On to Paro!

The flights from Portland to Bangkok were on time and without incident. Mercifully, my seatmate from Chicago to Tokyo spoke English poorly and really didn't want to communicate. Tokyo to Bangkok I was alone, which was great because I could sleep.

I checked into a very nice little hotel near the airport which was cheap as dirt-- very nice, clean, pleasant, very acceptable restaurant as well. I will recommend to future volunteers. It was in a middle class commercial district, which was kind of cool. I took a long walk and saw real Thai life as opposed to tourist spots. Here's a little bit of what I saw:

Druk Air is the name of the airline that flies to Paro. Druk means dragon in Dzongha, the language of Bhutan.

The flight from Bangkok to Paro was quite interesting.

Because of weight issues (not mine, the baggage) I upgraded to business class. I ended up sitting next one of the supreme court justices of Bhutan. They were coming back from a long trip in the US and Europe exploring judicial systems. Interesting chat from my end, although he clearly wasn't too interested in talking and ultimately moved to an empty seat. The approach to Paro airport is based on visual flight rules. Before landing, I didn't understand why. After landing, I had a much better understanding-- the pilot literally needs to fly through a winding valley, all the while dropping altitude, to land on a single airstrip. Wow.

The Himalayas from the plane.

 Next: My first couple of days.