Remote Monasteries
Hidden Gems
Gompas above the treeline and the Himalayan valleys that hold them.
14 places
Yuksom
Dubdi Monastery
Sikkim's oldest monastery, set on a forested hill above Yuksom.
Key Monastery
Monastery Kitchen
The traditional wood-fired kitchen where friendly lamas prepare hot butter tea and local barley meals for visitors.
Nubra Valley
Diskit Monastery
Founded in 1420 and the oldest gompa in Nubra. The thirty-two-metre Maitreya below it was finished in 2010 and faces down the valley towards Pakistan, which was the point of putting it there.
Tso Moriri
Korzok Monastery
An ancient multi-century old Buddhist monastery overlooking the lake, serving as the cultural heart for the local nomads.
Zanskar Valley
Phugtal Monastery
An architectural wonder of the world, built like a honeycomb directly inside the mouth of a massive cliffside cave.
Zanskar Valley
Karsha Monastery
The largest Buddhist monastery complex in Zanskar, cascading beautifully down a steep rocky mountain slope above Padum.
Bir Billing
Chokling Monastery
A beautiful traditional Tibetan monastery located near the landing site, featuring a grand stupa and peaceful prayer halls.
Himachal Pradesh
Key Monastery
Key Monastery is a thousand-year-old Tibetan Buddhist monastery belonging to the Gelugpa (Yellow Hat) lineage. At 4,166 metres, it sits on a prominent volcanic cone hill overlooking the wide Spiti River valley floor. Located roughly 14 kilometers from Kaza, it stands as the largest monastery, primary spiritual archive, and leading training school for resident Lamas in Spiti Valley. The unique architectural layout of the monastery has evolved over centuries of restructuring, resulting in a tightly stacked, fortress-like profile known as the Pasada style. The close grouping of white-washed mud-brick rooms, multi-tiered chapels, and narrow defensive corridors gives the complex the appearance of a monolithic castle emerging naturally from the mountain slope.
Spiti Valley (Kaza)
Dhankar Monastery
On a spur of eroding mud cliff between the Spiti and Pin rivers at around 3,900 metres. The old building is genuinely unstable and has appeared on international endangered lists; a newer monastery below now holds the services. Dhankar lake is an hour's climb above.
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Rajgir
Vishwa Shanti Stupa
A white peace pagoda atop a hill, reached by a ropeway.
Kushinagar
Ramabhar Stupa
The large stupa marking the site of the Buddha's cremation.
Tawang
Tawang Monastery
India's largest and the world's second-largest Buddhist monastery.
Amararama (Amaravati)
Amaravati Stupa
The ruins and museum of a great ancient Buddhist stupa nearby.
Leh & Ladakh
Alchi Monastery
Alchi is unlike any other gompa in Ladakh: it sits low by the Indus rather than on a crag, and its temples preserve some of the finest 11th–12th century Buddhist art in the world. The Kashmiri-style murals of the Sumtsek and Dukhang — thousand-Buddha walls, colossal bodhisattvas painted with miniature scenes on their robes — survive from the era of the great translator Rinchen Zangpo. It is a quiet village of apricot orchards, a living museum of a vanished artistic world.
