Doctor of Historical Sciences Flights from Nepal to Bhutan are operated by Bhutan Druk Air. It's at her office in Kathmandu that I buy a ticket to Paro. I ask a Butan cashier if there are any discounts for diplomats. Lightning fast response: discounts? for diplomats? Diplomats should pay more! Then she laughed. DRAGON AND TIGER RIDES I was flying from the only Hindu kingdom in the world, Nepal, to the Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan (then Nepal was still a kingdom). Just an hour of summer along the entire Himalayan range! Behind the porthole, Mount Everest, Makalu, Kanchenjunga, and other eight-thousand-meter mountain peaks float majestically, not to mention peaks of less than 8 thousand meters.The Tibetan plateau, glistening with snow and ice, goes beyond the horizon. The picture is amazing! No wonder the Bhutanese airline is called Druk Air. Druk is a mythical thunder dragon, the guardian of Bhutan. By the way, in Bhutanese, the kingdom is called Druk Yul - the Land of the Thunder Dragon. Our plane is decorated with a golden image of a miracle animal. ..The pine-clad mountain slopes are already rapidly approaching. After flying through the hills, the dragon plane breaks into a narrow valley and goes to land. The airport is a building that resembles a fairy-tale tower. The Bhutanese themselves are similarly dressed in national garb: men are dressed in colorful gho robes, and women are dressed in clothes that resemble a sundress with massive silver clasps on the shoulders. My escorts, also dressed in national garb, were waiting for me at the airport exit: guide Cencio and driver Vandy. I had to travel with them in a Jeep for a whole week. I spent two days in Paro, which is considered a large city in the kingdom, although it is rather a large village. All the more amazing is the Paro dzong fortress, which stands on the bank of a fast river. Chencho says that the Dzong, built in the first half of the 17th century, was and still is the administrative and religious center of ... Read more