New York Daily News
Lloyd Grove
04-25-06
A high-level Bette Midler sighting
How serious is the Divine Miss M about the “divine” part of her moniker?
So serious, it seems, that the 60-year-old diva spent Easter weekend communing with her spirituality in the remote Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan, a country of fewer than 1 million inhabitants nestled high in the Himalayas between India and Tibet.
Lowdown’s Katherine Thomson was there, too, and passed within inches of a Midler look-alike while making the three-hour zigzag climb up the sheer face of the mountain – endless stairs with no railings and a 1,000-foot drop – on the way to Tiger’s Nest, a Buddhist monastery built into a cliff.
Later, a guide explained to Thomson and her fellow hikers: “It’s some American singer or actress. You passed her on the trail today and you were all too busy taking pictures to notice.”
The locals had already been whispering that Miss M was in town, reportedly staying in the $1,000-a-night Aman resort in the city of Paro – where a private jet, apparently Midler’s, was parked conspicuously at Bhutan’s lone airport, and took off the first thing Monday morning. (There is only one commercial flight from Bangkok every other day.)
Midler’s flack had no comment.
