217: Tiger’s Nest Monastery or Paro Taktsang or Weight Watchers Bhutan, Bhutan from the 1000 places to see before you die

After experiencing terrible food in the hotels
I had my guide take me
to a restaurant frequented by locals to compare.
On the left is chicken chilli and the
right is pork chilli

Well there is something that the government of Bhutan hasn’t yet cottoned on to…..trips for fatties. As the man next to me said when looking at this morning’s buffet “I feed my animals better.” A culinary trip Bhutan certainly isn’t. Breakfast consists of scrambled eggs with chilli, sliced processed sausage, roasted banana and toast……every day. Lunch consists of thinly sliced beef and potatoes, sliced mixed vegetables, chillis with cheese, red rice and broccoli……every day. Dinner consists of one inch chopped chicken with bones swimming in a thin clear soup, chillis with cheese, red rice, chunks of some meat in a thin soup or deep fried, potatoes and broccoli in chilli….every day.

This is the restaurants beef chilli and cheese

With most of us on 8 to 10 day tours, its quite common to find the buffet overlooked by tourists more content to talk and catch up on their notes than eat the food.

So….thats 1kg off due to eating less and a further 1kg off as everything has chillies in it to rev up your metabolism. I convinced my guide to take me to a restaurant where Bhutanese eat …you can decide for yourself from the photos!!

And then there’s the nightly noises which will keep the fatties pacing the floor most of the night and then help them leap out of bed in the morning. Most of these hotels are newly built and sound proofing isn’t something that has arrived in Bhutan, nor double glazing it appears. Add that the positioning of the hotels is splat in the middle of town or along the airstrip and the timing of going to bed and getting up becomes a carefully worked out objective for the day.  Nothing like knowing the flight timetables so that you can be up to witness the thundering of glass in your room and the roar of an Airbus 319 landing a few hundred metres away, or having that extra glass of red wine because the local dancers in the hotel over the road wont finish until 9pm, or knowing that the kitchen shift arrives at 6am so you can forgo a wake up call for the sounds of frying pans being banged together. Put another kilo loss down for all of that.

And then there’s Tigers Nest Monastery. A perfect half day exercise for the fatties, already bleary eyed from the night’s revelry over the road and the kitchen crew wake up call, hallucinating from a lack of food in their system they square up at the bottom of the mountain to listen to their guide explain that it is a minimum of 2 hours to visit…but overlooks to mention that that is the one way, “best time” done by a horse, or the fact that its 900m (that’s 2000 feet) pretty much straight up a mountain…at just a smidge over 3 kilometres (that’s 10,240 feet), above sea level. 5 kilos about to melt away.

In the mountain top hump right in the middle of the photo,  one third down from the top of the hump you can faintly see a white patch about 3mm by 1mm....thats the monastery

Making my way through the few hawkers, I gazed at the horses with their pretty saddlecloths and the knowledge that for a meager $10 it could take me up the mountain (sadly they don’t carry passengers down due to the slope) but my guide said that it was better to go by foot. Thinking that was because of some special sites to see on the way, or optimistically thinking that the horses went on a different track so I didn’t have to negotiate horse shit while I clambered ever upwards over the rocks and mud, I set off.

Prayer wheels dot the path

 Half an hour later, after setting a good clip I thought, I was overtaken by a horse. With a 20 stone fattie on board. Given that the horses here are more polo pony size and, like us tourists, probably exist on a diet of chilli cheese and broccoli, you couldn’t help but feel sorry for the horse. Consequently I decided to keep the nag company and one hour later both horse, two tour guides, one fattie, and I arrived at the cafeteria marking the half way point.  Half way point that is for fit fuckers like me, and end of the line for unfit fatties like her.

Almost half way point

You can just spy the monastery in the distance

Paro Valley

prayer wheel at the cafeteria

She was destined to join the rest of the members from Weight Watchers Bhutan (I joke!), the pensioners with hip replacements, and the faded footballers with their buggered knees, to gaze over their tea cups at the monastery a tantalizing 400 or metres up the cliff but a further one hour vertical hike.

View from the cafeteria 

And it was here that my guide told me that the reason why walking was better was that it was meant to be a spiritual journey of penance. If you went up by horse then you’d lose the spiritual element, and if you then walked down you’d gain the spiritual element but the sum total would be neutral. Goody. Double penance points for me I thought even if I felt like throwing up from exhaustion.

Saying goodbye to Mary from Tennessee and “Horse” we hit the path again, renewed by our sweet milky tea, only to find that our legs had filled with lactic acid with the short stop so it was agony for the first 15 minutes as we tried to get back into our stride. My guide seemed to be flagging at the pace I was setting, but lured by the sights and smells of fresh horse shit in front of me, I upped the pace to catch up with what I knew must be shortly around the next bend…….Horse 2. Sadly, it was about five punishing bends later at full pace that I came across Horse 2 and Horse 3 and a couple from London astride their bony brown backs. 

The cruel deception...so close..and now starts the Thigh Master
Work out

Ever a fount of useful facts my guide then told me that walking behind the horses is very good for altitude sickness as the smell of the horse shit reduces the symptoms. What the….??!!  I then had to explain the term “the horse owner was pulling your leg” to my guide. Finally we hit what must be the end of the line because the horsies slowed down. Ahh sweet deception to those fatties that had managed up this far as it was merely the end of where the horses could go. Seems that everyone must do some form of penance and there it was in front of me. I could reach out my hand and it was parallel to the entrance of the monastery but, in between me and it was a gorge and a waterfall to master and, as a result of the building of a tiny bridge where the gorge met, rather than a massive bridge higher up, I still had a punishing 400 vertical steps straight down followed by 300 vertical steps straight up. Sweet Buddha!!

The little bridge crossing

I was almost prostrate by the time I dragged my legs up the last step. Suitable I guess given that this was one of the most religious sites in Bhutan. Guru Rinpoche introduced Buddhism to Bhutan, transformed his favourite consort into a tigress and rode her around the Indian subcontinent landing at thirteen caves, of which this monastery was built around one. After meditating for 3 years he popped out in eight reincarnated forms, all of which I was going to see shortly at the Thimphu Tsechu festival.

Prayer flags criss cross across the ravine

60m waterfall

Aside from its benefits to fatties, the monastery was rather spiritual. The roar of the 60 metre high waterfall, the whisper from the pine trees, the flutter of the prayer flags on the surrounding hills, the bells from the prayer wheels, all contributed to a scene of serenity and contemplation. Discretely positioned above the monastery were houses of meditation for the monks, some of whom stay up for three years at a time, following Guru Rinpoche’s lead.

Dont fiddle the religious objects!

Clay and ashes....
memories of the dead made into little painted cakes

The meditation huts for the monks

 As for me, it was time to amble back down the slope and have a Tiger beer in celebration.

Up close.....worth it!

216: The French Quarter of Hanoi from the 1000 places to see before you die book

Quite a change from the bustling streets full of motorbikes, pedestrians, hawkers and garish shops. the French quarter exudes charm, class, dignified facades and deserted wide tree lined streets.




Hanoi was the capital of French Indochina (1887-1954) and the buildings, nestled in a tiny quarter near the central lake, do look out of place.

The Metropole Hotel was well worth the visit- bit like going to Raffles in Singapore and the high tea was marvellous.

now..does it belong in the book of 1000 places to see before you die. Well...no. Its a bit like saying Mayfair in London is a must see before you die...which it isnt. Page rip out!"

215: Cha Ca La Vong, Hanoi Vietnam from the 1000 places to see before you die book

Could have sworn I posted this...but clearly not. So now to dredge up my memories of a trip 3 months ago with several in between that I know i was meant to write but got caught in more trips!!

Cha Ca is a Vietnamese curried fried fish dish- some would say their national dish. I was rather amused to hear that restaurant critic AA Gill put Cha Ca as one of the best ways to start breakfast...mmm...not sure about that. Id eat congi or Vegemite under scrambled eggs for breakfast any day....but buttery fried fish.......

And if fried fish wasnt enough- it turns out that Fried  Fish Restaurant serving Fried Fish is on Fried Fish street- yes Cha Ca La Vong restaurant- that serves only Cha Ca-  is on Cha Ca street!! Thats pretty much tantamount to painting yourself in green and yellow and eating a vegemite sandwich while singing "I come from the land down under" on Vegemite Street.

Wonder if there is such a thing as Vegemite Street?

Well a web search says there is a street named after vegemite-  Theodore St in Canberra- which is named after Cyril Callister, the Chief Chemist of Kraft Walker Cheese Company which still produces Vegemite. I hear you asking for help connecting the dots there. Well not even askJeeves could help on connecting Theodore with Cyril, bar one hit for Teddy Roosevelt and vegemite without any explanation.   Given Obama took a swipe at Vegemite recently proclaiming it "horrible", I can imagine that Kraft doesnt need the publicity of the views of two Presidents of USA.

Certainly Cyril did develop the spread per his boss's request to utilise one of the richest known natural vitamin B sources - brewer’s yeast- which was a discarded product at the time.   And so vegemite was launched to millions of future happy little Vegemites in 1927. While no street appears to be directly named after Australia's favourite...spread? seasoning? soup base? gravy base, it is true that the first scanned product in a supermarket was Vegemite, that some 22 million jars are sold every year and I have kissed Vegemite Rock- which exists in a little seaside suburb of Melbourne opposite where the factory was originally located.

I digress- Cha Ca (could follow anotherlate night Australian angle now and think of that little feathered dancing granny from the Amazon on Clive James Late night show at this stage) but let me stick with garoupa fish- which is what is in Cha Ca.  Boiled or fried in some oily substance, you take your noodles, add the fish then add various additions in front of you such as peanuts, pickled vegetables and various sauces. It was nice.....like any fish cooked in a heavy butter sauce would be...but would I put it in the "1000 places to see before you die" book??



Page rip out on this one Im afraid. The restaurant is no different to thousands in Vietnam..that means cheap furniture, gaudy colours and an abundance of plastic flowers.



The dish- well its a bit like putting a hole in a wall in some back street in Edinburgh, selling deep fried mars bars from it and getting it featured in the 1000 places to see before you die book.

Ill pass!

214: Halong Bay, Vietnam from the 1000 places to see before you die book

Its a dog ear rather than a rip out the page for this one- albeit it didnt start off too well- a rather dull 4 hour road journey (getting better however at doing tours so I booked a private driver who didnt speak English and thankfully therefore didnt get the pitter patter the entire way down) and them arrived to a cloudy, grey harbour which was the take-off point for Halong Bay.

The boat looked rather magnificent though so it started to look up

Upon arrival we were greeted with a cold drink which was fab as it was damm hot and given lunch while our luggage was taken to the room.

The windows were a delight- windows overlooking the water so you could lie in aircon comfort and watch the passing scenery.

And the big deck to lounge on

We then putted off to our first destination

That afternoon I went on an hour long kayaking trip around the limestone islands

and then proceeded to work my way through 15 wines at wine tasting on the deck while the sun set

After a night of squid fishing the next morning saw a trip to the floating village nearby

and a trip to a limestone cave. "Tastfully" lit (beloww) is Happy Buddha Rock

and then a long hard work climb to the top of the mountain to take in the view of Halong Bay

The summation- definate worthwhile inclusion in the 1000 places to see before you die book

213: Sapa, Vietnam from the "1000 places to see before you die" book

Id always dreamed of a long first class train journey in some exotic location. Gin and tonics in swanky gear in a bar chatting to interesting people as we meandered through the countryside, waking up on 1000 thread cotton sheets in aircon splendour and lazily watching the landscape unfurl through the window, a few stops on the way where cold towels greeted us as we alighted for a few hours at some fabulous location, the smell of varnished and polished teak wood with dim Parisian lamps on tables, flowers scenting the airconditioned hallways. At least...thats what a train journey meant to me.

And so it was in two minds that I decided to venture to the north-west corner of Vietnam on the border with China to visit the town of Sapa...and joy oh joy the only way of getting there was by train.  The research on the trains was short and sweet- theres a normal train- hard and soft seat (here's the hard seat)

which clearly didnt fit into my Orient Express fantasy....or go on the train run by the resort that I was staying at the Victoria Sapa Resort and Spa. And so it was a call to my concierge service Quintessentially to get the whole thing sorted.

What a pleasure- cold towel on arrival, icy cold room beckoning me after the muggy heat of Hanoi, a fabulous cabin, a brilliant dining room open all night for the 8 hour journey with fresh flowers and western background music, fabulous cocktails and great food. Only thing was, I was unswankily clothed after a plane flight and 6 hours traipsing around the Old City of Hanoi and too tired to talk to fellow passengers.

In the dining car having a pre dinner cocktail

my lovely cabin

8 hours later after a steaming pot of coffee, eggs and bacon and some fab conversation with fellow guests we embarked at Sapa where I promptly jumped on a motorbike and went up and down a few hills checking out some waterfalls.

But the highlight of Sapa is its weekend Saturday market. The surrounding hill tribes come in from far away to sell their wares and catch up with their girlfriends- all dressed in their traditional garb.

The next day we ventured to the Flower Mong people's market in the nearby town of Bac Ha.

A definate entry into the 1000 places to see before you die book