Layap People live in the high Himalaya Mountains in Bhutan
At 3800 meters, the small settlement of Laya can only be reached by foot, as there are no roads leading to the village. It is a muddy multi-day trek from the nearest town. The Layap people and their animals carry everything that is needed in the roughly 100-house-big village up through the mountainsides.
The Layap is small indigenous group of about 3000 people and their ancestors were displaced to Bhutan from Tibet in the 1500-century. Today, many are semi-nomadic yak herders or collect the high-value cordyceps, a fungus that lives on certain caterpillars in the high mountain regions of East Asia.
The Layap women wear a distinctive hat that is made from woven-bamboo strips with a pointed and painted colorful wooden top. There is only one hat maker left among the Layaps.
