems
pretty happy/

Monastery and the small village below it.

Entry to the Monastery

One of the paintings in the entry.

A group of young monks we talked to.

A drain gargoyle

Then we had a chance to watch part of a service before walking down the mountain  towards the village. It was a pleasant hike, mostly downhill, and was designed to get us active at 9500+ feet to help us acclimate to the altitude.  We met the non-hiking folks at a little monastery and walked about 15 minutes to our bus, where we headed to lunch.

Ancient stupas as we started our walk.

Practicing using walking poles that I hope will help me go
uphill by supplementing leg strength with arm strength as
well as providing additional stability downhill.

Chimi with two local entrepreneurs who are searching for
rocks to heat hot stone baths, the local variation on hot tubs.

These little structures dot the landscape, where ever there is
running water. Inside is a large prayer wheel that is water
powered and strikes a bell each time it rotates.

Another old stupa

Three generations of women who are waiting for the local
version of a bus -- a truck comes by while we are chatting
and they depart.

The monastery we are hiking towards. We probably covered
3 miles altogether.

This type of design in prevalent and not
necessarily associated with sex. It is seen as
a good luck symbol and a way to ward off evil.
We will visit the Fertility Temple tomorrow and
learn more about it.

 After lunch, we visited the Black Necked Crane Center. This valley is a major nesting place for these beautiful birds, which are considered vulnerable. They summer in Tibet, and we missed their out-migration by a couple weeks. Before going into the center, we encountered a volunteer from Texas who introduced us to Karma, a black crane that was found badly injured in January last year, probably due to a feral dog. Karma is no longer able to fly, though there is some talk of raising money to get a US veterinarian to repair her injured wing. Because the center was not set up for rescue, they had to quickly build an enclosure and now are trying to raise $20,000 to build a proper aviary. They also have a promise from a group in the US that breed Black Necked Cranes that when there is better housing, they will breed a companion for Karma and send it to Bhutan. Even if Karma could fly, she is too accustomed to people and the other cranes rejected her when they tried to reintroduce her to the flock last fall. Since cranes can live 30 to 40 years, giving her a companion seems like a good plan. 

In the center, we learned that the cranes are called Birds  of Heaven by the local people and are considered omens of good fortune. This year, they counted over 450 cranes in this valley and a total of 555 in Bhutan.

Next, we drove down into the area of farms in the village and 6 of us set out to meet local people while the others retired to the hotel. Chimi saw three women  hoeing the potato fields and yelled up to them to see if we could visit. Soon, we were standing in the field, trying our hands at hoeing and talking to them about their lives. They are cousins, two of whom never married. We asked who would take care of them in their old age, and they said the children of their siblings would help. Then the owner of the home we were next to invited us into her house and we spent about 30-45 minutes learning about her, seeing her house, and answering questions about our lives.

Our farmers. Potatoes are a primary crop here due to the
elevation and shorter growing season. Potatoes are a cash
crop and are hauled to the south border for sale.

Lloydene and Jim try hoeing. Lloydene grew up on a farm
and was pretty good at it.

Our host's farmhouse. As you can see, the architecture is
similar to the rest we have see but simpler.

Our host and her granddaughter (in bed) who is trying to warm
up. The walls of the house are less substantial than they first
appear, there is no insulation and occasional gaps where daylight
is visible. Winter here is harsh. It must be like living outdoors
only with protection from the wind. This room is also used
as their bedroom because it is the kitchen and is warmer.

The main living space.

Bedroom space, primarily for guests.

Supplemental kitchen storage in the living room. All very neat,

An entire room the size of the bedroom is dedicated to the
home's shrine.

Then it was back to the bus for our ride to the hotel, for rest, fire-starting, and dinner.

4/26 -- Drive to Gangtey

We left Thimphu early because we had a long drive east to Gangtey in the Probjikha Valley, which was anticipated to take 8 hours plus stops. A good chunk of the road in the east half was under construction and basically at the stage of being a glorified dirt road, so our average speed was unimpressive. Our first stop was at Dochu La pass, which, when clear, provides a great view of the Himalayas. The day started off sunny, but got progressively cloudier as we approached the 10,200 pass.

Simtocha Dzong, near Thimphu, the first fortress/monastery
built by Zhabdrung Rinpoche

In addition to the mountains we couldn't see, there was collection of 108 stupas, built by the eldest Queen Mother (the Father King, untraditionally, married four sisters at the same time....). Stupas here are not burial places like they are in Tibet. They may  contain a variety of relics, but most importantly they have mantras seeking a better life for all. We walked to the top of the hill, then over to the restaurant for tea and restroom break. When we arrived, there were no more than 10 vehicles there, but when we wanted to leave, the place was  jammed with cars, trucks, vans, and buses that had blocked us in. I was amazed that we were able to get out when our driver honked a bunch and two vehicles left to make room for us.

The stupas at Dorchu  La Pass

Jim made it to the top

I wheezed my way up in the high altitude a bit
more slowly.

Monastery or temple behind the restaurant

The mountains we would have seen but for the clouds.

Our next stop was Rinchengang Village, where we went up endless steps to talk to local people. We stopped to speak to a crew building a house and some of us helped out a bit. Sujay mixed the mud mortar and Lloydene, Lisa,  Shelly, and Chimi formed a bucket brigade to move a bunch of big adobe bricks to the front wall of the house. The owner was a woman whose next door house had been made unlivable by an earthquake, so she was starting over and working along with the rest of the crew. When the new house is ready, they will demolish the old one down to the stone foundation and rebuild it. 

Along the way, we stopped to take pictures of grazing yaks.
The next time we saw them, we stayed in the bus....

Roofs here used to be thatched, but needed replacing every
couple years. Now they use metal, but it has a tendency to
peel off in high winds, so rocks on the roof are a common sight.

In this new house, the dirt will be dug out down to the level
of the base of the interior door. They were using the dirt, mixed
with water, just beyond the door to create a mortar to hold the
adobe bricks together.

Chimi (red jacket), Lisa (blue hat), Lloydene (red shirt below
Lisa), and Shelly (unseen) helped move several adobes to
the front of the house as a window foundation.

Up was the operative word here. At an elevation around 8000+
feet, it was our first serious uphill high altitude hike -- tough
for us sea level folks.

 A bit farther up the hill, we met another two women. The younger one was telling us how bad her knees were. Lloydene showed off her scar from her knee replacement surgery and commiserated with the problem of bad knees. The lady said she wished she could trade knees with one of us and Shelly volunteered, pulling up her pants to display her knee and sat next to the woman so they could compare them. In the meantime, two adorable little kids, both girls, ages 4 and 2, showed up and followed us to the top of the hill. We stopped at a carpentry shop and talked to the workers, who were using boards from a project to measure where to cut additional boards.  I pulled out my portable sewing  measuring tape to show them an alternative and ended up giving it to the crew boss. Afterwards, I noticed that the most experienced member of the crew, hired from elsewhere, also had a real construction tape measure.

The first lady we saw as we continued up. She is holding a
winnowing basket for coriandor. Note the partial view of the
painting on the wall behind her. More on that later.

The two friends, aged 58 (left) and 74 (right).

Shelly and the younger lady comparing knees.

The first little one shows up.

The older sister appears. I didn't realize they
were girls til Chimi talked to them later. The
older one reminded me of our grandson, Dylan
(same haircut, same skinny build, same age).

Power tools are not used.

The village, looking down

Terraced fields for the village

Across the river, this dzong is being rebuilt.

We continued to the top of the village to a small temple, but it was closed for the day, so we got back to the bus and continued. After lunch, back on the road, I zoned out til I was shaken awake by the rough roads (our Bhutanese massage) and the slow speeds allowed me to look as the scenery went by. We made one more short stop at a middle school where the boys and girls were outside.They were part of a nature club and were working on building the first of a series of terraced ponds. Only a couple of the boys looked like they were working, and the teacher came and talked to us briefly before it was time to go.

Nature club girls

Boys digging the first pool with lots of supervision

Making beef jerky at a rest stop. Based on other beef we ate,
I suspect the cows die of natural causes rather than being
slaughtered. They also have not discovered the slow cooking
technique to tenderize tough meat.

At another 10,000 foot pass, we got out to walk and look at
a herd of yak, all part of the plan to acclimatize us to high
altitudes so we can survive the Tiger's Nest walk.

Flowers in the pass

The  Probjikha Valley and Gangtey, our home for the next
two nights.

Our hotel in Gangtey looks quite elaborate from the outside and very ski-lodgy on the inside. The most challenging part is that we are responsible for building and maintaining a wood fire in a small stove in our room. In theory, we need to add wood every 20 minutes, which is not going to happen once we go to sleep. We are hoping it does not get as cold as we got in Africa  last year. The lighting is minimal too, and I discovered the difficulty of working on the computer and typing this blog even with my headlight on because there is not a single light on this side of the room. I also goofed in packing by not including backup batteries because Jim's headlight is dead and mine is fading. Only two nights here is a good thing.

Two wings to our hotel in Gangtey above and below.

Our views

 

Our room -- three lamps on the left side, none on the right,
with the wood stove next to the entry.