Rangdum Monastery is a Tibetan Buddhist monastery belonging to the Gelugpa sect, situated on top of a small but steep sugarloaf hill at an altitude of 3,657 m (11,998 ft) at the head of the Suru Valley

Suru valley

The Suru valley is a valley in the Ladakh region of Jammu and Kashmir, which is drained by the Suru River , a powerful tributary of the Indus river. The valley's most significant town is Kargil.-People of the Suru Valley:...

, in Ladakh

Ladakh

Ladakh is a region of Jammu and Kashmir, the northernmost state of the Republic of India. It lies between the Kunlun mountain range in the north and the main Great Himalayas to the south, inhabited by people of Indo-Aryan and Tibetan descent...

. It is next to the tiny village of Julidok, and about 25 km from the 4,400 m (14,436 ft) Pensi La (pass) which leads into Zanskar

Zanskar

Zanskar is a subdistrict or tehsil of the Kargil district, which lies in the eastern half of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. The administrative centre is Padum...

History

According to an inscription the monastery was built by Gelek Yashy Takpa during the reign of King Tsewang Mangyul of Ladakh about 200 years ago. Although it is physically in the Suru Valley, it is culturally part of Zanskar. Because one cannot count on crops being harvested due to the brief summer, both the village and the monastery depend on supplies, other than locally produced dairy, brought up the largely barren Suru Valley, or over the 4,400 metre (14,436 ft) Pensi La pass from Zanskar. The monastery is home to about 30 monks and almost as many donkeys.

External links

• Photographs