Bhutan, Day 9, Tue, Nov 15, 2011
Early this morning I felt greeted by a day that seemed to be filled with serenity and a reassuring comfort. That was a good omen, I thought. This is a long travel day from centrally located Trongsa to Punakha, our two night stay town, half way to Thimphu. The Bhutanese newspaper reports that according to the local astrology, this is an inauspicious day to travel. This is disturbing as there are concerns about rains, possibly heavy rains today, and the possibility of snow on the one high pass we will encounter. I simply can't imagine traveling on these Bhutanese roads when bad weather makes them more difficult or more treacherous. They do not have snow tires for vehicles or chains. When it snows a lot, which it does - these ARE the Himalyas after all - they just close the roads. So a fair amount of this country lives in isolation in the winter. So, ... a day radiating clearity and comfort is quite welcome.
The sky presents a high cloud cover and the low valley has collected all the fog in sight which is mimicking the river flowing gracefully down the valley, wherever the speeding river may direct it. The Dzong down the hill and the far valley hillside are clear and crisply visible.
Breakfast awaits us at 6:30, and our journey, now not seeming quite so ominous and uncertain, is ready to spring into action at 7:30 sharp, with, 'bells-on-it's-toes'.
The mornings travel was unremarkable, except to say the Bhutanese Weather Gods smiled kindly on us and the traffic was blessedly light. Our driver Ka Ka is so good.
We lunched in a very small rustic village. The Restaurant was primitive but delightful. The proprietor was a friend of our guide who used to guide for the same company. We did not order. He brought enough food for 4 people. But that's ok as they reserve food that we don't serve to our plates. Is was interesting, but "fun". Next to the restaurant was a very active chilly pepper market. It struck me larger and more active than a town of this small size would support .
An hour into the afternoon's drive Thinley, our very fine guide suddenly said we must stop here and motioned toward a large flat area in the rock wall to our right. It was a cave maybe 50 feet tall, 100 feet wide and likely 30 feet deep with several paintings and writings on the wall. Wow, I recognized it immediately! Bhutan's most well know movie: Travelers And Magicians had a number of scenes shot here. I've seen the movie a number of times. As I looked around, quite a bit of the movie was shot within a few hundred yards of the cave.
Long drive finely made it to Punakha. Lovely hotel: great room with a view. Crash til dinner, then early night after eats.
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