Trans Bhutan Trail set to reopen after 60 years, offering adventurers a 403km journey across the mountain kingdom’s rich ancient history
- The Bhutan government and a Canadian organisation worked together to rebuild the trail, which had been in a state of disrepair for six decades.
- Communities have created a network of high quality accommodation along the trail to make it ready and appealing for adventurous tourists and locals
Captivating, mysterious and seemingly idyllic, that’s Bhutan. The landlocked Himalayan kingdom at the roof of the world is on many an adventurous traveller’s bucket list of destinations.
As with most Asian countries Bhutan has been all but sealed off to international visitors for almost two years now because of the coronavirus pandemic. Many would-be travellers are waiting in anticipation of the country opening its doors to the outside world once again, which is expected to happen sometime between March and April 2022.
While the borders were sealed off there was a great deal of back-breaking physical groundwork being undertaken by the Tourism Council of Bhutan and the Canada Bhutan Foundation, who were ably helped by some 900-plus pandemic-furloughed workers.
Their task begun just before the pandemic struck, and that was to restore the historical and long lost route of the Trans Bhutan Trail. At the same time the remote local communities and regional governments along the way came together to create a network of high quality accommodation along the trail to make it ready and appealing for adventurous tourists and locals.
“It’s not often you can hike a historic trail that was used for millenniums by royals, monks, and traders,” Canadian tour provider G-Adventures, which is helping to promote the trail, says on its website. “In fact, it’s been 60 years. Until the 1960s, the Trans Bhutan Trail was the only real way to traverse the mountain kingdom of Bhutan before it fell into disuse.”
