The school year gets off to a slow
start here in Bhutan. The set date in the calendar is Feb 10 for teachers to
report to school, however that is a Sunday so it would shift to Feb 11. But the
Bhutanese new years celebration, Lo Sar, is Feb 11-12, so we report to school
on Feb 13. Hence the trip to Phobjikha to see the black necked cranes.
The bus loads up, full, full and
leaves at 2:30. I am happy to have purchased tickets in the morning and we do
have seats but they are near the back of the bus. The distance can be covered
in a car, as I now know, in a bit more than 2 hrs. Four and a half grueling
hours later, lots of road construction, many stops, music blaring from speakers
right over head with an occasional full song and lots of 3 second snippets, we
pull into Phobjikha. It is dark, everyone on the bus is going home for the
holiday, we are trying to find our lodging. After several attempts to ask and
the aid of the helpful son of the inn keeper who calls to us and shows us the
way we find ourselves in very comfortable inn where 2 others of our BCF group
are waiting to join us for dinner. They give us good info about walking the
area and we head to bed.
The valley is quite large with a
very flat bottom, not at all similar to the ravine like gorges we have crossed
previously. The valley sits at about 10,000’ and is only a few miles long
before it disappears into one of the aforementioned gorges. There are several
hundred of the regal, highly endangered, black necked cranes in the area.
During a morning walk we see perhaps half that number. This is a wintering
ground for this flock and all the cranes summer in Tibet. They fly over the
Himalaya to get there. Quite a habitat these creatures have. We head back to
Yueli Kiis, the hotel, and have a bit of impromptu lunch outside in the sun
enjoying the view. Again the helpful son is assisting us with arranging a ride
back to Punakha. The prices are much higher than anticipated and the options
limited. Suddenly he has a brilliant idea, he calls a cousin of his with a car
who is a tourist guide and arranges a ride for a more acceptable price and he
gets to go to Punakha as part of the deal. Very shrewd is this 16 year old. The
guys are good company on the way down, they share a lot of interesting
information and quiz us a bit about the west.
As we were waiting for our ride we
watched as a woman, with several assistants rotating in to help, was setting up
to weave a piece of fabric. Her work stretched the full length of the bit of
sidewalk in front of the main store. Big rocks held it taught and she was tying
multicolored threads to matching threads, her assistant walking back and forth
with a spool and another stick so that she could stretch 3 threads at a time.
The sun was warm and it was a beautiful day. I could not understand the answers
I got about the time it would take to finish the project. It looked like months
to me but who knows?
We met up with our two comrades at
Punaka Dzong, they had hiked a good bit of the way and then caught a ride. The
Dzongs are combination historical fort, Buddhist temple, and seat of current
government. This one is quite large and is the winter home of the monk body of
Bhutan. We walked across the longest extension bridge in Bhutan and up to
another BCF teachers house to spend the night.
By Monday afternoon I should be
back in Gaselo with a day to get myself ready, whatever that might entail. I
think laundry by hand, out back under the spigot, is part of the plan.
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