A shared taxi from Paro to Thimphu, about 50 kilometres, costs $8 to $12 per seat. A night in a local guesthouse outside the main towns runs $15 to $25. A mid-range hotel in Thimphu or Paro is $40 to $80.
What Nobody Tells You About Bhutan
The first number that matters is 250. That is the Sustainable Development Fee, charged per person per night, in US dollars, for every night you are in the country. It is not a visa fee. It is not a one-time entry charge. It is a nightly number, and it applies to almost every foreign visitor.
Most people hear “Bhutan is expensive” and picture a luxury resort. The truth is stranger. The daily fee is the floor, not the ceiling, and it is collected by the government, not the hotel. In 2023 the rate was reduced from $200 to $100 per night for a period, then returned to $100 for most nationalities, while some regional visitors pay a different rate. Check the current figure before you build a budget, because the number has moved more than once in the last five years.
The Daily Fee Is Not the Whole Bill
The $100 nightly fee is separate from your food, your bed, your transport and your guide. It does not cover the $40 visa fee, which is charged once. It does not cover the $30 or so you will pay for a mandatory guide on most routes. It does not cover the $15 to $25 a night you might spend on a guesthouse in a small town, or the $8 to $12 a main dish in a local restaurant in Thimphu.
Add it up and a bare-bones week looks like this: seven nights at $100 is $700 in fees alone. Add $40 for the visa. Add roughly $200 for a guide across the week. Add $60 for a bed and $70 for food. That is over $1,000 before you have paid for a single bus ticket or a single monastery entry. The number people quote as “Bhutan costs $250 a day” is close to right if you stay in mid-range hotels and eat in restaurants. It is high if you sleep in farmhouses and eat momos.
Getting In and Getting Around
There are two airlines that fly into Paro. Drukair and Bhutan Airlines. Fares from Delhi, Kathmandu or Bangkok run between $350 and $600 return depending on season and how early you book. The Bangkok route is often the cheapest from Southeast Asia. The Kathmandu route is short and the views on the left side of the plane, past the Himalaya, are the reason some people pay the fare twice.
The runway at Paro is 2,265 metres long and sits at 2,235 metres elevation. Only a handful of pilots are certified to land there. Flights are frequently delayed or cancelled because of weather, and there is no night landing. If you have a tight connection in Delhi or Bangkok, build in a spare day. People miss international flights out of Paro every week of the season.
Inside the country, roads are the only option. There is no domestic rail. A shared taxi from Paro to Thimphu, about 50 kilometres, costs $8 to $12 per seat. A bus on the same route is under $3. The road from Thimphu to Punakha, 70 kilometres, takes two and a half to three hours because of the curves. The road from Thimphu to Trashigang, in the east, is 550 kilometres and takes two days with a night stop. Nobody drives it in one go.
What Things Actually Cost
A night in a local guesthouse outside the main towns runs $15 to $25. A mid-range hotel in Thimphu or Paro is $40 to $80. A high-end lodge is $300 and up, and some of those charge the nightly fee on top.
Food is cheap if you eat what Bhutanese eat. A plate of ema datshi, the chilli and cheese dish, is $4 to $6 in a local place. A momo plate is $3 to $5. A set lunch in a tourist restaurant is $12 to $18. A beer, and there is a decent local lager, is $2 to $3 in a shop and $4 to $6 in a bar. Coffee in a Thimphu café is $2 to $4.
Entry fees are small but they add up. Paro Taktsang, the Tiger’s Nest monastery, is free to enter but the climb takes three to five hours return and you will want a $10 walking stick and a $5 pot of tea at the cafeteria halfway. Punakha Dzong entry is around $8. The National Museum in Paro is about $6. A hot stone bath in a farmhouse is $15 to $25.
The Cheap Bits Nobody Mentions
Tap water is not safe to drink in most places, but a 1.5-litre bottle of local mineral water is under $1. A refill from a hotel filter is free, and most hotels now have one.
Public buses are the cheapest way to move. Thimphu to Paro is under $3. Thimphu to Phuentsholing, on the Indian border, is $6 to $8 and takes six hours. Buses leave early and fill up. You buy a ticket at the bus counter the day before or on the morning, and there is no online booking. If you are on a tight budget, this is where the money goes back into your pocket.
Homestays in villages like Gangtey or Bumthang cost $25 to $40 a night including dinner and breakfast. That is the best value in the country, and the food is better than most restaurants in Thimphu.
Trekking is where budgets break. The Druk Path trek, four days, runs $150 to $250 per person per day with a licensed operator, on top of the nightly fee. The Jomolhari trek, eight days, is $200 to $300 a day. Those prices include camp, cook, horses and guide. Doing it independently is not permitted.
When to Go and What It Costs You
March, April, September and October are the busy months. Flights cost more, hotels cost more, and the good guides are booked out. December, January and February are cold, especially above 2,500 metres, but hotel rates drop 20 to 30 percent and flights are easier to find. June, July and August are monsoon. The roads in the east wash out, leeches are real on the lower treks, and the views are cloud. It is also the cheapest time to go, and the rice terraces are green in a way they are not in spring.
The one number that never changes is the nightly fee. Whatever else you cut, that stays. A two-week trip with a guide, mid-range hotels and a couple of short treks lands somewhere between $2,500 and $3,500 per person. A bare-bones two weeks on buses, in guesthouses and homestays, with a shared guide, can be done for $1,600 to $1,900. The gap between those two figures is almost entirely food, beds and transport. The fee is the same either way.
Bring cash. ATMs in Thimphu and Paro work but there are few of them outside the main towns, and many guesthouses and small restaurants do not take cards. Change money at the bank in Thimphu, not at the airport, where the rate is worse. Keep the receipt. You need it to change leftover ngultrum back at the end of the trip.
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