Earlier this month on my way to Mukkumglung Pathibhara, I dropped by the Himalayan Habre Center in Deurali – Taplejung. The center which is about thirty minutes’ drive from Phungling, the district headquarters of Taplejung is a resource center for all things red panda! Think of it as your place to learn about the endangered animal that live in the forests of Taplejung.
The center which opened on Earth Day, April 22 this year is impressive in its design and use of local materials. Insulated walls, heat storage, split-level dorm rooms – all in Taplejung? Who would’ve thought about it! We also managed to say ‘Hello’ to a group of forest guardians undergoing a refresher training. The Himalayan Habre (red panda) Center is slowly coming into operation and it aims to be a place where people can develop skills like sustainable energy use (their kitchen is pretty cool for this) and construction (entire building and its energy efficiency is amazing to learn about), organic farming, handicraft production, sustainable herding, bio-briquette production, nature guide and eco-trip leadership, rainwater harvesting, water conservation, nursery and homestay management. So, there will definitely be plenty of things taking place!
The views that you can see of Taplejung is brilliant as you can see from my photos on this post. Of course, head over to my Facebook and TikTok to see the video clip (walk through) of the center. The impressive building which certainly is one-of-a-kind for Taplejung was designed and constructed by the Sustainable Mountain Architecture (SMA), an org dedicated to sustainable design and improving building methods at high altitudes.
If you would love to see a red panda in the wild then head over to Red Panda Network’s website to see their next ecotrip dates! I’ve been lucky enough to go on three ecotrip so far and see a number of red pandas in the forests of Ilam! Hopefully it will be Deurali – Taplejung next!
