Tea is more than a drink; it’s a way of life, a journey and a path. There is no need to hurry. Take your time to look around you. The path we travel on our tea journey is part of the experience, as it leads us to the top of a mountain. It invites contemplation. To understand tea, you must understand the path that leads to it. You have to want to explore it and to get to know everything about it. The road to tea teaches us about tea itself: its inaccessibility, its climate and soil, even its flavours. As we observe the path and the landscape, tea reveals itself to us. En route to Trongsa in the Black Mountains of Bhutan, I pause to gaze in awe at the wetlands of Phobjikha Valley. If I wait a few days, the black-necked cranes will appear in the sky as they do every year, returning to settle here at the end of their long migration. They follow the same route every year, flying south from Tibet to escape the cold. Professional and amateur ornithologists await their arrival, counting them to ensure they are all present. My tea route crosses the path of those black-necked cranes. Tea shows us different landscapes and phenomena. It is the end of September, and the cranes will arrive in a few days. I wait, and watch for them.
