Merak and Sakteng sit at roughly 3,500 metres in Trashigang District, in the far eastern reaches of Bhutan, and are home to the Brokpa — semi-nomadic yak herders whose ancestors migrated here from Tsona in southern Tibet, generations ago. The Brokpa are genuinely distinct from the rest of Bhutan’s population: they speak their own dialect, hold their own deities, and follow customs found nowhere else in the kingdom. Their most recognisable feature is a hat called the tsipee charko, woven entirely from yak hair, with five long tentacle-like fringes radiating from the crown specifically designed to drain rainwater away from the face and neck — a genuinely functional piece of highland engineering, not simply decorative dress.

Every winter, Brokpa families undertake what is called the Drukkor, or grain journey, descending to lowland villages where they maintain long-standing relationships with host families, living together for weeks while bartering yak butter, cheese, and dried meat for maize and grain — a barter economy that continues largely unchanged from centuries past. Sakteng itself comprises roughly 250 households across three main villages — Sakteng, Tengma, and Borang — with residents known as Saktengpa, sharing the Brokpa language, dress, and spiritual customs of neighbouring Merak.

The trek crosses Nachungla Pass at 4,153 metres, the route’s highest point, through juniper and rhododendron forest, within the Sakteng Wildlife Sanctuary — a roughly 700 square kilometre protected area home to red pandas, Himalayan black bears, musk deer, and over 200 bird species, alongside the blue poppy, Bhutan’s national flower. Local legend also holds this remote sanctuary as territory of the migoi, Bhutan’s version of the yeti.