Thak-thak is a small gompa, above the village of Sakti, a few kilometres beyond Chemrey. This monastery was founded in the reign of Tshe-wang Namgyal in the second half of the sixteenth century around one of the many caves where the Indian sage Padmasambhava is said to have stayed and meditated during his journey to Tibet. He was the first to introduce the gospel of Buddhism there. It is the sole representative in Ladakh of the Nying-ma-pa, the oldest of the Tibetan monastic sects.

The Thak-thak monastery of Ladakh is constructed against the mountainside around Padmasambhava`s cave. This cave had been reformed into a temple and is an excessively dark and gloomy chamber. The stain aroused from the smoke of the lamps burning from year after years has completely obscured the paintings that once adorned the walls. Another cave a little further down has been made into a kitchen, where, on immense stoves, food is cooked for the pilgrims who flock to the gompa`s annual festival. The verandah of the du-khang has the usual paintings of the Four Lords, while the walls of the temple itself are covered with recent paintings of fierce divinities. A new temple a little way below the main gompa complex was consecrated by His Holiness the Dalai Lama in September 1980.

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