Margot Raggett Travel Photography: Visually Exciting Paro Festival in Bhutan

by · December 16, 2012

In an earlier post, I covered some of the travel photography of Margot Raggett from her travels in Kenya Africa. This posting shares more of Margot Raggett Travel Photography: Paro Festival Bhutan

Margot Raggett travelled to the Paro Festival in Bhutan in April 2012 and took this series of images. The Paro Festival is one of the busiest in Bhutan and is attended by thousands of pilgrims each year who come from all of the Kingdom to worship and  celebrate with their relatives and friends. Everyone who attends dresses in their finest outfits to watch days of ceremonial dancing, with each masked dance enacting a particular tale from folklore. The festival culminates with the unfurling of the giant ‘Thangka’, which is a religious picture scroll known as a Thongdroel and it is exhibited for just a few hours, at day break of the final day of the festival, enabling the people to obtain its blessing. This holy scroll ‘confers liberation by the mere sight of it’ (the meaning of the word ‘thongdroel’ in Bhutanese).

Young monks filing in for the festival

Young monks filing in for the festival

Thousands of pilgrims attend

Thousands of pilgrims attend

Masked dancers enact traditional dances

Masked dancers enact traditional dances

A monk peeping from inside the monastery to see the action

A monk peeping from inside the monastery to see the action

 

Dancing is often fast and colourful

Dancing is often fast and colourful

People wear their finest clothes for the festival

People wear their finest clothes for the festival

The Thangka is unfurled just once a year pre-dawn

The Thangka is unfurled just once a year pre-dawn

Worshipping in the presence of the Thangka, one of the most religious and precious items in Bhutan

Worshipping in the presence of the Thangka, one of the most religious and precious items in Bhutan

Margot Raggett Photographer

Margot Raggett Photographer

Margot Raggett is an aspiring photographer who travels as often as she can to pursue her love of taking images. She bought her first ‘proper’ camera in 2010 for a Safari to the Masai Mara and fell in love with both the place and the art of taking pictures. After a course at the London School of Photography and several camera upgrades later, she now shoots on a Nikon D800. She loves wildlife, people and landscapes and her photographic heroes are Jonathan & Angela Scott. When not travelling she splits her time between London and Greece and is a business consultant.

Gary Bembridge

I grew up in Zimbabwe, but I have been based in London since 1987. My travel life spans more than three decades and that includes more than 95 cruises. In 2005, I launched Tips for Travellers to make it easy and fun for people to discover, plan and enjoy incredible cruise vacations. And the rest, as they say, is history. I have the largest cruise vlogger channel currently on YouTube, with more than 3 million video views per month.

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