:: Best of British craftmanship

This made me laugh out loud - I can only assume it's meant as a joke.

:: let it snow let it snow let it snow

There hasn't been any snow to speak of here, so at the weekend I went off in search of some - and found it! Lovely thick deep squeaky dry snow, at the Hermitage in Perthshire.





Bertie was notably reluctant to stand around posing, or even to stand around waiting for me to take photos - any lingering and he was barking impatiently. It was fuhreezing! Especially if you're just wearing a coat. In other countries they are better prepared for arctic conditions.

:: funny dog story

I took Bertie to the vet this morning. He's generally in good health, but over the past week or so had developed some kind of weird back pain. He was walking fine, not limping or anything, zipping up and down the stairs, stretching, the whole works. But any time you touched his spine or flanks, he flinched. Really flinched, dramatically, with his whole body. Ow! That hurts!

If you touched a particular spot on his spine, his back leg would start scratching in reflex, and he'd sometimes half collapse. On the other hand, I discovered he appreciated a back massage - I was feeling along his spine for lumps, fearing the Big C. All his muscles were tense and shivering, but he leaned in for more back-rub.

So I took him off to the vet, which meant getting up early on a fiercely cold morning when I'd much rather have stayed in bed. I explained to Fiona that he seemed healthy enough blah blah, apart from this: and took off Bertie's coat and touched his back.

Nothing. He stood like a rock. I touched his flanks - nothing. "Oh, he's not doing it!" I babbled, as if he was supposed to start tap-dancing or speaking French. I poked and prodded, but he remained staunchly flinch-free.

So I explained, and Fiona felt along his back and confirmed that his muscles were flinching even if he wasn't showing it. I reckon he was scared to show how much pain he was in in case he was whisked off for surgery.

Fiona says it's probably arthritis in his spine, and that the muscles are tensing and hurting because they're having to hold the spine in a different way to keep it from hurting - the back-rubs help ease the muscle spasms.

So he's now going to be on painkillers long term. Anticipating this, I'd printed off a prescription form for an online vet pharmacy: the vet charges £15 for a 30ml bottle, while online it's less than £25 for 180ml. So even with the prescription fee of £7.50 it's far cheaper.

There's always the possibility that it's not arthritis but a tumour on his spine. But he's very healthy, as I say, eating well and enjoying life. So - fingers crossed it's not going to develop into anything that will spoil his fun.

In other health-related news, Faye is recovering from her op. She's more sore than she'd anticipated, so she isn't going to come up to Scotland until January, even though she says she's "bored out of my brain".

:: delofted

I kept up the pace today, loading the car with cardboard and polystyrene even though there was a gale raging and rain lashing down. I got a freecycle taker for the loft panels and he collected them straight away, so that was a bonus. Then I took the rubbish to the tip ... sorry, took the recycling to the community recycling centre. Actually it was pretty good - lots of enormous bins for absolutely everything, all well organised. I got lost on the way there and drove around aimlessly for a while trying to remember where it was. Then suddenly remembered my new phone has internet - and googled it! And found it! I do love technology.

I even managed to post Faye her dressing gown, and I only got her letter this morning. Whatever happened to my procrastination habit? This is kind of weird, this efficiency business.

So now I just have to find homes for the carpet offcuts and CD shelves. I'm also going to have a hard look at the sheds, see if there isn't more stuff lurking in there that could be recycled or freecycled.

:: What i've mostly been doing today

Clearing out the loft seemed like such an easy thing to do. How wrong I was.

I was under the impression that there were just a few cardboard boxes up there. Oh, and that bit of carpet. And some left-over packs of laminate. And the old lamp and the CD shelves and Pop's old suitcase. And the floor panels and the old doors. And actually, there were like about a dozen cardboard boxes, big ones, and they were almost all full of smaller cardboard boxes and/or polystyrene blocks. Poor Bertie was very worried indeed as the boxes came hurtling down through the hatch, followed by packs of laminate and floor panels.

It was terribly tempting just to give up, but I plugged on, stymied only by the three old doors, which are huge and about an inch and a half thick. After I'd hurled everything out I clambered back down and spent another hour or so separating the boxes from the plastic and polystyrene and bagging everything ready for recycling. So that's it - I'm never leaving this house. I don't have boxes for anything any more.

I've also filled the shed up with the bits and bobs I'm keeping. The rest is in the hall, waiting for me to list it on freecycle. And THEN I got out the vacuum cleaner and dealt with all the fluff and dust. Incredible.

:: keep reading!

I've done some more travelogue ... I'm up to the second day in Thimpu now. Just a couple more days to go!

Day 14: Kolkata to London to Edinburgh to Queensferry... sigh...

The wake-up call was 4am, followed by a waiter with a pot of tea - Darjeeling of course. He brought the tray in, I tipped him and waited for him to leave. "Please, let me pour," he said. "No thank you, that's fine." "Please, madam, allow me the privilege." Good grief! I just wanted to let the tea draw.

We were away too early for breakfast, so the hotel made us up boxes, with a sandwich, juice, crisps and so on and we ate that at the airport. Amazingly I had a row of three seats to myself again! Very comfortable. And the flight was fun too because it was daytime and I had superb views of somewhere hot and dry - possibly Afghanistan.






And I had visits from Merle, Desi, Susan, Lynda and Denis, and visited them ... the most sociable flight I've been on in a long time.

At Heathrow I was really pleased I left so long between flights - it took an age to get to T5; it wasn't just a train trip, I had to change trains! And the security routine was quite something. The thing I hated about the terminal though was the shops - it was all designer and swank and swish, but hardly anywhere to get a coffee. The few cafes had giant queues. My advice is to open a couple of traditional tea shops, with lovely big pots of tea, plates of cakes and proper sandwiches. Crazy idea.

Finally, at last I got on the plane for Edinburgh, with a chatty, witty chap sitting next to me who made me feel glad to be going back to lovely Scotland.

Day 13: Paro to Kolkata

Up very early and off to the airport after breakfast for our flight back to Kolkata. It was a gloriously sunny day, so we finally got a look at the mountains the clouds had been hiding.





It was sad to be leaving after what felt like a lightning tour, plus there were a lot of things we didn't get to see because they were closed. But here we were, flying up and away - in a Druk Air plane of course; only the national airline flies from Paro. Tshering wasn't even getting the rest of the day off - he was collecting his next group later on. They were about 30 Americans on a super deluxe tour. They normally fly by private jet but had had to hire a Druk plane for Bhutan. Gopal was driving back to Phuntsholing to collect his next party.

The temperature in Bhutan had been perfect - not too warm, not too cool. Kolkata was stinking hot, hotter than before we left for the hills. And we were back in the mad honking traffic, the frantic pace. I was almost tempted to stay in the hotel, that cool, hushed haven of marble, maybe have a swim in the pool. But I was in Kolkata! Can't waste the day lazing around! Ajay offered either a river cruise or a tour taking in the botanic gardens, a Jain temple and a place where they make religious statues. Desi fancied the river trip but no-one else wanted to so she fell in with us - and was sweet enough not to say I told you so later on!

We had a bit of a rest - I went and did some emailing in the beautiful business centre - and then met in the lobby for the tour. The guide, a woman whose name I didn't catch, took us to the gardens first. It was mildly interesting - there's an enormous tree there, except it's more like a grove of trees. It's a banyan - aerial roots come down from the branchs and turn into trunks, so the tree gradually expands into its own forest. It was gloomy under the foliage so my photos aren't up to much.



We actually drove around the gardens in the bus - very dull business. The Jain temple was next - Desi said they are usually beautiful, airy places, so I was looking forward to it. And then we hit the traffic jam. The beeping, honking, revving, smoking traffic jam. The guide tried to keep us entertained by sharing her philosophy of life. "I think it's important just to take people as they are... when I meet someone new I accept them for who they are, and if they don't accept me as I am then that's their problem. So many people have expectations about other people...." blah blah blah, on and on and on as we crawled along in three raucous lanes of buses, lorries, cars, taxis, tuktuks, rickshaws, scooters, bicycles.





I was just about ready to kick the door open and run for it, but the people up the front of the bus were apparently rapt, soaking up every word. Merle, however, was slumped with her head in her arms. I caught her eye and rolled mine, and now we were the bad kids in the back seat. After a hissed conversation about how ghastly this was, I took the intiative and interrupted the guide's monologue to ask when exactly we would get to the temple. "I don't know, the traffic...." she waved vaguely. I explained that I was very tired and that our wake-up call was at 4.30am and I for one would quite like to have dinner reasonably soon.

It turned out that the people up the front were just as bored/hot/tired/annoyed as Merle and I and chimed in with requests to please just go back to the hotel if we couldn't get round the traffic. So after an age we managed to turn off on to a smaller road, and suddenly we were hurtling along, whizzing past all kinds of interesting-looking places, including the book market that we'd been meant to see on our first day in the city. In what seemed like no time at all we were at the hotel. The tour had taken about four hours and we'd seen almost nothing.

I went straight to the restaurant with Merle and Desi, and after a Fawlty Towers display by the waiters (to be fair, I think there was a change of shift as we were trying to order) we had a delicious meal.

And so to bed... oh the bliss of that bed!

Day 12: Taktsang (Tiger's Nest) Monastery

The last full day in Bhutan was the highlight of the trip: a walk to the famous Tiger's Nest monastery, Taktsang. The brochure for the trip had a photo of Taktsang on it, but after looking it up on the net I doubted we'd visit it because of the long walk, and it wasn't clear from the itinerary if we'd have time. So I was thrilled when Tshering said we'd be going there.

Remember it had been raining for the previous three days - the clouds had been hanging low over the hills the whole time. We were at a point the previous day when we should have been able to see the monastery but couldn't. But Tshering told us today was an auspicious day to visit it - the last day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar or some such. Yes, I just checked it and it is the last day of the eighth month of the year of the mouse (rat, actually). Very auspicious. So I was sure it would work out fine, even though the nay-sayers were saying nay very loudly.

Walking up steep hills for two and a half hours wasn't everyone's idea of fun - Judy was ill, poor thing, and Mike stayed on at the hotel to minister to her; and Merle the New Yorker was happy to spend the day checking out life in downtown Paro. Of the rest, just Susan, Duncan, Christine and I went all the way to the monastery. Desi, Denis and Lynday stopped at the cafeteria halfway up.

The day looked promising when we set out in the bus and soon we got our first glimpse of our goal.



The path initially was quite straightforward - wide, a little muddy but not too bad, and not too steep. I took it at a steady pace, enjoying the chance to have a good walk after so much sitting round in buses and cars. I was really pleased to have packed my walking stick, though Tshering had brought along some nice wooden ones. There were quite a lot of other people walking the path - a lot of locals, because it was an auspicious day, and a lot of tourists of course. And dogs! There were dogs all along the path.

At one point an American woman overtook me at speed, wheezing and puffing. "Hello doggy!" she yodelled at a dog that happened to be sitting there. "Hello doggy!" She completely ignored me - SO not cute! A bit further on I came across her again. She'd caught up with a friend, and they were having a wee at the side of the path! I was tempted to call out "Hello doggy!" A bit after that they overtook me again, again ignoring me, huffing and puffing. I finally passed them near the cafeteria - they'd stopped for a breather.

I'd love to come back and do the walk in spring - there were loads of rhododendrons and orchids on the way up, it must be really pretty.

After an hour's walk we got to the cafeteria - Susan in the lead, then me, then the others. We stopped there for a cup of tea and to admire the view.





The funny thing was that as Susan and I stood there gaping at the scene and taking photos, the American women showed up and noisily greeted the rest of their party. "Wow I'm really out of breath, naw, don't need the bathroom, took a leak on the way up, oh great, tea, is there anything to eat?" and so on and on, all at the top of their lungs. And while they yakked, the cloud quietly closed in, shrouding the monastery. "Hey, where's my view gone?" bellowed one of them, finally noticing. Hee hee. I did feel a bit smug.

There were cats as well as dogs at the cafeteria, all with well-honed techniques for polite begging.



Further up from the cafeteria the vegetation changed - now we were up among the clouds there were more orchids and ferns and spanish moss.







It was hard to get a really good photo of this - the colours were very rich and striking, russet and jewel green - these shots are a bit washed-out.

All along the path there were reminders that we were in a holy place. Bit of background: Taktsang got its name because it's the place where Guru Rinpoche meditated after arriving in Bhutan on Yeshe Tsogyal, his flying tigress-consort. This was in the 8th century. The monastery was built in the 17th century. In 1998 a good part of it burnt down (like so many buildings in Bhutan! a combination of well seasoned wood, devotional lamps and a lack of firefighting equipment), but it was rebuilt in what must have been an incredibly difficult project.

So, Taktsang having been a place of pilgrimage for more than 1,200 years, the pathway leads not just to the main monastery but to several other smaller temples and caves and retreats. The monks at Taktsang stay just a few months, but in some of the retreats monks come for three years, three months and three days. They have just one meal a day and spend most of their time in meditation.

Here's a holy spot with a collection of miniature stupas. These are little terracotta cones moulded with a hollow bottom, into which something commemorating a deceased person is put - it might be ashes, a photo or a piece of scripture.



I don't know what this was about - I like to think it was a nice little prayer rather than something like "take your litter home".



Not that they would say anything that crass:



And of course there were the dogs to keep us company.





At this point the path went from being reasonably easy going to being very difficult indeed, at least for someone like me with bum knees. I took a couple more ibuprofen and contemplated the view. At the point the path went very steeply down to the left of the picture below, then very steeply up again. I thought maybe they got the prayer flags across the gorge by shooting an arrow across with a bit of string tied to it; but no, they take one end and the string of flags and trudge down the steps and back up the other side.





But before we started down the steps we stopped at the butter lamp chapel. Ah yes, they have learned a thing or two: the butter lamps are kept well away from the monastery.



It was the sweetest little place, shimmering and cosy with the light and warmth of dozens of butter lamps. We lit one for each member of the party, plus one for Tshering and his family, and then Duncan lit one for his late wife - so he had to light another one to make it an odd number - it's auspicious.



I realised later that I hadn't taken a photo of the monk - that's his bare foot in the bottom left-hand corner! He was very nice, shy and smiley.

Then it was down down down the steps to the bridge across the stream at the foot of the waterfall.





Just past the waterfall is a tiny little pilgrimage site, Senge Phug, one of the nine sacred caves at Taktsang.



And then up and up and up and up to the entrance, where we had to shed our bags and cameras, submit to being frisked, and then put on our jackets.



Just when I was feeling pretty good about having made it there, I saw the next lot of steps leading up inside the monastery. Great big tall stone steps, two flights of really really steep steps. Just as well I was allowed to keep my stick! Off I went, up and up and up. And it was well worth it.

The main temple is a jewel box, a gleaming gem painted with images of the Buddha and Guru Rinpoche. There's a statue of the guru as well, and piles of offerings. Every detail is exquisite, the door, the door handle, the statues, the paintings. But the highlight was in one corner: a huge gilded door with a little window in it, through which you can peer in to the actual cave where the guru meditated. It is decorated and hung with white silk scarves, but it is clearly a cave, a deep cleft in the rock.

After viewing the cave, we each received a blessing from the monk - you give a donation, chose a symbol from a little basket and he tied it around your neck while murmuring a prayer. I have a phurbu, a ritual dagger, with a dorje or thunderbolt on the handle. It's more like a three-sided tent peg than a dagger, and symbolises the overcoming or cutting through of the three poisons of ignorance, greed and hatred. The dorje symbolises cosmic energy in its pure form. (Fascinating Fact: Darjeeling comes from Dorje Ling, Place of the Thunderbolt.)

Tshering made three full prostrations in front of the guru statue. He says if you meditate in this temple he will sometimes speak to you. "But so far, nothing," he said cheerfully.

We had a look out over the gorge from a balcony just down from the temple, then went around the corner and up some more steps to see the cave where Yeshe Tsogyal, the flying tigress and consort and enlightened being, the Queen of Bliss, meditated. No fancy temple, no gilded door, just a plain cave.

And then it was back down down down the steep stone steps. A Bhutanese woman coming down behind me said, "Same! Same! Sore knees!" and gave me a helping hand. We got chatting and she asked where I was from. "Edinburgh," I said. "I've been there," she replied. Her husband went to university in Scotland, studied agricultural science. She was murmuring mantras as we walked along.

For some reason I didn't take many photos on the way back down down down the stone steps and back up up up the stone steps - rather too busy staying alive!



The dogs were still tooing and froing along the path. They seem to have quite a nice life.





The cairns on the path reminded me of hillwalking in Scotland.



At one point we had to wait to let some monks go past with ponies carrying supplies for the monastery.



Finally we reached the cafeteria, where we had lunch. The food is all vegetarian, because it's a holy place. It's cooked on wood stoves in a very basic (and smokey) kitchen and served in a buffet in the large dining room. We ate outside.



The animals were quite restrained.



Just near the cafeteria some ladies were selling necklaces and so forth from blankets spread on the ground. They called out "shopping, shopping" as soon as we hove into view. I'd had a look on the way up and knew what I wanted - some yak-bone prayer beads. I negotiated a price I was pleased with and the seller was very pleased with. I got one set for Anthea and one for myself. I love them - they're very plain and simple and very heavy.



She's smiling with her mouth shut because her few remaining teeth are stained red with betel nut. She's a sweetie.

On the way back down the hill we came across a team of litter-pickers. I asked them to pose so I could send a photo to the CleanFerry group - litter-picking is one of my hobbies.



After the long walk I was pretty knackered but elated. The bus was waiting and we drove in to town for a quick bit of shopping before heading back to the hotel for a well-earned shower and a rest. We went out for dinner to a very nice restaurant in Paro - delicious food. There was a real treat in the buffet lineup: yak goulash. John will be thrilled to know that Hungarian cuisine has reached the furthest corners of the world! It was delicious, by the way. And it was a proper goulash too, yum.

After such an action-packed day I slept very well that night.

Day 11: Thimpu to Paro

A bit tired and jaggy from lack of sleep, we piled on the bus bound for Paro - where Tshering assured us the hotel had softer beds. First of all, though, we paid a visit to Thimpu's weekly vegetable market. It's in a temporary venue at the moment, because the market proper is being renovated.

Farmers from all round the area come to town to sell their produce, plus there are importers selling goods from India - exotic fruit, spices and so on. It was still raining, and the market entrance was a sea of mud, with planks and bits of cardboard to walk on. The market itself was under tarps, so a lot of the photos have a blue cast.















The last pic there is a betel nut seller - a lot of people chew betel nut, a mild stimulant. You can tell because it turns their teeth and gums red. The seller wraps the nut with the leaves and lime powder. The fruit and veg looked delicious, nice and fresh.

Back in the bus we set off for Paro. En route we stopped at a famous bridge, Tamchog Chakzam, designed by the engineer monk Thangtong Gyalpo, who built iron chain bridges all over Tibet and Bhutan in the 15th century. The Paro bridge was washed away in a storm in the 50s and rebuilt.



The little cave in the hill behind the bridge is the mine where the iron ore came from for the chains. The bridge is suspended on heavy iron chains that go through the buildings and are pinned at the back. The bridge is made of wire mesh and bamboo slats - springy but secure feeling, nice to walk on. And of course it's festooned with prayer flags.









Paro is a nice little town, just a few shops and a laid-back feeling. There were dogs everywhere of course.



The whole Paro valley is beautiful, with fields of rice along the river, and houses and farms and scattered in the hills.



We visited the Rinpung Dzong next, crossing a nice covered bridge to get there.



















It was massive, and rather gorgeous. Again it was raining, again we couldn't wear any hats or open our umbrellas, but still it was wonderful. Some things remain a mystery... this sign for example:



The paintwork was great, sometimes gaudy, sometimes subtle.





And there were grand views.



Bhutan's national sport is archery, so we were thrilled to see a match in progress just near the dzong. It's interesting to see that the national obsession with doing everything traditional style doesn't include the archers' equipment - they all had the very latest composite bows.










Here's a little film of the archers dancing.



The women, meanwhile, were singing too - to put off the men of the opposing team. Because it was raining they were in the tea tent.



We had lunch at a cafe in Paro, where some of the others tried the local beer, which wasn't a big hit. It was a white beer, yeasty and clouded. Downstairs from the cafe was a weaving studio and we popped in for a look. The women were working on the most amazing pieces, very intricate and embellished with extra threads woven in with a shuttle. I don't know what the technique is called, but the resulting cloth was stunning. And was selling for a stunning price too! Worth it, but well out of my league - we're talking £400 for a small tablecloth. Just looking, thanks!

So... time for another dzong. This was Drukyeldzong, which burnt down in the 1950s and hasn't been rebuilt... yet. It's possible it will be in the future, but at the moment it's just earth and stone walls and a few charred beams. Very popular venue for picnics, apparently.








The buildings around the dzong had some spectacular decorations:



And we passed a puppy with the comfiest bed in Bhutan:



Right! What next? Oh, I know, another monastery! This one was rather special, Kyichu Lhakhang, dating from the 17th century.





It was small, simple, lovely. The courtyard was especially nice, with a little orange tree.



But just as we were about to go into the temple, I got a nose-bleed. Amazing! I've never had one before and it came from nowhere (well, from my nose, obviously, but you know what I mean). Duncan is an anaesthetist and he advised pinching my nostrils for five minutes, while Judy gave me a bundle of tissues. Then they all went into the temple while I stood around outside, bleeding and pinching. It stopped just as they came back out. Apparently the temple is REALLY nice.



Back in the bus, Tshering said, "And now we will go to .... another dzong!" He was only kidding - we were going to the hotel, the Olathang. Very nice place, built in the 1970s. It has a stuffed yak, the only yak I saw (apart from the goulash). And the beds, while not exactly soft, certainly weren't as hard as the Druk's. Plus it had the best shower of the whole trip, so strong it nearly blasted me off my feet. The rooms had a hasp and padlock rather than a conventional lock, and were painted in traditional style - mine was red with blue beams and mandalas on the ceiling.

There was a bizarre surprise for us at the Olathang. There was a fascinating couple staying at the Druk in Thimpu, an elderly woman who talked and talked and talked and a slightly younger looking man who listened and listened and listened. Those with better hearing than me reported that she was telling her life history, with a lot of detail about her childhood and her mother. She apparently said she was 90, which she really didn't look. The man looked as if he would die of boredom at any moment. We had fun coming up with theories of who they were - we plunked for him being her therapist.

So who should be there at the Olathang when we walked in!!! And at dinner they were exactly the same: her talking and talking and talking.

That night I looked up my bumf on altitude sickness to see if nose-bleeds were a symptom, but they weren't. I noticed one odd symptom I hadn't heard of before: you can wake up in the night unable to breathe. But relax - it's just your body's auto systems adjusting to the lower oxygen content. And lo and behold, that night I woke up unable to breathe! If I hadn't read the bumf I would have panicked, it was a horrible feeling. But because I had I just relaxed and started breathing normally and went back to sleep.