Mongar Tchetsu!

What a rest day we all had in Mongar.  The annual festival is a very important time for the local people who come from miles around all dressed in their very best clothes. The rally crews were determined to look their best and, out of respect for the traditions of Bhutan, we too all wore national dress.  Never, ever can there have been a smarter and more colourful rally family.

The festival has deep significance in the religion and local culture of Bhutans  inhabitants.  The spiritual dances are performed by monks, in a variety of astonishing masks and vivid costumes.  Very few foreigners get to witness the Eastern festivals - mainly because of the lack of tourist infrastructure- so we were pretty much the only chillips there. How welcoming everybody was, so friendly, and they were most amused at us all in their national dress and thought we looked beautiful.

The dances are mesmerising, all accompanied by horns, drums and extraordinary chanting. The Dzong was decorated in wonderful fabrics fluttering in the breeze against the bluest sky you ever did see.  As is traditional, we enjoyed a picnic lunch but ours was in a very special place.  We had permission to have our lunch in the Royal families' garden overlooking the main courtyard of the Dzong. 

This morning, our drive to Trashigang was 90kms.  For the most part, the road was good but the usual road widening made some sections a little tricky and very dusty.  As always in this magnificent country, the scenery was spectacular, the roads narrow and twisty and the drops massive.  Trashigang festival was in full swing and was a simpler, very intimate affair with a very special feeling.  

Our home tonight is in an orange grove.  We have some hotel rooms but many of the crews are camping in  pre-erected tents in the rice paddies.  They are certainly more "glamping" than "camping".  They have proper beds, a table and lamp and even have a carpet. Such is the spirit amongst our rally family that crews were begging to camp rather than have a room.  The car park has plenty of people standing around looking busy but, in fact, they are listening to music (Leonard Cohen - bad choice!) drinking beer and pretending to do things with screwdrivers. There is a bit of routine fettling going on, but no real issues.

It's hard to believe that we only have two days driving left. Tomorrow we start the long drive down from the mountains towards the plains of India. For our last night in Bhutan we are all camping, just a few miles from the border - in elephant country!