The next night, heavy snowfall blocked all the passes for two or three days. The refugees learned that soldiers had been following close on their heels, and had the Gyalwa Karmapa not urged them on, they would have been captured.

Twenty-one days after their depart from Tsurphu, the Gyalwa Karmapa and his followers entered the district of Bumtang in Bhutan. They were greeted warmly by the Bhutanese princess Ashi Wangmo who was also a nun. Kalu Rinpoche, surrounded by his monks, came to visit the Gyalwa Karmapa in Tashi Chedzong, as did Situ Rinpoche. After having met with King Jigme Dorje Wangchuk in Thimphu, the capital of Bhutan, the Gyalwa Karmapa decided to go to India.

At Baxa, on the border of Bhutan and India, Rigpei Dorje met the Prime Minister of Sikkim, Banya Tashi Dadul, who conveyed the Maharaja's invitation for him to come to Sikkim. The Gyalwa Karmapa accepted the invitation and, on the twenty-fifth day of the fourth month of the Earth Pig year (1959), he and his followers arrived in Gangtok, the capital of Sikkim. The Gyalwa Karmapa received a warm welcome from the royal family and the Sikkimese population. When asked where he wished to set up residence, he answered that as Tibetan refugees, they hoped to return to Tibet one day, and their stay would therefore only be a temporary one. Nevertheless, since the 9th Gyalwa Karmapa Wangchuk Dorje, had built the monastery in Rumtek, he, the 16th Gyalwa Karmapa, also chose to establish his seat in exile there.

Not long after he arrived in Rumtek, the Gyalwa Karmapa enthroned Kongtrul Rinpoche from Palpung in a very elaborate ceremony, and confered many initiations upon him. That same winter (1959 - 60) Rigpei Dorje went to India where he met with the Dalai Lama in Benares and later with the Pandit Nehru, who was Prime Minister at the time. Nehru was very sympathetic towards Buddhism and the tragic exodus of the Tibetan refugees. During the summer, the Gyalwa Karmapa gave many initiations to the crowds which thronged to see him. The governments of Sikkim and India granted him considerable funds to aid in the construction of a new monastery, on 75 acres of land near the ancient monastery of Rumtek. The site chosen presented many favorable signs: it was facing seven hills, seven rivers joined there, a mountain was behind, there were snow-capped mountains in the distance in front, and below, a river whose meanders were in the form of a conch. The disciples of the Gyalwa Karmapa were so enthusiastic in their work that the construction was finished in four years.

The Gyalwa Karmapa ordained over three thousand monks and recognized hundreds of tulkus. He was responsible for the publication of a new edition of the Dergé Kangyour, the encyclopedia of Buddha's teachings. In a gesture of interconfessional fraternity and solidarity, he distributed 170 copies of this work to the four Tibetan schools of Buddhism and to the representatives of the Bönpo faith. He carried out three world tours. Several Karma Kagyu lamas established Dharma centers in the West, and the Gyalwa Karmapa visited them and gave teachings.

During his third tour, he concentrated more specifically on the United States and Southeast Asia. He established Dharma centers and monasteries in various places around the world in order to protect, preserve, and spread the Buddha's teachings. Rangjung Rigpei Dorjé departed his body on November 5th, 1981 in Zion, Illinois (near Chicago), U.S.A

As Kalu Rinpoche reminded us when he visited Dhagpo Kagyu Ling in November 1984, the Gyalwa Karmapa predicted that his 17th incarnation would be even more influential in the world than his previous one.