Boutique Bhutan: 10 days on the lodge circuit
Bhutan has an unusual hotel market. Below a certain level there is a broad band of decent, similar, government-classified hotels that are perfectly comfortable and hard to tell apart. Above it there is a small number of international lodges, most of them run as circuits with one property in each val
- Duration
- 10 days
- Pace
- Relaxed
- Hotel changes
- 4
- Best months
- Mar, Apr, May, Oct, Nov
- From
- $7,800 per person
There is very little in between. This itinerary is the upper circuit, done properly: five valleys, five lodges, ten days, and a pace slow enough to use them.
The honest framing on cost is this. The Sustainable Development Fee is fixed per person per night regardless of where you sleep, so it does not scale with luxury. What does scale is the lodge rate, and these lodges are priced at international resort levels. This route sits at our luxury tier and it is roughly double the comfortable one.
Who it suits: travellers who want the country and the hotels equally, honeymooners, and anyone who would rather do five valleys well than eight quickly.
Your specialist: your named Bhutan specialist, with our Delhi office running the ground and holding the lodge allocations.
Day by day
Day 1: Fly into Paro. Arrival at about 7,300 feet (2,225 m), transfer to your Paro lodge, and an afternoon with nothing in it. Altitude plus a long flight is a bad combination with a schedule.
Day 2: Paro. Kyichu Lhakhang early, then the Rinpung Dzong and the National Museum in the round watchtower. Afternoon up to Chele La at 12,400 feet (3,780 m), the highest road pass in the country, with a picnic. Spa treatment in the evening if you want one, and the lodges here do them well.
Day 3: Paro to Thimphu. An hour’s drive. The Buddha Dordenma, the National Textile Museum, the arts school, and the dzong at the end of the office day. Your Thimphu lodge is out of the city on the valley side, which is the right side of the trade-off.
Day 4: Thimphu to Punakha. Three hours over Dochula at 10,170 feet (3,100 m), stopping at the chortens, then the long descent to about 4,300 feet (1,310 m). The Punakha lodges are on the river and they are the best of the circuit. Afternoon by the water.
Day 5: Punakha. The dzong at the confluence in the morning, which deserves two unhurried hours. Afternoon: the Mo Chhu float, or the climb to Khamsum Yulley Namgyal Chorten, or a farmhouse lunch. A hot stone bath in the evening, which every lodge here builds properly.
Day 6: Punakha to Gangtey. Four hours east and up to the Phobjikha valley at about 9,800 feet (3,000 m). The Gangtey lodges look straight down the glacial valley and they are heated, which matters. Afternoon on the Gangtey Nature Trail, an easy walk of about ninety minutes.
Day 7: Phobjikha. Gangtey Goenpa on the ridge, the crane centre, and a walk up onto the valley side for the view back. From late October the black-necked cranes are on the valley floor, and the winter light here is the best in Bhutan. Evening by a fire.
Day 8: Gangtey to Paro. The long drive west, five to six hours, broken at Dochula and with a farmhouse lunch. Back to your Paro lodge in the late afternoon.
Day 9: Tiger’s Nest. Paro Taktsang at about 10,200 feet (3,120 m), roughly 1,700 feet (520 m) of steep ascent, two to three hours up, starting at seven. The lodges send you with a packed breakfast and meet you at the bottom. Afternoon: a bath, a massage and nothing.
Day 10: Departure. Transfer to Paro airport.
What is included
Full board throughout at lodges on the international circuit, private vehicle with a Bhutanese driver, a licensed English-speaking guide throughout, all entry fees, the Chele La picnic, the Mo Chhu float, one hot stone bath each, one spa treatment each where the lodge includes them, the visa applications, the Sustainable Development Fee for all nine nights itemised per person per night, and a WhatsApp group with your specialist and our Delhi office.
What we would change, and when
- Want Bumthang as well? Add three nights and a domestic flight, which reaches the fifth and sixth lodges of the circuits and the oldest religious sites in the country. Ten becomes thirteen.
- Want it cheaper without losing much? Substitute the best independent hotels in Paro and Punakha for two of the lodge nights. It moves the trip to our boutique tier and it is a defensible trade.
- Travelling with a group of four or more? Some lodges have villas that change the maths in your favour. We will price both.
- Peak festival dates? Lodge allocations in Paro and Thimphu go early for the tshechus. We hold them long before the dates are confirmed.
Honest notes
These lodges are genuinely very good and they are expensive by any standard, not only by Bhutanese ones. What you get is architecture that belongs where it stands, small rooms counts, heating that works in valleys where it often does not, food that is not a buffet, and staff who have been there for years. What you do not get is a different Bhutan. The dzongs, the walks and the roads are the same ones everyone else is on.
The Sustainable Development Fee is charged per person per night on top of the lodge rate. On this route that is nine nights each. It does not vary with your hotel standard.
The drive from Gangtey to Paro on day 8 is long and there is no way around it that does not cost a night. We break it properly rather than pretend it is short.
You will have a guide and a driver with you throughout, because that is the rule in Bhutan. The lodges do not change that.
Tiger’s Nest is genuinely steep and the lodges cannot make it less so. Two to three hours of uphill on a rough path at altitude, with stairs down and up at the end.
Phobjikha is at about 9,800 feet and it is cold from October. The lodges are heated. The valley is not.
Built by your named Bhutan specialist, and checked by our Delhi office before it goes out.
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