Bus to Bumthang

Early morning at the Thimphu bus station is a flurry of diesel fumes and relatively organized commotion. Buses leave promptly on schedule top loaded with suitcases, boxes and 50kg sacks of potatoes, onions and rice. Waiting passengers spin a giant prayer wheel, an Indian man dressed in a bubblegum pink shalwar kameez paces back and forth; the whole scene is far less hectic than I had imagined.




The small buses are moderately comfortable, by far the most pleasant public transport option in Bhutan (but only if you have motion sickness medicine—these things have long earned their nickname, Vomit Comet). Big windows and elevated seats provide excellent views which whiz past at a much slower speed than in the kamikaze taxis. Constant bouncing and swaying back and forth (combined with Dramamine) sort of rocks you to sleep and I struggle to keep my eyes open, not wanting to miss the scenery.

Today is Losar, (Chinese New Year) and we’re headed east, on a 10 hour ride to Bumthang.
Around 10am all the passengers are awake and making silly faces at the little baby girl sitting backwards in her mom’s lap, entertaining us with her happy little cherub face, dark eyes, and chubby hands waving constant hello’s. It is impossible not to stare at her.

mrc

mrc

Outside, the density of the forests continues to impress me. I want to know what it’s like inside there, beyond the walls of leaves and tree flesh. Giant ferns dangle from perpendicular road banks. The tree tops are voluptuous, leaves fat and engorged on CO2, exhaling the planet’s purest oxygen.

One lone tree is covered in an outbreak of small pink flowers, standing alone in the corner of a brown yard. The white washed walls of an old farmhouse show patches of mud in its wrinkles. A sturdy tree with thick black limbs looms skeletal and barren but for the bizarre clusters of blood red petals like lipstick on a corpse. Another tree passes with bright yellow flowers—brilliant rebellions of color defiant against the invading browns and golds of winter’s parched army.

In the distance, splotches of bright green wheat shoots preface the coming harvests stretching in long patches along the monotone valley. Mist hangs low on the mountains allowing just a seductive taste of what might be revealed if you lifted up the cloud’s skirt…the keeper of Bhutan’s secrets.

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lunch stop

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