I had wanted to visit Bhutan for a long time and finally set off towards the Land of the Thunder Dragon this December 30th. The journey from Sikkim to the Bhutan border town of Phuntsholing takes about 7 hours by road. A long drive indeed and I believe I slept most of the way. So after traveling for what felt like eternity, we reached Phuntsholing at 3 pm. Now the difference between the two sides of the border is startling. Jaigaon, the last town of India is this bustling, clouds of dust-billowing-in-the-air, crowded place where cows rule. As you cross over to Bhutan (while the Bhutan police looks suspiciously at the back seat of your car – not their fault actually, cause we had piled our luggage in such a manner we appeared to be smuggling something across the border), you feel more clean and the slope uphill made me feel immediately at home.
Memorial Shrine, Thimpu
No major formality to enter the country, really; just drive through in your car and you’re in a foreign country! Easy as that. Once inside Bhutan, we hunted for a hotel to dump our baggage and in a hurry to eat, ended up choosing a not so great hotel although if we’d just circled the block, we’d have found much nicer hotels. I’d forgotten how it was to be a tourist.
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