Zhangmu
We had an interesting border
crossing today. It was the first one for our group, and it was a new experience
for Brooke and me as well - we had no truck. We were dropped off at the Nepal
immigration office in two Land Rover Defenders. On the ride over we saw more
landsides and the destruction they cause to the valleys, trucks, and the
locals’ lives.
Usually, having a truck at a
border means lots of forms and customs checks, and waiting, waiting, waiting.
This time everything was smooth sailing. We checked out of Nepal and checked
into China. Paolo's Dalai Lama book was confiscated and I needed to go for an
EBOLA virus screening (again) thanks to my South African passport. At every border in the last two months they make
everybody from Africa go for a screening. It is a relatively painless process.
They even bombarded Hannah with questions when they saw she visited Africa
earlier this year.
We also met our new Chinese local
guide at the border. Her name is Yan, and she will be with us all the way to
Kashgar, close to the Chinese border with Kyrgyzstan.
It was a short bus drive up the
hill to Zhangmu, our first stop in Tibet. We were all delighted to get into a
spacious 32-seater bus with big windows, air conditioning, and lots of space.
This will be our transport until we get to Lhasa, where we will get on our
first train.
At the hotel our local Tibetan
guide, Tsewan, and a police escort was waiting for us. I was glad to see
Tsewan, because he has been on our truck before. The police escort is a new
Chinese rule to make sure drivers of tourist vehicles follow all the rules and
stay responsible.
This evening we will have a group
dinner to discuss the effects of the high altitude we will be going into
tomorrow.
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| Zhangmu |
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| Zhangmu mountain pass |
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| All of us |
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| Morgan, Heathcliff & Karen |
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| Our China bus |
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| Heathcliff |
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| Barren passes in Tibet |
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| Paolo |
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| Morgan, Nico & John on a mountain pass |
Old Tingri
Today we drove one of the most
breathtaking roads I have ever been on. It crosses the Himalayas. We started in
the lush jungle of the south and climbed up to more than 5000m above sea level.
At the bottom there are hundreds of waterfalls and raging rivers, but as we go
higher the vegetation thins out and it becomes drier. By the time we reach our
highest point of the day, the land is barren and the landscape is spectacular
in its vastness. Now we are really in Tibet! The architecture is typically
Tibetan and the local people as well. There are yak patties packed on all the
houses' walls and smoke coming from every chimney. It's like a magical old
world stuck in time. The rivers are slow and a deep filthy turquoise blue.
Our overnight stop is Old Tingri.
It is a small village centered along a kilometer of the Friendship Highway,
mainly catering for the subsistence farmers of the area. It is bigger than
other villages, because the road to Everest Base Camp forks off here. If we are
lucky, the clouds will rain out over the night and give us a clear view of
Everest!
I can feel it will be cold
tonight (we are sleeping at 4300m) and we will be sitting in the warm, smoky
tea house next door to stay toasty and have some momos for dinner.
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| Signs to Everest Base Camp in Old Tingri |
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| Kids of Old Tingri |
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| Smoky tea house in Old Tingri |
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| Typical Tibetan door |
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| Old Tingri from the hill |
Shigatse
When we woke up this morning, it
was still overcast. No view of Everest. It was a bit disappointing, but we had
a spectacular drive and our highest point of the expedition to look forward to.
We shared our adventures of the
previous night at breakfast. The quick ascent to high altitude affected us all
differently. Some of our stomachs were upset, some had headaches, and some had
a great sleep. All in all we were happy to be going down again.
But first we went up. We reached
our highest point for the trip on a mountain pass in the middle of nowhere. It
was 5248m. As soon as we stopped a couple of Tibetans ran over to the bus
trying to haggle off some prayer flags and shiny stones. We took some pictures
and savored the moment and jumped back on the bus quickly. It was freezing cold
up there!
We were off again and saw our
first yaks. The Tibetans kit them out with tassels hanging off everywhere –
ears, tail, neck, and horns. We even got an opportunity to wear a hat and sit
on them for a picture.
The adventures for the day were
not done yet. In one of the small villages a Toyota Prado (the local taxi in
Tibet) drove out in front of us without looking (common practice here) and
smashed into the bus. No major damage to us except for a cracked windscreen and
some cosmetic bumper cracks, but the bus driver had to go through the whole
process with police and court right there and then! We decided it was a good a
time as ever for lunch and headed into town. We soon learned that only one of
the restaurants in town was licensed to cater for tourists. It is another
common practice in Tibet. The bus driver took a couple of hours to explain that
the accident was not his fault, while our police escort was smoking cigarettes.
Off to Shigatse! We got here at a decent hour and we all scurried off to find
dinner.
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| Marjo on our expedition high point |
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| Tibetan selling prayer flags |
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| Danni & John |
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| Brooke & Nico |
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| Zoe, Brooke, Michelle & Morgan |
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| Lisa at our highest point |
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| You can get your picture taken with this dog |
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| Three-horned ram |
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| Tasselled yak |
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| Zoe on the yak |
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| Paolo |
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| Michelle |
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| Morgan |
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| Tasselled sheep-goat |
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| Women spinning yarn |
Gyantse
We all had a good night’s sleep
last night, even though we were still very high (3800m). On our agenda was a
visit to the Tashilhunpo Monastery before heading over to Gyantse. Our Tibetan
guide, Tsewan, took us to the monastery and showed us around, explaining all
the different tombs and buildings, and why there were so many monks around
(more than 900). For me, the strangest thing of the day was to see all the
worshippers filling the big candles with yak butter.
After the monastery we headed off
to Dico’s, China’s attempt at KFC. It was good to get a break from local food
before a short drive to Gyantse.
In Gyantse we went for a walk to
the Gyantse Fort, constructed in 1390. It is built on a hill in the middle of
town, separating old town from new town. It has quite an interesting history
involving periods of British occupation in the first half of the 20th
century.
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| Tashilunpo Monastery |
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| Monks at Tashilunpo Monastery |
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| Hannah, Morgan, Michelle & Karen at Dico's |
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| Gyantse Fort |
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| Gyantse |
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| Gyantse locals |
Lhasa
Before heading to Lhasa, the
capitol city of Tibet, we spent the morning at the Palcho Monastery in Gyantse.
It was destroyed in the Chinese cultural revolution, but is now restored and
according to some the monastery to
see in Tibet. The girls enjoyed it thoroughly.
The rest of the day was spent driving
to Lhasa, and when we got here we went for a group meal at Dunya’s to try out
some yak meat burgers and steaks.
In Lhasa we all must have walked
20km a day for three days straight. There is so much to see and it never ends.
One of the highlights for our stay here was to see the Potala Palace. Tsewan
took the group to the busy tourist hotspot and walked from room to room and
explained what was what among a million other Chinese tourists with their
guides. It is quite an interesting building and I could imagine how serene it
must have been to live there and receive guests in tea rooms with views to die
for.
Tsewan also took us to the
Jokhang Palace and the Sera Monastery. The Jokhang Palace is an
important stop on a Buddhist pilgrim’s journey. They go there to pray. At Sera
Monastery you can watch the monks debate and clap their hands when they agree.
On our adventures we found the
fish market, selling everything that swims in the sea and everything that doesn’t!
We also found out that we could
not take our pocket knives on the train! This was quite a challenge. We could
not send it with DHL or China post, so Brooke and I took a chance and went down
to the cargo bays of the train station. There was a lot of saying no, no, no,
but after some negotiating we managed to sign everybody’s knives in as “art
supplies.” Fingers crossed it gets to Golmud!
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| Palcho Monastery |
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| Glacier |
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| Potala Palace |
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| At Potala Palace |
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| Couple getting married |
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| Golden yak statue |
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| Shoemaker at work |
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| Fish market |
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| Thousand Buddhas |
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| Candles |
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| Fish market |
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| Deep fried goodness |
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| Tibetans on pilgrimage |
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| Pilgrims praying at Jokhang |
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| The girls ready for walking |
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| Artisan man painting Buddha faces |
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| Marjo & Michelle after a lot of walking |
Train
We got to the train station early
this morning to make sure we were on it when it left. Everybody gets assigned a
seat or bunk, but the Chinese still seemed very anxious to get on that train as
soon as the gates opened. There is no concept of standing in line or walking to
your bunk behind the guy in front of you. It’s more like a mad rush. Hurry up
and wait! Nevertheless we all stayed calm (except for our Chinese guide who was
running with the crowds) and got to our bunks and settled in for a 14 hour, 1100km
train journey across the Tibetan Plateau. Very exciting! This is the highest
train journey in the world, with stations above 5000m.
We are expecting to get to Golmud
around midnight and check into a hotel there to get a couple hours sleep before
heading to Dunhuang, our first city in China proper, on the edge of the world’s
second largest sand desert, the Taklimakan.
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| Morgan & Karen on the train |
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| John, Hannah & Danni having a blast on the train |
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| Three monks shared one of our cabins |
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| Spectacular landscape |
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