Thimphu II

Today we first visited the memorial stupa that was a dream of the third king, but he passed away before fulfilling that. So his wife did it two years after his death in 1974. A wonderful stupa, we could even go inside and see the figures. As in all holy sites you are not allowed to take pictures and you have to take off your shoes. After that we went up to see the big buddha overseeing the town. It was built and sponsored by the Chinese and honestly, it didn’t feel like being in Bhutan visiting that place. Nevertheless impressing sight. Then Tenzin made us see the oldest Dzong constructed in 1626 a bit further out of the city. Beautiful building with so much detailed paintings and woodcraft. The highlight of the day for me were the Tarkins. We went up to the reserve that was a zoo before. They didn’t like the idea of having animals in captivity so they closed to zoo. Since the Tarkin stayed around they decided to do a reserve. There are also other animals in the park but just few of them. The Tarkin is a very unique animal. In their belief one of the guru (I’ll tell more about that particular guru later on) after a meal took the head of a goat and the body of a pig and made the Tarkin. It is the national animal and it really looks funny. We went then for lunch, had a chat with another Swiss couple on tour with the same treking company as we were and visited the weekend market. That one was in the old days only open on weekends, since the demands grew higher it is closed now only on monday and tuesday. Bhutan banned plastic bags so you get everything in a stoff-bag. We could do that in Switzerland, too. After the market we were again free. We went for a last shopping trip, a coffee and a little walk. It is the last evening of Lilian since she is flying back tomorrow. I have another five days in that amazing country. I will have to take my own picture now since Lilian did the job for me. I am a very lazy photographer as Tenzin pointing it out very accurately. After diner we had a cocktail at our favorite spot in Thimphu.Read more