The museum is located in the refurbished old watchtower which is in interesting edifice to see. The exhibit is mediocre though. If you're pressed for time skip it in favor of the Royal Heritage Museum in Trongsa if you travel that far.

The museum is sited in an old fortress, as such the layout of the museum exhibits is not the best. Some are in glass cases along narrow corridors while others are set around the walls of a large room. The route also follows an up and down route and in some areas the ceilings are quite low. Worth a visit but no need to spend more that 45 minutes looking around. Outside there are magnificent views of the valley and mountains. There is also a second display in another building of Bhutan geology, geography and wildlife again worth a visit.

There are 2 reasons to visit this magnificent museum. One as a watch tower constructed in 1651. Two as a reopened museum in 2020. The design and setting is simply elegant and mindboggling. From here savour the bird’s eye Paro valley view. There are so many splendid collections listed below and about 3000 artefacts denoting the time period from stone age to modern times, a true reflection of Bhutanese cultural heritage of over 1500 years :-  Copperware  Bronze  Textiles  Paintings  Carvings  Weapons  Ornaments Walk down a path to town from the museum, for a simply exhilarating experience ! Happy to spend time here in the cool September weather and appreciate the government’s role of preserving & promoting the cultural values of the kingdom. BTW, the wall of this structure is a massive 2.5 meters !

At the entrance to the museum, all the visitors must leave all their belongings in the lockers. We asked the security guard at the entrance if we could at least take our passports and money with us, but he refused. This was not nice, because the area with the lockers was not under the video surveillance. However, we cheered up as soon as we entered the museum. The museum is located in the oldest building in Paro, which originally served as a watchtower. This is a round building with 5 floors. The museum collection is really interesting. In the first part of the collection there are the objects from archaeological sites. Then comes the collection of old religious paintings, tapestries, statues, ceremonial objects etc. We were very impressed by the collection of the various folk costumes. At the end, we saw various household items that were once used. A really beautiful museum! We understand that nobody is allowed to take pictures, but they should make a book with photos of the museum exhibits to sell to the visitors. This museum deserves the highest evaluation, but the management of the museum does not.

Truly an architectural marvel. A circular building comprising of 7 floors constructed in the 17th century orignally as a watch tower to kepp a look out for invading tribes from Tibet. Been converted into a musuem in the 60s with many artefacts and items pertaining to the various Kings and rulers of Bhutan. It is located about 30 mins from main Paro town.

This is not our first trip to Bhutan but each time we go, we see small changes or things we may have missed the first time. The people at Enticing Bhutan have excellent guides who are very passionate about their Kingdom as is evident in the gentleness of the people we met. The driver we had was nothing short of amazing in the way we negotiated the twisty roads into the mountains.