Taktsang is just one of those places. Machu Picchu, the Great Pyramids, Angkor Wat, the Taj Mahal —they don’t disappoint.

The hike was long. And in hindsight, the almost comically-large bottle of Johnny Walker Red that we somehow casually made disappear the night before probably wasn’t the smartest way to prepare for a three-hour trek uphill the following morning.

But like I said, Taktsang is one of those places in the world that’s worth almost anything to experience. A location on Earth to which very few others can be compared in any way.

Clinging to a vertical cliff that drops down thousands of feet below, the Buddhist monastery soars on the wind as precariously as the innumerable prayer flags that stretch off in so many directions around it.

One of Buddhism’s most-sacred sites, looking down from the temple complex across Paro valley and to the mountains beyond, one cannot help but feel spiritually free.

It’s the sort of feat of engineering otherwise only found in the imagination, instilling in its visitors a childish joy. And, adding an element of fairytale romance to its legend, it is Taktsang where the tragically-oppressed democracy advocate Aung San Suu Kyi saw her late husband proposed to her, now, so many years ago.

My final images from five months in Bhutan.

Lots more photos at my Flickr stream.