Taktshang Palphug: The Tiger's Nest Monastery
Paro Taktshang (Tiger's Nest) is Bhutan's most sacred monastery, clinging to a cliff-face 900 meters above the Paro Valley. In the 8th century, Guru Rinpoche (Padmasambhava) flew from Tibet to this location riding on the back of Yeshe Tshogyel, his consort, who had transformed herself into a tigress. At the cave known as Taktsang Senge Samdup, Guru Rinpoche assumed the wrathful form of Dorje Drolo and meditated, subduing malicious spirits and establishing Buddhism in Bhutan. An alternative legend says Tashi Kheudren, a local Bhutanese girl, was the disciple who transformed into the tigress. Th