Road Repairs and Snow at the Pass

I got up this morning and got a nice fire going, using up my remaining pine sticks as I was checking out today. I packed and then joined the other group for breakfast. We would all be making the long drive back, this time stopping in Wangdue. While they all piled in to a minivan, my driver prepared my nice roomy seat, complete with a fresh beer. He normally stocked this with bottled water but I guess there were still quite a few beers that had to be drunk. This was the perfect beverage for the road that awaited us. This time we had the added element of snow as we headed back over the passes.


Before we got too far we found that with the snow, part of the road collapsed, and as this was the only way in and out of Bumthang, we had to wait until they cleared and repaired it.




Once we got going again we went back to sharing some music and a little conversation.


Along the way we stopped at the Trongsa Dzong, which we had seen from the road on our way out.


While the inside was much like other Dzongs, this one offered amazing views down the valley.




We walked around the courtyards a little before going in to the temple.






Even though I had seen this architecture so many times before, it still impressed and amazed me. I loved these places and could spend hours exploring.




We headed in to a temple and I would be given another lesson, however, this time it was one that I had been taught many times before, but clearly could use a refresher on. I made an offering and my guide told me of the history of this temple, before going to do his chanting, as he had done with all of our temple visits. I went to meditate, and with my last experience so profound, could not wait to let go again. However, I just finished my second beer (hey, we had a lot of time to wait for that road to be cleared), and while physically I was relaxed, thoughts were jumping in to the forefront of my conscious mind and I could not free myself of these distractions. A subtle reminder from the universe. Afterwards, a little disappointed, I went monk watching instead.








There were a few monkeys playing up in the rafters. I also noticed that every door had a small rectangular hole in it on the bottom right, turns out this is so cats can come in and chase away the mice.


Some sage that would be burned as incense.


We headed out towards the pass.




As we approached the pass we started to see some early signs of snowfall, really just a light dusting.


We stopped here to warm up and have some tea.


The lady inside was able to make tea on one of the same crappy fire/hotboxes I had in my room at the lodge. You can get a feel for how hot the outside of the unit gets as she was able to boil water on top of it.


We said thank you and good bye and started out.


My guide was a little cold and made a brief stop at the gift shop for an extra blanket.


We continued on and while this road was closed, ours was not.


More yaks.


As we approached Wangdue we got to the corner where we saw a truck go over the edge three days ago, somehow they had pulled it back up. We stopped for a break and my guide asked if the driver survived, he did not.




We got to the hotel in Wangdue, which was right on the river, and easy to fall asleep to the sound of the rapids. The electricity worked, it had a great heater that required nothing more than the flick of its on-off switch, and if you turned on the shower and then went to dinner, by the time you got back there would finally be a hint of hot water. For dinner, rice, noodles, deep fried vegetables, and of course, your choice of chilies. This place was strict vegetarian, so no meat could be found anyplace. After my dinner and shower, I flicked on the heater and crawled in to bed, it had a nice hard mattress and I was asleep in no time.

VIDEO: Day 7 - Trongsa