Photos from second half of our journey

Marie hangin with the local kids in a village on the road to Haa Valley.

Diana, Dwight, Bob and Marie at the highest road pass in Bhutan, 13,000 feet, just before our 30 mile screaming downhill ride through snow to Paro

Dwight and Diana about to tour Kila Nunnery with Bob and Marie and Tashi

This is the building your donations will help rebuild.  The nuns who lived here are camped out in the main Temple.  We visited them and were blessed by them, but they were in silence so could only communicate by smiles and waves.

In Thimphu

Sorry for the writing but the internet does not have the capacity for photos.  So what's happened since the last post:

* rainy weather in the dry season
* saw black neck cranes in Gangtey
* 24 mile downhill (Bob almost bought the farm on this one)
* 24 mile uphill
* had a 'session' with a 7 year old lama...we were all fascinated
* visited several Dzongs (forts)
* visited the art school in Thimphu
A hightlight of or day yesterday was meeting Dr. Tashi Zangmo, Executive Director of the Bhutan Nuns Foundation and officially making our donation of $1200 to help restore the Kila Goenpa nunnery. She was thrilled and quite emotional about the fact that several people in remote Nashville Tennessee donated money for one of her nunneries.  We met in the afternoon at the painting school and then she stopped by our hotel last night with a handwritten note for all of you who donated. I will forward it to you when we get home.  We talked for a couple of hours about her life story, which is amazing, and her advocacy for the 26 nunneries in Bhutan which are so often overlooked.  One of her projects is to build a small library in a couple of them, and she has acquired land for a central resource center for the nuns, something the monks have had for generations.  She is really an amazing woman, and thanks to Linda Leaming for arranging an introduction.
We also had a shopping frenzy going on yesterday in Thimpu.  For better or worse, Bob and I became kindred spirits with our shopping mania, going from store to store all afternoon and buying some wonderful items, including two of the giant horns for the Coffey/Griffin house!  Marie will probably never allow Bob and I to shop together again!

More scenes from the road

The 'flat head' cobra sunning itself that would not let us pass.

This was at ~7,000 feet altitude....no wonder it was enjoying the warm day

Marie and Bob celebrate after conquering another climb.

Note the road in the background

Bob and Marie chat with the Boss, head of the new hospital in Mongar.  We toured it later.

Weavers near Jakar.  This one is all silk and will sell for thousands.

All of us at the 7th Century temple in Jakar

Always, beautiful prayer flags everywhere!

Monks at Trongsa Dzong were working on their moves for an upcoming festival.

Marie and Dwight taking a break from riding to pick out some bananas.

Dwight and Diana at Trongsa Dzong

Happy monk smiling for the camera.  They are awesome.

Our view from the road of the high Himalayas.

camping the himayas wih 9 Bhutanese men making evey wish come true Ok moving along

Sunset on our camp spot through the prayer flags erected before the migrant workers moved away.  It was a fancy camp with a hot shower and huge bon fire.  Cold at night? I more long underware, base biking shirt, two wind jackets fleece jacket and my gore tex coat.  Still freezing so I added foot and hand warmers left over from our skiing days,

On the road

Our daily routine of ride, have lunch on side of road and ride again.

We have our own cook travelling with us making fresh food every day.  Nice.

Baby calf born just moments before we rode by on way to Mongar

New photos

The gang at the India/Bhutan border starting the adventure

Tough couple of days.....

We are in Mongar after a rough couple of days for Bob & I....we both came down with a case of whatever Montezuma's revenge is called in Bhutan.  He had a more severe case than me but nonetheless mine was enough for me to abandon yesterday's ride.  I was about 15 miles (~30 miles total) and 3,000 feet into a climb which is about halfway, when I realized it wasn't happening.  After numerous stops to relieve myself and despite hydrating like crazy, I was spent.  Caught a ride to the top and we all did the great downhill to the hotel in Mongar.  Today was to be a 91 mile day and I knew that wasn't going to happen, so we all decided to make this a well deserved rest day in Mongar.  Tomorrow we will be driving part of the route and then continuing the cycling into Jakar.  Unfortunate that I won't be able to say I rode across Bhutan but if you've ever had an episode of this traveler's affliction, you understand.
In Mongar, there is a Public Health conference going on and we tagged along with Bob and Marie as they visited. (Diana was the official photographer) We then went to the local hospital and got a tour of the facility and were able to talk to some of the physicians.  Bob and Marie felt they were much more advanced than they were expecting.










A note about photos: I wish I could let you enjoy Diana's photos instead of having to read my crappy writing (yes, its a pun) but the Internet is slow enough that its about a 15 minute per photo operation to upload. Supposedly we'll have 3G in Jakar, but like the roads in Bhutan, perhaps its under construction....stand by.

In Trashigang

Three days of riding completed.  Last night I was completely wiped out and actually felt like I was coming down with something. Got 12+ hours of sleep and feel much better this morning.  A review of the ride statistics helped me understand why I was wiped out:  102 miles....I know not impressive for three days...but 13,978 feet of climbing on roads that were in many cases dirt, gravel and mud.  The sorest muscles I have are my triceps.  For those of you who have ridden with me in the mountains you know how much I enjoy descents: total downhill yesterday was 6,502 feet with most of that on the final descent with reasonable roads.  I was ready to get to the hotel so I let it go. 
I was riding with one of our guides on a realtively tough ascent yesterday when I saw what at first looked like a fire hose on the road.  It turned out to be a snake....according to the guide it was a flat head cobra sunning itself on the road. I can't say I got out a measuring device, but my guess is it was 10-12 feet long. We were stuck as we weren't about to go around it.  Finally a car came up the road and the snake 'slithered' off into the bushes. We made a hasty ascent past where the snake had been.  Talk about a road hazard.
One cultural note:  there was a Buddhist celebration going on in a village along the route and we got invited in.  Very moving with chanting and worshipers being blessed and probably one hundred monks.  The head lama is 17 years old and apprarently quite remarkable.  Just one of the interesting facets of travel in Bhutan.
Pictures are coming........

First Day of Riding

We had a good sleep in Sanjop Jankhar (SJ on your Visa form) except for the barking dogs.  I counteracted by ear buds and music via the nano.  Began the ride at 500' and am now writing this at ~5,000 ft, according to my bike computer 5,200 feet of vertical climbing with a few downhills on some of the worst roads....really needed a mountain bike, but supposedly the pavement which started 2km from our campsite continues from here on.  No damage to anyone's bike but it made 30 miles feel like 60.  Some of the group saw monkees, but not me.  Now we are at our campsite on a ridge with an incredible view and fantastic sunset, not to mention a hot shower.  We are roughing it. Hopefully we'll get it together to share some photos tomorrow.  Amazing I can be out here in the middle of this very rural country and have web access.

More on Guwahati

Think of any negative adjective about a city and it will probably apply to this town....not positive about the crime but with 2.5 mil people, I'm sure there is some.  Oddly though the streets are full of life and  people, most going about their business.  Also the people are generally attractive, especially the women...they wear colorful wraps that are in stark contrast to the mostly squalid surroundings.  Very ironic.  One more note, Diana and I are either rock stars or novelty items, I presume the latter since virtually everyone stares at our very white faces and they are not shy about it....not bad stares just long enough for Diana to use Pee Wee Herman's line: "take a picture it will last longer."
Also, following up on yesterday's 'Zen' blog, the gate attendant in Delhi with the four hour delay had no clue what was going on I suspect.  Her English was not great (but better than my Hindi) so we had a difficult time getting information.  Every ounce of my business acumen wanted to lecture her on what a horrible way this was to run Air India and we would have to think twice about using their services again...but since I know if would have done no good and the situation was completely out of our control I didn't (or as Diana says "chilled").  On top of that I'm sure the attendant would have said so what. That's the Zen of Travel...knowing what you can control and having the wisdom to know what you can't.  Pictures are are on the way.

Zen and the Art of Travel

After 40+ hours of non-stop travel we finally made it Guwahati, India.  If you're interested: N'ville-Chicago-London-Delhi-Guwahati, including a 4 hour delay in Delhi when we were about at the end of our proverbial ropes.  Usually on these trips we'll have a moment where, although unspoken, we are thinking, "this is a vacation?"  That happened in the Delhi airport at 4 am this morning, but luckily Diana found a pay-by-the hour lounge that allowed us escape the madness and heat of the general airport area and pulled us through.  We did have a nice view of the Himalayan mountains on the flight from Delhi to Guwahati.  The luggage all made it including the bike (not in one piece since its designed to come apart) but the wheel spokes all appear to be in good shape, which was my biggest concern.  Tomorrow morning we pick up travelling companions Bob & Marie at the Guwahati airport and drive 2 hours to Bhutan.  As a city, Guwahati is what you think of most Indian cities....dirty, crowded, run-down and noisy...not exactly a place to vacation. The car ride from the airport gave me as much of a taste of an Indian city as I need.  Looking forward to getting back to 'Shangri La' Bhutan in the morning.