Jon and Heather's Road Trip Part 3

I woke up to  a frosty morning in the Phobjikha Valley and went out for a short walk to explore where we might see the Black Cranes.  Actually I could hear them and so went to find the source of their racket. There is a huge marshy area in the middle of the valley.  Everything had heavy frost and was white.  The Black Necked Cranes winter in this valley at 3,000 metres and in the summer they are found on the Tibetan Plateau.  I saw them in the distance, waking up.  Although there is only one road in the valley, I got a bit lost on my way back to the guest house.  Jon and I had breakfast, chatted with the owner and marched off with our backpacks.  As we followed the road into the marsh we saw the tourists being let off to walk.  We had been told we could not walk in the marsh as it would disturb the cranes.

  So instead we took a ride in the back of a Bolero pick up truck, up out of the valley bottom to Gangtey Geompa and shedra.  A shedra is a monastic school.  The temple is old (1613 or 1618) and under repair.  The young monks were all studying and let us into the altar rooms.  It was fascinating. Apparently the llama or rinpoche lives further up on the hill.  We also did not see any of the older monks that we let off of the bus, so we assumed that they too live up in the fancier digs on the hill. We were told that the rinpoche's sisters run the guest house we were in and the swank resort that is above it.  

We walked up the hill and hitched a ride.  A German tourist I had said hello to that morning picked us up. We got a ride to the junction where we waited over an hour for a ride to Tshangkha where Sarah D lives. We went into her classroom to surprise her, led up the steep hill by her "naughty" grade 4 boys.  We met the students, sang songs, took photos and drank tea.  Jon had been looking for momos earlier that day and presto students had prepared a special tea with momos and we just happened to be there. 

We walked to the monastery where Sarah taught English to the monks for a very special tour. Back to Sarah's for dinner and scrabble.  The next morning I took the bus back to Chukha - a gruelling 9 hours on the back seat.  With amazing views of the mountains. Jon's adventure continued. 

Sarah's students

Sarah's room mate weaving