Walking to Tiger’s Nest

Taktsang sits nine hundred metres above the floor of the Paro valley, fixed to a granite cliff with no visible means of support. It is the most photographed building in the Himalaya and the one thing almost every visitor to Bhutan does.

The walk itself

Four to five hours return at an unhurried pace. The path climbs steadily through blue pine hung with prayer flags, reaches a cafeteria at roughly the halfway point where most people stop for tea, then continues to a viewpoint directly opposite the monastery. From there the route descends a long staircase into a gorge, crosses a waterfall, and climbs back up to the entrance.

That final section is the part nobody warns you about. It is roughly seven hundred steps down and then up again, and you do it at around 3,000 metres.

Altitude, not fitness

The trailhead is already higher than most European mountains. Reasonably fit people who would walk this distance easily at home find themselves stopping often. This is normal and not a sign of a problem. It is also why we place Tiger’s Nest late in an itinerary rather than on day two.

Horses can carry you as far as the cafeteria. They cannot take you further, and the second half is the harder half.

What is actually up there

Four temples built around a cave where Guru Rinpoche is said to have meditated for three years, three months, three weeks, three days and three hours in the eighth century. He is said to have arrived on the back of a flying tigress. The buildings you see date largely from a reconstruction after a fire in 1998, which some visitors find disappointing and which misses the point. The site is sacred, not the timber.

Practical

Start early, ideally by eight. Bags, cameras and phones are left at the entrance. Bring more water than you think and a layer for the top, which is cold even when the valley is warm.