South to the border -- the animals

We took our first trip this weekend and decided south was the way to go in the hopes of T-shirt weather. Phuntsholing is a Bhutanese town that borders India -- in fact, there is a gate and a metal fence that mark the border. The drive took about five hours and included a descent of about 2,000 meters (about 6,500ft) through the different climatic zones. Here are the highlights in a few blog posts.

This is a Gharial crocodile, a critically endangered species that is now extinct in the wild in Bhutan. We saw him (males have the big noses like you see here) at the crocodile zoo/breeding center in town.

This bird was hanging out around the crocodile pond, maybe in hopes of some fish. It is an Indian Pond Heron.

On the drive back to Thimphu, we saw one monkey dash into the forest from the road, and then closer to town, we saw a whole bunch of them. They ran right up to our car.

And this is probably my favorite picture I've taken so far. This little guy was hoping for handouts from a truck that had stopped on the side of the road.