Boutique Hotels in Bhutan

Stay in the Paro valley, where the airport and the Tiger's Nest are. At Bhutan Spirit Sanctuary, among the apple orchards of the Neyphu Valley a quarter of an hour from the runway, every bed has been placed so that a sleeping guest's feet do not point at Eutok Goenpa, the monastery on the ridge opposite, which in Bhutan would give offence. Louk Lennaerts, a Dutch hotelier, came looking for land more than four years before he opened in 2018, and his sons built the place on the pattern of a dzong with the local monastery advising. Members book it at rates we hold for the Club. Meals, house wine and a treatment a night come with the room, so nobody signs a bill; the government's fee, the transfers and the guided days do not.

Start with Taktsang, the Tiger's Nest. Guru Rinpoche is said to have reached the ledge on the back of a flying tigress; everyone since has walked, about 500 metres up through blue pine, with ponies as far as the teahouse. Leave early and allow most of a day. Thimphu deserves a day and not much more. The road over the Dochu La and its 108 chortens reaches Punakha in about three hours from the capital, and Phobjikha, winter ground of the black-necked crane, lies two and a half hours on. Bumthang is a long day's drive east or a short flight.

Bhutanese cooking treats the chilli as a vegetable. Ema datshi, the national dish, is a bowl of them stewed in local cheese and eaten with nutty red rice, and kitchens cooking for visitors will temper it if asked. Ask for the real one once. Suja, butter tea churned with salt, is easier to drink if you think of it as soup. A guide can arrange lunch in a farmhouse, which is where the cooking is best.

The guide is the thing to be honest about. A licensed one goes with you on tours and to most dzongs and monuments, and anyone who travels to be left alone will find that a real cost. Dzongs and temples are working religious buildings, so cover arms and legs, leave cameras outside the shrine rooms and walk clockwise around chortens. Cash still matters outside the towns. Paro sits at about 2,200 metres and the passes climb past 3,000, so take the first day gently.