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Following the footsteps of the Divine Madman along the Trans Bhutan Trail

It was my first official day of hiking along the 500-year-old  Trans Bhutan Trail (TBT). We had set off early in the morning from Dochula Pass, at 3100 m (10,171 feet) walking through thick Rhododendron forests and whistling to scare off Himalayan bears and tigers. While thankfully we didn’t run into a bear or worse, a tiger, we did see a pack of gray-faced Langurs, a species of monkeys that live in the forests of Bhutan.

Today’s hike would bring us along a special part of the TBT that is known as the “Divine Madman’s Trail” and of course like all things in Bhutan, there was a famous legend behind it.  “Bhutan is a land of stories,” Singay told me while we descended through the forest to a beautiful verdant valley. “What I love most about the Trans Bhutan Trail is that is a walking museum of history, legend, and culture. And this hike is no exception. Now we are following in the footsteps of the Divine Madman, Tibetan lama Drukpa Kuenley, who arrived in this part of Bhutan in the 16th century to fulfill his legacy of suppressing evil energies through his dharma teachings”. 

Setting off down the Divine Madman's Trail through beautiful Punakha Valley

Setting off down the Divine Madman’s Trail through beautiful Punakha Valley

 Traditional farmers working the land as they have for centuries

As I looked down the lush valley at the legendary arrow house in Thinleygang, Bhutan, I thought about the tiny trinket that has laid next to me on my bedside table gathering dust for over a decade. Follow your arrow it says, reminding me of a long-held promise to be hiking in Bhutan before my next milestone birthday. I couldn’t believe that just like the Divine Madman who had shot an arrow traveling through the high plateaus of Tibet to Bhutan, I’d ended up halfway around the world as the last guest of the season on the Trans Bhutan Trail, just before my 51st birthday.

“I have driven near this valley many times as a child alongside my father to return to his maternal village each year,” said 28-year-old Singay Dradul, my guide.  “I had heard the legend of the Divine Madman and the infamous Chandana Lhakhang which means house where the arrow landed. But in all those years I had never actually visited the Arrow House until I became a trail guide.”

“And here we are” he smiled as we looked down the valley at a 16th-century traditional farmhouse. “Are you ready to meet the owner and her brother and learn the history of the arrow house?”

The legendary "Arrow House" (Chandana Lhakhang) Bhutan

First glance of the legendary “Arrow House” (Chandana Lhakhang) on the right

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Dochula Pass Chortens Bhutan
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Dochula Pass: If there is a will, there is a way

I arose early on my first full day in Bhutan to the sounds of stray dogs barking outside my window and the morning light shining on the mountains above the Trashi Chho Dzong  (fortress). Today was the first day of hiking on the 500-year-old newly reopened Trans Bhutan Trail and I could hardly wait. 

Room with a view. The view outside the balcony at my hotel in Thimphu. 

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Tashi Delek. Welcome to Bhutan!

After collecting my luggage, I took a deep breath and walked out of the airport to find my guide. To visit Bhutan, it is mandatory that you have a guide and a driver for the entire stay. Thus, these two people are who I’d be spending the next nine days with during my solo trip to Bhutan. While I get along easily with most people, I desperately hoped we would connect.

Dressed in a gray-colored gho, a pair of black knee-high socks and freshly polished black leather loafers, my guide smiled warmly holding a sign with my name. Nicole Melancon, Trans Bhutan Trail. 

“Tashi Delek. I’m Singay. And this is Dorgi, our driver,” Singay said pointing to another young man dressed in a red and green plaid gho, Bhutan’s traditional dress. “Welcome to Bhutan”. 

Little did I know, Singay, Dorgi, and I would be great friends by the end of the trip. We made the perfect team, and their jokes, laughter, knowledge, and passion for Bhutan made the trip all the more memorable.

My two new friends. Dorgi (on left) and Singay (on right).

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The last hiker of the year on the Trans Bhutan Trail: Part 1 Arrival

As we made our descent into the emerald-green Paro Valley I couldn’t stop myself from thinking I was in a scene from the Avatar. It almost didn’t look real. Just twenty minutes before, we had passed Mount Everest on the lefthand side window of the plane and I was instantly spellbound. After over ten years of dreaming, I was finally almost there.

The landing at Paro airport, the only international airport in Bhutan, is one of the most difficult and dangerous in the world. In fact, only 15 pilots are authorized to land there because it requires a manual, visual landing. Trying to navigate a jet airplane through a country that is known as the most mountainous country in the world requires guts.  Especially since Bhutan’s average elevation is 10,760 feet and mountains cover 98.8% of its total area. The only other place I had felt so fearful of landing was over the Himalayas of Nepal. And Nepal is what brought me to Bhutan.

As we descended, I couldn’t help but feel a little giddy by the magical surroundings outside the window. The valley was lush, verdant, and blanketed in trees. Lovely calming music that felt like being more at a spa than on an airplane was gently playing through the Druk Air’s loudspeakers. If this was the world’s last Shangri-La,  I was certainly very excited to see it.

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Kilimanjaro hike to Barranco Camp Machame Route
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Why Using Local Guides Matters

Over the past twenty years, the world has truly become a smaller place. Once hard to reach, remote parts of the planet that used to be only for the most adventurous of tourists, have become more accessible. Places like the Himalayas of Nepal, the tiny fishing villages of Southeast Asia and the bushland of the Maasai have opened their doors for travelers,  allowing us to see their beautiful unique cultures as never before.

Although it is wonderful that more of the remote corners of the world are now accessible, it comes with a price. The negative impact of tourism on the environment, culture and people of a place, threatens it’s very own authenticity and landscape. This is why choosing sustainable travel is critical if we want to preserve and protect these destinations for the future.

Maasai beadwork has been integrated into the Mkuru community to empower women and give them economic opportunities to sell their work.
Me and Mary learning how to bead
Receiving a gift of earrings

My father and I have been trekking in remote places for decades and every place we go we use local trekking guides and companies. I honestly admit that the initial reasons behind our choice were purely convenience and economical.  However, the more we began using local guides, it became clear how incredibly rewarding and important it is to hire locally. Not only do you get a more intimate cultural experience by getting to see a country through their eyes, your investment also greatly supports the local community in which you are visiting. By hiring local, all money you spend on your trip is directly reinvested back in that very place that is so special instead of profiting an international corporation who only has financial interests to gain.

Furthermore, the cross-cultural friendships and understanding that are made and shared by hiring local are priceless. Not only does it create goodwill, it brings a new perspective and understanding on both sides of the relationship. As a client, you get to learn as much as possible about a culture, history, society, life, flora and fauna and environment. As a guide, you gain a better understanding of people who are so different from those portrayed in the media. Together, you can create life-long friendships that promote cultural understanding and peace.

Kilimanjaro hike to Barranco Camp Machame Route

Our group heading down the trail on Kilimanjaro.

Here are three examples of why supporting local guides matters.

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Annapurna Trek Nepal
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My heart breaks for Nepal

“We cannot stop natural disasters but we can arm ourselves with knowledge: so many lives wouldn’t have to be lost if there was enough disaster preparedness.” – Petra Nemcova

News of the devastating earthquake this past Saturday has sent shock waves throughout the world. Once again, Nepal is struggling to help rescue survivors after another catastrophe. For me personally, my heart is broken. A place that has meant so much to me has continually suffered and is now in ruins. A place where I found my voice and was inspired to start this blog.

Annapurna Trek Nepal

Me and my Dad at the start of the Annapurna Trek. November 2010.

They sometimes say that bad things happen in threes. In Nepal’s case, I certainly hope it ends at three. A series of natural tragedies over the last year has brought heartache and struggle to this tiny mountain country, one of the poorest countries in the world.

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Vivekananda Camp, Delhi India
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A Snapshot of India

Sometimes it is true that a picture can paint a thousand words. This week’s photo challenge: A Split-Second Story, inspired me to dig deep throughout my vast archive of photographs, each one telling a story of a certain place and time. In my opinion, there is no place on earth that a simple photo can tell so much about a place than India.

India, one of the most populous countries on the earth, is full of color, contradiction, glory and pain. It is a place of wonder, sorrow, fear and hope. India bursts with humanity on every street or corner you pass. You can see it all there – poverty, wealth, good, bad, happy, sad, beauty and tragedy.

Behind the beautiful, lavish parts of India always lies the most abject poverty imaginable. Nothing can prepare you for the stark reality of desperation, misery and despair of walking through a real live slum in the heart of India’s capital. Sometimes the most severe poverty is hidden behind the walls and within the confines of a slum. Other times, it stares right back at you like a hard slap across your face. You try to look away, and ignore the creeping, uncomfortable nagging guilt. But you can’t.

Dignity

Vivekananda Camp, Delhi India

Woman leaving the newly constructed toilet compound thanks to WaterAid.

Irony

Vivekananda Camp

Women living on the street, outside the walls of the American Embassy near Vivekananda Slums in Delhi, India.

In the background of the lush green, beautiful grounds of the American Embassy lies the Vivekananda Camp, one of many unauthorized slums that surround every single part of Delhi. I visited this slum as part of a tour with WaterAid, a global NGO that provides safe drinking water and sanitation to areas around the world that do not have access to it.

The stark contrast between the neighboring American Embassy and the Vivekananda Slum were almost too hard to morally comprehend. These two places represent the immense contradictions and inequalities that can be found all throughout Delhi and India as a whole. One of the greatest inequalities ever seen anywhere in the world is right there staring into your face, making it impossible to not feel deeply distraught.

In the Vivekananda Camp, a slum of approximately 500 households, there is no running water, no sewer lines and people live in absolute dire circumstances. Thanks to WaterAid, improvements to sanitation have been made by the building of a Community Toilet Complex (CTC), a compound containing 20 toilets for women, 20 for men and a few for children as well as a couple of showers, providing some sort of dignity in a place where dignity hardly exists.

When I saw the old woman leaving the Community Toilet Complex, I couldn’t take my eyes off her. She was moving slowly, at a snail’s pace, with the help of an old wooden cane. She was heading back into the deep confines of the dirty, dingy slum, to her home.  I watched her gait with wonder and hope. She had to be in her eighties and most likely spent almost all her life without a proper toilet. Finally after all these years she had the one thing every human being on this earth is entitled to: Dignity. It brought tears to my eyes for the simple things we take for granted.

Less than a third of people ( 772 million people) have access to sanitation in India, and 90 million people in India do not have access to safe water per WaterAid.  Over 186,000 children under five die from diarrhea every year. With 17% of the world’s population (over a billion people), the water crisis in India is only getting worse and is becoming life or death for millions of people.

-WaterAid

This post was inspired by the Weekly Photo Challenge: Split-Second Story. To view more entries, click here. 

 

Note: Right after I posted this today I saw the following tragic press release from WaterAid. Lack of toilets reportedly linked to murder of Uttar Pradesh girls . Via @WaterAidAmerica

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Annapurna Trek, Nepal
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On Top of the World at Nepal’s Thorung-La

I will never forget the moment I was on top of the world. I was trekking around the Annapurna through the world’s largest pass – Thorung La. We rose in darkness and anticipation of our two-hour ascent up to the highest point of our Himalayan hike, the pass at Thorung La at an intimidating 17,769 feet (5,416 m). 

We had spent a sleepless freezing cold night at Thorung Base Camp to acclimatize before our morning ascent. I remember being so utterly cold during the night in our barren, unheated room that I emptied every single item of dirty clothing out of my pack and slept in everything I had along with three wool blankets. Unfortunately I was still frozen to the bone and could hardly sleep that night due to the high altitude and apprehension about the next day.

Would I be ok? Would I get altitude sickness? Would I make it to the top? These were all the worries and concerns that were racing through my restless mind and keeping me up in the middle of the cold, dark night.

Annapurna Trek, Nepal

Our last day-long hike up to the top of Thorung La Pass in Nepal.

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Lotus Temple Delhi India
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A Unique Visit to Delhi’s Lotus Temple

Any trip to Delhi requires a stop at the spectacular Lotus Temple. Built in 1986 of pure white marble from the Penteli mountain in Greece, the Lotus Temple is a Bahá’í House of Worship where people of any religions can come to pray.  What makes this temple so incredibly unique and awe-inspiring is its shape and form.

Inspired by India’s sacred lotus flower, the temple is composed of 27 free-standing marble “petals” arranged in groups of three to form nine sides forming a lotus flower. It is fitting that the temple is designed to look like India’s treasured lotus flower as the lotus symbolizes many important things in Indian culture: Long life, honor, and good forturne. Images of lotus flowers can be seen throughout India as engravings on temples, buildings and in art.

Lotus Temple Delhi

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Los Glaciares National Park
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My Top Five Wild Hikes

I just finished reading Cheryl Strayed’s “Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail” a dark, raw and fiercely humorous book on how one woman finds herself during a three-month long trek through the wild Pacific Crest Trail. The book is powerful, emotional, honest and inspiring, and Strayed uses her brilliant memoir to take a hard look at self-discovery, heeling and change.

Of course when times are tough, we can’t always pick up our bags and leave town. Yet, I often find that there is no better way to escape and reflect upon life than to go on a hike, and the more remote and wild, the better. I have been fortunate to have done many wonderful adventurous hikes over the years.  Although every hike I’ve done has been special and has brought me to a new place, there are a select few that have truly inspired me and are unforgettable.

Here is a list of the top five wild hikes that are bound to get your mind thinking.

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Delhi Street Photography
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The tilted view of the streets of Delhi

“It is impossible not to be astonished by India. Nowhere on Earth does humanity present itself in such a dizzying, creative burst of cultures and religions, races and tongues”. -A Rough Guide to India

A trip through the streets of India brings humanity to her knees. No place on earth is quite like India. When asked by friends “What is India like” I seem to suddenly become silent as no words can fully describe the place unless you’ve been there.  Through all her culture, her craziness, her unbelievable sights and her charm, India remains perhaps one of the most intriguing places in the world. I don’t think any place on earth can quite compare.

Getting around India is one of the most knuckle clenching, heart racing things you can do. Oftentimes there are cows in the streets, traffic coming at you in every direction and people everywhere. Many times you get awfully close to an overpacked car and the two dozen pairs of eyes seem to stare into your soul.

Inspired by the views seen through the streets of Delhi I compiled a post of my favorite street shots, many taken from inside a moving vehicle as I was tilting or craning my neck. Just taking a ride through the streets of Delhi is bound to capture your attention and your camera. I remembered to take my third eye along on this trip and it is a good thing I did. Everything and anything is possible in India.

Here are some of my favorite captures.

Delhi Street Photography

View outside the car at the over-crowded streets of Delhi.

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