In Bhutan, Trekking in Style

Four days on the trail, high in the Himalayas, in one of the most remote and unspoiled spots on earth, with all the comforts of home

by Bruce Einhorn

The lobby of the Uma Paro, one of a handful of luxury hotels in Bhutan that organize treks along the Druk Path for foreign tourists.

• View Slide Show

It was quite an entourage. A dozen mules, lugging the tents, sleeping bags, backpacks, gas stoves, and enough food for both humans and animals for four days. Managing the animals were three pony men. The group also included two cooks, two campground managers, and one guide in charge of keeping everything in order. Oh yes, and two guests: my wife and me.

We were gathered on the edge of Paro, a small town in the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, as we were about to embark on the Druk Path, a four-day trek that would take us through forests of blue pine, past monasteries of whitewashed stone that look a bit like Swiss chalets, above the tree line to yak-herder shelters, along snowy ridges with stunning views of the high peaks, and finally down to the valley of Thimpu, a bustling town of government ministries, international aid-agency offices, small museums, and tourist shops, which is the closest Bhutan has to a city.

Rugged Terrain

A country the size of Switzerland sandwiched between the plains of India and the plateau of Tibet, Bhutan is renowned for its challenging trekking: One of the toughest mountain treks in the kingdom, the Snowman, involves weeks of Himalayan ascents and descents through some of the most isolated—and beautiful—places on earth. Such treks are definitely not for beginners. But you don't have to be hard-core to trek in Bhutan. The Druk Path (druk means "dragon" in Bhutan, and the Bhutanese call their country Druk Yul, or "Land of the Thunder Dragon") is certainly challenging: We started at 7,500 feet above sea level and walked and walked till we were at 13,800 feet. But the trek is also quite accessible, assuming you're in reasonable shape and not prone to altitude sickness.

This accessibility has made it a favorite for a small number of Western tourists looking for a taste of Himalayan trekking while maintaining a bit of luxury. I'm no hiker, but my wife had wanted to go to Bhutan for years. So, equipped with sturdy boots, four-season sleeping bags, and altitude-sickness pills, we headed for the Himalayas.

Keeping the World at Bay

Bhutan, with a population under 1 million, has an ambivalent attitude toward outsiders in general and tourists in particular. The landlocked Buddhist kingdom is famously isolated: TV broadcasts and Internet access weren't available until 1999. There are few roads. Cell-phone service didn't arrive until 2003. The telecom network is hit-or-miss. And forget about trying to use a BlackBerry to get e-mail.

The country's young king, a graduate of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard who last month forced the reluctant Bhutanese to have their first ever parliamentary elections, is determined to protect the country's culture—not to mention its countryside—from outside influence. The government is keen to keep Bhutan from becoming a backpacker haven like nearby Nepal. Bhutan has policies designed to keep out the Lonely Planet crowd and appeal to more affluent travelers. Tourists must to spend a minimum of $200 a day and can't trek without a licensed guide. Not surprising, then, that we barely saw anyone else during our four days on the Druk Path.

Further complicating travel to Bhutan, there's no competition among airlines to keep fares down: The country has only one airport, in Paro, and only one airline flies in and out. Druk Air operates two incoming flights a day, one from Bangkok via Dhaka and the other from Delhi via Katmandu. Once the two flights have departed again in the morning, the airport simply shuts down. On our first afternoon in Paro, we hiked to a hill overlooking the airport, and there wasn't a plane in sight below.

So Bhutan is not for the bargain hunter. But the kingdom enjoys the sort of political stability unheard of among its neighbors. While the Bhutanese share a similar language and religion with Tibet, the border with the Chinese-ruled region is closed, and there's no spillover from the Beijing's crackdown on supporters of the Dalai Lama.