Bumdra Trek: A Journey Through Bhutan's Spiritual and Natural Wonders скачать в хорошем качестве

Bumdra Trek: A Journey Through Bhutan's Spiritual and Natural Wonders

The Bumdra Trek is one of Bhutan’s most visually stunning treks, offering a night of camping in the wild. The trek provides a unique opportunity to experience pristine natural landscapes combined with some of Bhutan’s most iconic cultural sites. Bumdra literally means the rock of one hundred thousand footprints of dakinis (female celestial beings). Legend has it that some 800 years ago, a hundred thousand dakinis flew to this place and left their footprints on the rock, hence its spiritual significance. One of the most exciting sites to visit during the Bumdra trek is reaching the sky burials. Sky burial is an ancient funeral where a human corpse is placed on a mountaintop to decompose, exposing it to the natural elements or offering it to scavenging animals, especially carrion birds. The purpose of sky burial from a cultural and spiritual context is primarily to offer the remains of the human body to hungry animals in an ultimate act of generosity – giving even in death. However, the practice has become obsolete today, rarely practiced in some remote highland communities in Bhutan. At Bumdra, there are three different sky burial sites, and usually, the third, located at an altitude of roughly 4500m, is visited the most. The second and the first sites are further up from the third, and without proper trails, reaching these sky burial sites is very difficult. Nevertheless, five of us, after walking a 12-hour round trip, have successfully visited all three sky burial sites in one day and returned home, which is very rare; otherwise, we have to halt the night at Bumdra base camp. During our visit to the sky burial sites, we carried a 20 KG bag full of prayer flags, which includes lungta, dolma, wangdue, and Baza guru, and hoisted them at the pinnacle of the first sky burial site at an altitude of more than 4500M above sea level. At that time, our lama friends performed Riwo shangchoe (smoke offering prayers) and lungta prayers for my kin and friends from Vietnam and Singapore. May all beings everywhere plagued by sufferings of body and mind obtain an ocean of happiness and joy by virtue of our merits. 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻 Enjoy a glimpse of our hike and get some ideas to plan your trip. Many thanks to my niece Yangzom Dechen, Co My Anh, lama Tandin Wangchuk, lama Kelzang Wangchuk, lopen Yeshi Wangchuk for the kind interest.