The Tiger's Nest @ Paro, Bhutan

Tiger's Nest,  Paro

Postcard view

Paro Taksang or more popularly known as the Tiger's Nest is one of the most popular attraction in Paro, Bhutan. Tiger's Nest is nestled up in the mountains among the lush greenery of the forests.

I was quite excited for the hike as it is always been a dream for me to visit this place. A bit of history of the monastery as copied from wikipedia: (I only remembered our guide, Namgay told us about the flying tigress part)

According to the legend related to this Taktsang, it is believed that Padmasambhava (Guru Rinpoche) flew to this location from Tibet on the back of a tigress from Khenpajong. This place was consecrated to tame the Tiger demon.

An alternative legend holds that a former wife of an emperor, known as Yeshe Tsogyal willingly became a disciple of Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambahva) in Tibet. She transformed herself into a tigress and carried the Guru on her back from Tibet to the present location of the Taktsang in Bhutan. In one of the caves here, the Guru then performed meditation and emerged in eight incarnated forms (manifestations) and the place became holy. Subsequently, the place came to be known as the “Tiger's Nest”

More picturesque view

For our 5 days 4 nights visit to Bhutan, we allocated one day for this place as the hike up to the Monastery takes about 1 hour for our guide but for us, we took 1 1/2 hours. The 'credit' goes to Namgay who volunteered to carry one of my friend's backpack so that she can walk faster!

XS climbing from behind

Finally we made it!!

The view is amazing

We started the hike early in the morning to avoid the sunny hot weather of Bhutan. I still remembered when I browse through all the forums and guide books online and discovered that August is not the best time to visit Bhutan due to the monsoon season from June to September. However, we were quite lucky as there were no rain and instead it was scorching hot, even hotter than Tibet!

There's a rest house halfway through the hike and we were very excited to see the monastery. After resting for half an hour, we resume our hike and finally reached the monastery. A long and tiring hike turn into excitement as we were rewarded with the majestic view of Taksang. It is simply too beautiful to describe in words.  Bags, cameras and handphones are not allowed in  the monastery and there's even a policeman located at the Tiger's Nest.

We spend some time at the monastery listening to stories told by Namgay. He had actually hike the Tiger's Nest numerous time, almost once a week! No wonder, he didn't even break a sweat when hiking up the mountain. He also mention that once he had to help his friend carry a Japanese guy who died in the middle of the hike.

After listening to his stories, we hike back down to the rest house for some refreshments and food!

Greenery along the hike

On the way down

Wadi Rum, Jordan

the camp site

I had a chance to visit a real desert during a trip to Jordan a while back and coincidentally, this desert is declared as one of the UNESCO World Heritage recently. We didnt have the chance to stay in a campsite at this desert but even a day trip visit is well worth. I even had the chance to photograph the amazing sunset in Wadi Rum at one of the 'bridge'.

Wadi Rum is famous for the filming location of Lawrence of Arabia as well as Transformers: Revenge of Fallen. Although the desert is currently one of the popular tourist attractions in Jordan, the place is still inhibited by some of the Bedouin tribes. Many of the tourists will take the chance to stay a night in the desert while enjoying the starry night.

inside the camp (left) and on top of the rock (right)




there is different colours of the sand in Wadi Rum




the bridge where I watched the sunset


the sunset


it's amazing just to look at the stars at night


the moon is finally out


mushroom head

The Leaning Tower of Pisa

the famous tower upclose

Pisa is a small town located in Tuscany and about an hour train ride from Florence. We took this chance to visit the famous leaning tower as a day trip from Florence. Pisa is small to walk around and after a few minutes walk, we could see the leaning tower from far. Even from far we could see that the tower is tilted towards one side. We could see almost all the tourist did the must do pose in front of the Pisa tower! and off course we also couldnt resist not to pose the cliche pose..haha..well you gotta pose what you gotta pose when you are in Pisa!

Other than that, we practically covered Pisa in less than half a day. However, it's a good experience to see the tilted tower upclose. One can actually climb up the tower to have a good view of the town but we didnt do so as the weather was too hot. Why the tower is tilted? Read somewhere that it started sinking after a few years after it was built.

Pisa from afar

posing the cliche pose :)



the cathederal




notice those tourists on the left side?

Roars of the Niagara Falls

view from Prospect Point


The video is taken by my dad to show how thundering and loud the falls can be

Niagara Falls is the largest waterfall in the world and situated at the border of US and Canada. We managed only to see the falls from the US side as we need visa to crossover to Toronto. The trip was in 2007, my first ever country beside Asia. The falls on the American side consist of the Bridal Veil, Horseshoe falls and American Falls.

The best time to visit Niagara Falls is actually during summer when the Maid of Mist is operating. Maid of Mist is the boat operator that takes tourists to see the falls closer. Practically I was wet from head to toe at the temperature about 3-4 degrees Celcius during the boat ride. I remembered that I read somewhere that Niaraga Falls had not been frozen during winter since 1910s. Seeing the falls upclose is surreal and made me realised that time never stops for anyone.

my favourite flower, tulips!

American falls




cave of the winds


all wrap up
getting ready for the boat ride


view from the Maid of the Mist




falls upclose

Another must to see things at Niagara Falls is the night scene. During summer, there are light that illuminate the falls at night which gives a mystical feel for the viewer. My regret is I didnt drag along my tripod to take a better view of the falls at night. For the best view of the falls is of course from the Canadian side.

colourful lights




frozen falls during 1911 (pic taken off the web)

The Pyramid of Giza

Pyramids and camels


view of the gigantic pyramid




Sphinx

Pyramid of Giza, one of the ancient seven wonder of the world located at the heart of Cairo town. And currently, Egypt is the center of attention due to the political turmoil concerning the president. Well, I am not gonna dwell much on the political news but glad that I had a chance to visit this wonder two years ago. In fact, if you thought you need to drive miles and miles to visit the pyramids, you are definately wrong. Giza is located at the center of Cairo town and surrounded by many modern buildings and residential area.

View from our hotel room
Can you see the pyramid top? (middle right)


A lady resting at the pyramid stones


view from the pyramid




first take, kind of ugly jump


second try, this one looks better

One of my very first sight when I saw Egypt from the flight was that it looks like a sandbox from top. Kind of scary!but excited at the same time. My very first visit to the African continent. I followed a tour which cheated quite a huge amount of money from us. The guide cheat us for the camel ride as well as the Abu Simbel tour. Seriously, this gives us such a bad first impression of Egypt and we find Cairo chaotic but the pyramids mysterious.

So from the cheated camel ride, we rode to view the nine pyramids. It's my first camel ride and it's kind of scary, fun, hot and sweaty. Yea..I want to save some money and decided to go Egypt during the peak of summer during the month of June. Almost fainted from the heat and it's about 45 - 50C. But then we got less tourists to fight with to take photos.

kid on camel


the camel that I rode on and got cheated