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BHUTAN - BIRDING, CULTURE & NATURAL HISTORYBirding Focused
Dates: November 7-25, 2012 Sorry. Full/Wait List
19 Days, $6,350 from Bangkok

Full 2012 Itinerary (.pdf)

We plan to offer our 7th WBA tour to the Himalayan Buddhist Kingdom of Bhutan in the fall of 2012. Nestled between India and Tibet, Bhutan is culturally fascinating, habitat-rich and teeming with over 600 bird species, including some of the most exotic and rare species in the eastern Himalayas. The Buddhist philosophy of respect for all living things and a progressive government approach to development have nurtured a healthy environment where flora and fauna flourish. As a result, Bhutan lies in an area designated as one of the world’s ten biodiversity hotspots.

As you may know, independent travel in Bhutan is not permitted. All visitors must be guided by Bhutanese tour guides. We work with a small company that specializes in birding and natural history, as well as culture – a perfect fit with WBA. Having traveled with them for a total of 21 weeks since 2004, we consider them dear and trusted friends. We eagerly anticipate returning for another spectacularly rewarding exploration of the natural and cultural wonders of this magical mountain kingdom. Our trip will combine camping and inns, day-hiking and road travel, birding and cultural explorations, high altitude Himalayan habitats and moist lowland forests. Bhutan has been open to tourism only since the late 1970s. It is growing fast in popularity and in population. Even with an impressively forward-thinking government, change is occurring rapidly.

Our itinerary begins with our flight into Paro on Day 1, heading east by road that day to the capital city of Thimphu. We’ll spend two nights in Thimphu, exploring outside the city by spending the day hiking and birding around an ancient mountaintop monastery. On Day 3, we head northeast, stopping first at Dochu La Pass with its 108 chortens and the high Himalayas in the background. We continue on through Wangdiphroedang (Wangdi) and north to Punakha at the confluence of the Mo and Po rivers, where the majestic Punakha Dzong (secular and monastic regional headquarters) is situated. We’ll head up the Po Chhu (river) to search for the globally endangered White-bellied Heron and keep our eyes open for the rare Pallas’ Fish Eagle. We’ll walk across the suspension footbridge to the Dzong, touring it, before making camp along the Mo Chhu. The next day, we drive east and then south to the beautiful Phobjikha Valley, winter home of the rare Black-necked Cranes. We’ll take a beautiful hike from the village through farmlands and wetlands at dusk, pausing to watch as the Cranes come in croaking and kiting down out of the sky to roost in the valley bottom.

The next day is the Black-necked Crane Festival, a series of colorful and remarkable traditional Bhutanese dances as well as school children performing skits and dances in celebration of the crane. We’ll spend several hours inside the courtyard of the Gangtey Goemba (monastery) enjoying the festival, before leaving this beautiful valley to continue our travels east over Pele La Pass, down into the Black Mountains and on to our destination of Trongsa, the geographical center of Bhutan. We’ll continue east the next day over Yotong La pass and into the Bumthang region, where we’ll camp out at almost 12,000’ and look for some of the high altitude specialties such as the White-throated Dipper, Himalayan Monal Pheasant, and other exciting birds.

We continue driving east the next day, over Thrimsing La Pass and down to our camp at Yongkhola, where we’ll spend two nights. This area is considered some of the best birding in the Himalayas. This is our farthest-east point of travel in Bhutan. From here, we return west to Bumthang, spending a night in a guesthouse in Chamkar before continuing back to Trongsa.

At Trongsa, we head south along the spectacular Mangde Chhu, watching for Great Hornbills and an increasing variety of bird and mammals species as we drop in elevation down the Himalayan south slope toward India. We’ll spent several days making a loop from Trongsa to the India border, west and north back to Wangdi (near Punakha), with one night at Khosola, two at Tingtibi, one at Gelephu and one at Tsirang before arriving at Wangdi. This southern route has only recently opened to tourists, and it greatly expands the diversity of bird and mammal species we’ll see on our trip. At Gelephu we’ll be on the edge of Bhutan’s Royal Manas National Park. Royal Manas adjoins Jigme Singye Wangchuck National Park to the north and India’s Manas National Park and Manas Tiger Reserve to the south, forming a 5000-sq-km protected area that runs from the plains to the Himalayan peaks.
From Wangdi, we’ll work our way back to Paro by way of Dochu La pass and Thimphu, spending our last two nights at a lovely inn amid the farmlands in the Paro Valley. From Paro, we’ll take a side trip up to Cheli La pass at nearly = 14,000 feet with stunning views of the Himalaya and possibilities of seeing Lammergeiers. Our second side trip from Paro will be to hike up to the Taktshang (Tiger’s Nest) monastery, built into a cliff wall as dramatic as the walls of Yosemite valley. A party at our guide’s family farm will bring our trip to a sad but sweet close.