TRAVELLING THROUGH BHUTAN - PHAJODHING, THIMPHU

Last year I went hiking for two days with some of my girlfriends. We went to Phajodhing in Thimphu. I had been there once before in 2015, but it was only a day hike and had gone only till the location of the lhakhangs. But last year was amazing. It was an ad-hoc plan and just like that I decided to go with my cousin and her girl friends. We were ten of us, some meeting for the first time.
The first time I went hiking was with my brother and my nephew, we took two hours to reach till the lkhakhangs (with no rest) and one and half hour on our way back. But that left us with sore body for few days (lol). The second time I went, we took two and half hours on our way up (we rested only once, when we reached the half way). Both the times I went was sometime in October to the weather was just amazing. No rain, no heat and not too cold.

When we reached the lhakhang, we got served with hot tea and biscuits, it was an auspicious day so the monks were performing rituals and were serving every visitors. We visited all the lhakhangs, got our blessings and had our lunch on the ground, and then continued walking up. We had to reach our destination at Thujidra. That was another one and half hour walk up, stopping by in all the small lhakhangs on the way and getting our blessings. By the time we reached up at Thujidra and settled down in the guest house it was 5 pm. Although it was starting to become darker, yet we could clearly see the beauty of the location, the holy water dripping from the mountain and the view downhill, everything was amazing. We had brought our ration for the night and the next day so we started making our dinner in the common kitchen.
I might be giving the impression that there is some sort of pay and use guest house…actually one of the girls in our group knew someone who knew the abbot of Thujidra so we were his guest. Since we didn’t want to impose on him we brought our own ration and used lhakhang’s kitchen for cooking our meals. Because we had an early start the next day we cooked the meals from the night itself and the next morning we all packed our lunches and ate our breakfast. We were done packing and started our walk by 6.30 am. Few of our friends had already requested two monks from the institute the day before to be our guide to the lake (it is very risky to go without a guide for the first time, you don't wanna get lost up on the mountains)

So led by them we started off. I must say, the first half an hour or so was soooooo tiring, it was a steep uphill climb. Once we crossed that treacherous uphill climb it was a beautiful scene, down we saw Thimphu valley and front we saw an unexpected plains which was absolutely beautiful. We were glad to know that from that point on it was pretty much plains, I mean basically we were on top of a mountain peak so no more climb. It was just few ups and downs. Before we started our walk from that point, the two monks lighted incense sticks and said short prayers to the local deity for a safe journey.

We were advised to take sweets to avoid getting mountain sickness and to keep our selves well covered. We walked and walked an walked which felt like forever, but every moment was worth it, the view, the location we all couldn’t help but keep taking pictures. We were told that it usually takes around 6 hours (one way) so we maintained our pace since we had to return to the base by evening. There were so many lakes on the way and we visited all of them from far and said our prayers.                                                             
         
 

On the way we even met some of the tourists and guides returning from trekking. Some were still camped. After almost 3 hours of walking, we decided to stop and have our packed lunch and rest for a while. The spot was breathtaking, almost like in heaven. After the lunch we continued and finally after another hour, we reached our destination. Upon reaching there, the monks once again lit the incense sticks and said the prayers. They advised us not to pollute the late or make loud noises near the lake since it is believed that it will disturb the lake’s deity.

From above the lake looked pretty close but the climb down to the lake was an entirely different story, we had to literally crawl and hang on the shrubs in order to avoid tumbling down to the lake. It must have taken us around 10-15 minutes to reach down safely…haha. Once we reached near the lake we all offered our prayers and cleansed ourselves with the holy late water. We stayed there for at least an hour taking rest and taking a lot of pictures. Once we were contend, we decided to walk back.

Personally for me, the return was very difficult, we started running out of water and we were getting more and more tired. By the time we reached back to end of plains, we were all really thirsty and tired and was dying to reach Thujidra so we can all have something to drink. We reached Thujidra by 2.30 PM and first thing we all did was clustered around the drupchu waiting for our turns. When we reached near the lhakhang, the abbot prepared tea for all of us (how sweet is that?) with which we had biscuits and puffed rice, it was such a treat for all of us.
                              
We started walking towards base by 3:00 pm and since we were all super tired and sore by then, it took us longer to walk down hill, I mean my knees were trembling at times. It was almost 6:00 PM when we reached the base. Looking back at that time, it was two days of sheer joy for me, even with all the walking and knee pains...something I plan to do again in the future. 

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