Tuvkhun Monastery

Tuvkhun sits at about 2,300 meters on the forested crest of a mountain over the Orkhon valley. The young Zanabazar, first Jebtsundamba and spiritual head of Mongolian Buddhism, marked the spot at fourteen and had his stone-walled retreat built there in the early 1650s after returning from study in Tibet; sources give the dates slightly differently, so the entry says early 1650s rather than commit to one year. He named it the Happy Secluded Place and used it as a personal retreat for some thirty years, making sculpture, developing the Soyombo script there, and writing works still read today.

The monastery was destroyed in the late seventeenth century during the Oirat campaigns, restored a century later, and gutted again in the Stalinist purges of the late 1930s that leveled Mongolian Buddhism. Religious life resumed in 1992, state protection came the same year, and four temples, two stupas, and gates were restored by 2001. The small meditation cave nearby and the two springs the founder reportedly used remain points of pilgrimage. The site falls within the Orkhon Valley Cultural Landscape World Heritage property.

Visiting

There is no operator site. Access is by rough 4WD track to a trailhead, then a hike up to the ridge; most visitors come as part of an Orkhon valley trip with a local driver. The UNESCO Orkhon Valley listing carries the background.

Photo: [Wikimedia Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tuvhun_Monastery1.JPG), CC BY-SA 4.0.