Paro

The Paro valley is one of the oldest settled places in Bhutan. Kyichu Lhakhang is traditionally counted among the temples founded in the 7th century by the Tibetan king Songtsen Gampo, and in the 8th century Guru Rinpoche is said to have flown to the cliff above the valley and meditated in the cave that became Taktsang. Its position mattered: routes over the passes to Tibet made the valley a trading and military corridor, and grain grown on its wide floor fed the lamas and lords who competed for it.

The modern shape of the valley comes from the 17th century, when the Zhabdrung Ngawang Namgyal's government took control of the west. Rinpung Dzong was built above the river in the 1640s on the site of an earlier fortress, with the round Ta Dzong raised on the slope above it as a watchtower. Drukgyel Dzong was built at the head of the valley in 1649 to commemorate a victory over Tibetan invaders; it stood until a fire all but destroyed it in the early 1950s, and a restoration was announced in 2016. The Ta Dzong was converted into the National Museum in the 1960s.

Aviation changed the valley again. An airstrip on the valley floor grew into Bhutan's only international airport, with scheduled flights from 1983, and Paro became the point at which almost every visitor enters the country. Hotels, guesthouses and shops followed, and the main street was rebuilt in a single traditional style, while the fields around the town stayed in cultivation.

Paro's identity is bound to its dzong and its festival. The Paro Tshechu, held over several days in spring, fills the dzong courtyard and the ground above it with masked dances performed by monks and laymen, clowns working the crowd, and families in their best kira and gho; on the final morning, before dawn, a giant appliquéd thongdrel is unrolled against a wall and rolled away again before the sun can touch it. Taktsang, about 10 kilometres up the valley, is a pilgrimage for Bhutanese as much as a walk for visitors.

Valley life keeps older habits. Farmhouses are built of rammed earth with timber upper storeys and elaborately painted window frames, and many still dry chillies on their roofs in autumn. Hot stone baths — a wooden trough of water heated by river stones taken from a fire, with artemisia leaves added — are a household tradition offered to guests. Archery ranges sit at the edge of most villages, and matches bring singing and teasing between teams.

Because the airport is here, Paro is also the country's threshold: arriving and departing visitors, pilots, hotel staff and guides pass through constantly, and the town has more handicraft shops and cafés than its size would otherwise support. Residents are used to foreign visitors and tend to be reserved and courteous rather than insistent.

Paro town is small — a single main street and the settlements around it — and it functions as the service centre for a farming valley. Government offices are in the dzong, the market and shops are on the main street, and the schools, hospital and airport provide much of the paid employment along with hotels and tour operators.

Farming still sets the rhythm outside the town. The valley floor grows Bhutan's best-known red rice, transplanted in early summer and harvested in autumn, and the slopes carry potatoes, wheat, apples and vegetables, with cattle kept for milk and butter. Households divide the year between fieldwork, festivals and, for many families, a second income from tourism: a farmstay, a hot stone bath, a driving job or a shop.

Days are quiet and start early. The flight schedule sets a rhythm of its own, with the morning arrivals filling the road to town and the valley emptying again by mid-afternoon. Concerns are those of the country as a whole — rising prices, the cost of building, young people leaving for Australia and the Gulf — with a local edge in how much farmland is being turned into hotels and houses along a valley with little flat ground to spare.

Paro is red rice country. The short, nutty grain grown on the valley floor is steamed and served with the cheese-and-chilli dishes that define Bhutanese cooking: ema datshi, whole green or dried chillies simmered with soft local cheese; kewa datshi with potatoes; and shamu datshi with mushrooms. Dried beef is cooked with chillies and radish, and phaksha paa pairs dried pork with chillies and vegetables.

Momos, steamed dumplings of beef, cheese or vegetables, are the common snack, and the valley's own dishes lean on what grows here — buckwheat, turnips, ferns gathered in spring, mustard greens, and apples that go into everything from raw eating to juice and brandy. Hoentay, the buckwheat dumplings of neighbouring Haa, appear on many menus, since the valley is only a pass away.

Drinks are as traditional as the food. Suja, tea churned with butter and salt, is offered on arrival at a farmhouse, sweet milk tea is drunk through the day, and ara, the home-distilled grain spirit, is served at festivals and to guests, sometimes warmed with butter and egg. Doma, areca nut with betel leaf and lime, is chewed widely and offered as a courtesy. In town, a small group of cafés and bakeries provides coffee and cakes, and larger hotels serve Indian, Chinese and Continental menus alongside Bhutanese dishes.