Dagala – Land of a Thousand Lakes

by John Wehrheim December 26, 2024

While working in Bhutan this Fall, my daughter Maile and my 8-year-old granddaughter, Ua, joined me for a trek across Dagala in the Central Highlands of Western Bhutan.

As a child, Maile would see me return from working in the Himalayas with photos, stories, and gifts and express her desire to go trekking with me. I told her that if she could walk 22 miles in and out of Kalalau (the rugged and dangerous NaPali Coast trail) carrying her clothes and a five pound bag of rice, I’d take her to the Himalayas. The summer of her eighth year Maile did just that, so in the fall of 1992 I took her trekking up into the snow fields and glaciers on the North Slope of Ganesh Himal. Two years later we trekked the first 125 miles of Bhutan’s Snowman route from Paro via Jomolhari and Laya to the Gasa Hots Springs and Punakha – crossing passes at over 16,500 feet. We often woke in the morning with our tent covered in a foot of snow.

This past summer, Maile made the same deal with her daughter. Ua hiked into Kalalau carrying a pack with her clothes (and Pandy, her panda bear) and Maile made plans for her and Ua to meet me in Bhutan in October, which included organizing the trip and selecting the 60-kilometer/7-day trekking route.

In the 30-year interval between Maile’s Himalayan initiation and Ua's, our trekking style had evolved from dirt bag to “glamping.” Eight-year-old Maile and I left Kathmandu sitting on the roof of a “standing room only” public bus, hanging on to its luggage rack. The road ended at the Trishuli hydro plant where we stayed at a tea house. The next day we trekked to the Rasuwa Hot Springs and spent the night on the floor of the hostel.

The following day we stopped at the first village and met Jampa, a young Tamang man. We wanted to go to the glacier and snow fields of Ganesh Himal, and though Jampa had never been there and didn’t speak English, I hired him to be our guide. I didn’t know a word of Gurung, Jampa’s mother tongue, so we communicated in pidgin Nepali/Tibetan. We borrowed a pot and three cups from his mother, then went around the village haggling for rice, tea, dahl, salt, butter, a chunk of dried yak, and tshampa, or roasted barley flour. We had sleeping bags but didn’t have a tent so we slept in herders' huts and caves.

Three decades later, we were “glamping” with a pack train, a cook, and a guide that spoke perfect English and had actually been to our final destination! Ua had no idea what she was missing and cried a lot less than her mom on her Himalaya initiation.

On the first day we climbed out of the forest at 9,000 feet and into the yak pastures above 11,000 feet to our camp.

Pack animals pasturing at our first camp.

Ua and the crew.

Each day we crossed passes–some over 14,000 feet.

Every afternoon, when we stopped to set up camp, Ua would roam, looking for “secret spots” where she would pick flowers, search for special rocks, find little caves to hide in and be by herself.

At sunrise, while our cook prepared breakfast, Mama would read to Ua as they drank their tea.

Eventually, we climbed above the yak pastures into the sacred lakes district. We could see fat trout feeding in the shallows at the water’s edge. These fish were stocked in the 1980s by Bhutan's Fourth King Jigme Singye Wangchuck, with a team of soldiers who hauled up fingerlings in tanks on their backs. However, fishing is not allowed. Fish and all wild animals are sacred and protected in Bhutan. The fish are there to enhance life and feed the birds of prey.

A hermit’s hut and cave above Golden Lake.

In Bhutan local deities protect the earth, sky, water and fire elements from waste, pollution and defilement. In Vulture Lake, the local people built an island and erected a shrine to the “Lu,” their protective water deities.

The “Lu” deities that protect lakes and rivers are called Tshomen. In Bhutan, before disturbing a body of water to build a bridge, a dam, or an irrigation diversion, the Tshomen living there must grant permission, or the project will fail. If she does not grant permission, a sacred dance can be performed to distract the Tshomem while the work is being done. But Tshomen are hard to fool and occasionally trick, then seduce, the men working on the project that tried to fool her. It is said that these seduced Tshomen lovers can still be found today – sad, mute and toothless old men living under bridges.

After climbing down from the lakes we found an empty hut where we camped.

Each morning, Ua would share some of her breakfast with the mules and they were always looking forward to seeing her.

This was Ua’s favorite mule, Poro Jam. She fed it every morning and often rode it around camp.

Ua shares her breakfast with her favorite mule, Poro Jam.

Ua was fascinated by yaks – the calves as well as the bulls.

The big bull and leader of the yak herd.

The yak herders are friendly and welcoming people.

Ua in one of her “secret spots.”

Maile and Ua climbing to the next pass.

With frequent snacks and lots of water breaks, Ua was able to trek as far as 14 kilometers a day – steep climbing and descending over rough, wet, swampy and broken ground.

The valley bottoms were often swampy bogs, spring fed from the lakes above.

Climbing down from the highland pastures we came to this camp at the edge of scrubby woodlands where we found dried windfall branches for our first campfire of the trek.