Paro Taktsang

Interesting facts

On 19 April 1998 a fire gutted the main monastery building and killed one monk; the complex was rebuilt and reconsecrated by 2005.

The reconstruction after the 1998 fire cost about 135 million ngultrum and was overseen under King Jigme Singye Wangchuck.

The monastery stands at roughly 3,120 metres above sea level, about 10 km north of the town of Paro.

Beside the buildings a waterfall drops about 60 metres into a pool regarded as sacred.

The cliff holds eight caves, of which only four are relatively easy to reach.

Later Buddhist masters said to have meditated here include the Tibetan yogi Milarepa, the teacher Machig Labdrön and the bridge-building saint Thangtong Gyalpo.

A first sanctuary was built on the site in the 14th century, and for centuries until the mid-1600s Taktsang was held by lamas of the Kathogpa tradition.

The small temple of Ugyen Tsemo above the main monastery dates back to 1408 and was rebuilt after a fire in 1958.

Why it is worth it

Legend holds that Guru Rinpoche, the 8th-century master credited with bringing Buddhism to Bhutan, arrived at this cliff riding on the back of a flying tigress — accounts differ on whether she was his own consort transformed, or a Tibetan emperor's former concubine turned disciple — and meditated inside the cave here for months, some tellings insisting on the oddly exact span of three years, three months, three weeks, three days and three hours, before subduing the local spirits and beginning the valley's conversion.

This cave is one of thirteen "tiger lair" sites across the Himalayas where Guru Rinpoche is said to have meditated, but it's the one that lent its name — Taktsang, tiger's lair — to all the rest. The monastery physically enclosing that sacred cave wasn't built until 1692, nearly a thousand years after the legendary flight, commissioned by the ruler Gyalse Tenzin Rabgye.

There's no road. The only way up, to a monastery clinging to a sheer rock face roughly 900 metres above the Paro valley floor, is on foot — or partway by mule to a viewpoint, followed by a final steep climb on stone steps. That physical effort is part of what keeps the site feeling remote, in a way surprisingly few daily-open landmarks in Asia still manage.

Good to know

Independent travel in Bhutan is restricted; most visitors arrange the trip through a licensed local operator or guide rather than showing up on their own.

Best time to visit

Spring and autumn, for clearer mountain views and drier trail conditions on the climb.

Getting there

28 km from Thimphu. Paro International Airport (PBH) is about 12 km away.