Unexpectedly, in late 1997, I had the chance to meet Ms. Pommaret, a French Tibetologist and one of the world's few experts on Bhutan. And so, in October last year, I finally did. The kingdom opened only to very limited tourism in 1974. One pleasant surprise is that several of the Bhutan tour companies have Web sites and can be contacted by E-mail. During their stay, travelers are accompanied by a guide, and although itineraries can be amended, you cannot strike out on your own.
Most agencies are happy to fashion a personal itinerary.
My girlfriend, Lucie, who has agreed to join me on this expedition, and I choose the individual option. Once we arrive in Bhutan, our guide is quite receptive to individual whims and is almost always ready to alter schedules. Once he brings us to a town, we are free to wander alone but more often choose the company of our escort, whose presence allows us to talk to ordinary people and get access to holy sites that otherwise would be closed. Before the Indian Army's Corps of Engineers built the country's handful of surfaced roads in the 1960's and 1970's, reaching Bhutan's capital at Thimphu involved a weeklong ride on horseback across serpentine mountain paths. Now, armed with a prepaid tour voucher, you can enter the country by car at Phuentsholing, or take Druk Air, the national airline, which links Bhutan's only airport at Paro Valley with flights to New Delhi, Bangkok, Calcutta, Katmandu and Dhaka, Bangladesh.