China & Tibet

5th to 19th September 2018

Top of Page

Day 8 - On train to Lhasa -

Wednesday 12th September 2018

We go by train across the "Roof of the World" to Tibet

Top of Page

This is the highest rail line in the world. Its 1,200 miles of tracks traverse 342 miles of permafrost, much of it at altitudes exceeding 13,000 feet. Rising to a height of 16640 feet (5072 metres) at its highest point.t.

Woke at 7:15am, about half way there....1000km along the track of about 1800km, and at 4600m altitude and still climbing! Outside is white! We are passing through wide open plains, a few hills, and lots of wide open river beds, which are mainly mud with some water. There are also lots of small lakes at times. In areas where there are snow fences to stop drifting, there are also a grid pattern of rocks laid, presumably to help stop the drifting. There are queues of lorries on the road at every small incline where they are going very slowly.

Breakfast and coffee had, and more of the same scenery. So far we have seen wild donkeys, yak, some sheep, a fox? Or something dog like anyway. And something that may have been antelopes.

9am - just had an update from our local guide, Basang, we will be at the highest point of the trip in 30 - 60 minutes times - over 5000m. He also brought around a bag of goodies for us - a banana and a small cucumber each, for breakfast! Interestingly at the moment we have green and mud to look at, not white! The track is running alongside a road, which was built about 50 years ago... the final section of the train track just 12 years ago. It is single track, with lots of extra infra structure.... crossing sections for the wildlife - wild donkeys, yak, antelope, foxes. The earlier section of the road we saw queues of lorries, going in both directions.

As we continue to climb there is less visibility, and as we near the top of the Pass, it has got whiter and mistier.

11:30 am, and out in the corridors a very smartly dressed in uniform train lady trying to sell souvenir books (I think). She has been there for over half an hour explaining in great detail, i.e. page by page, two books. I don’t think she’s drawn breath more than half a dozen times! We have our photo taken with her.

This railway, the Rooftop Railway is one of the highlights of our tour. It covers 1956km and at the Tangula Pass, at 5072m is the worlds highest point on a railway. The final section, from Golmud to Lhasa was operational in 2006, and cost $3.68 billion. It is 906km and at an elevation of more than 4000m. There are 675 bridges and 550km of track is laid on permafrost. The Fenghoushan Tunnel the worlds highest at 4905m was a serious engineering challenge to bore through the ice and rock of the Kunlun mountain range. European tunnelling engineers said it could not be done!

As the day wore on the scenery hasn’t changed much. We went through a large section where we weren’t near the main road, but then came back towards it. At the moment we are going alongside major works... a new road is being constructed. This continues for pretty much the rest of our route....it is really an incredible feat of engineering, with bridges, (smallish over rivers), larger viaduct types over wide expanses, tunnels through mountains.

All along the way we have seen “sentry points”, with one person nearby, who has been saluting as we go past. Our guide has just told us they are local people who keep a look out for animals wandering onto the track and are letting the driver know all is clear.

As we start to descend a bit we see more signs of life, small communities, more herds of sheep and yak, a few horses, and small areas of cultivated crops. We can see workers in these small fields, scything the cereals, and stacking the straw in traditional hay stooks. We saw a few groups sat down under large umbrellas resting and eating.

As we got nearer to Lhasa, the more traditional buildings started to give way to the Chinese influence of lots of tall tower blocks, with lots of new buildings.

The train journey was a truly great experience, smooth and quiet, and quite comfortable. Nearly 22 hours after we left we finally arrived in Lhasa. We had been warned to be careful when taking photos from now on, and particularly getting off the train to make sure we didn’t take pictures of any army, police or security people. There were a lot of army groups on the train that all got off, lined up on the platform and marched off together.

Photo taking on the train was quite difficult... we had lots of different weather to contend with, dirty windows and moving objects, but hopefully the photos will give a flavour of what we have seen.

On route to our hotel Basang presented us each with a traditional white scarf, embroidered with symbols and a long fringe in each end. I need to find out what it is called as I can’t remember! We stopped off for dinner and had a traditional Tibetan Nepalese meal. We started with vegetable soup and Barley bread (looked like Naan bread). The main was various dishes, quite a selection of vegetables, rice, potatoes and other bits, and the extra course Basang promised us with the breakfast budget from this morning - Yak steak, which was very soft and tasty.

We finally arrived at our hotel and settled in...... a long couple of days.

No of steps walked today 3589 - sat on the train most of the day!

Day 9 - Lhasa - Thursday 13th September 2018

Top of Page

So today we are exploring Lhasa, the capital of Tibet. We stay mainly in the old central part of the city, and our first area is at the Jokhang Temple. Basang, throughout the day, explains to us, in small, digestible chunks, about Buddhism and what we are seeing, which is great. Nancy at the other Monastery was giving us so much information that we weren’t really taking it in!

He explained to us about the Prayer Wheels, rows of drums with symbols on them, that have scriptures inside, that as you walk past you spin, clockwise, for prayers. Everything must be done clockwise, even walking around the temples. We went inside some of the Temples, and everywhere there are people offering money and yak butter and alcohol....

Outside of each entrance there are stalls where you could buy the butter, alcohol etc.... bottles of clear alcohol - 33% proof, and cans of something. Also outside and in the streets leading to the Temples, there were people, mainly women, prostrating and praying. People are coming to these Temples as a pilgrimage, and depending on how far away they live how often they come.

We were very lucky that our guide was able to get us into one of the Temples where a high up Monk comes each morning to bless people, and we were allowed in to watch.... he chants and pours water over their hands and heads. They were queuing up to go up a very steep narrow staircase for this ceremony, and we squeezed past to go up to watch, and they were all very happy to let us do so, and were concerned about us banging our heads and being ok. Just before the Monk arrived we could hear what sounded a bit like religious music, but it was just someone’s mobile going off!

Downstairs again and we walked around the bottom part of this Temple and were allowed to take photos of it, but not the actual blessing. We then went in to another Temple, before walking down an alleyway, which was closed due to the building work going on, but our guide decided we could go anyway! We then had time to look around a shop selling authentic Tibetan gifts, where you were expected to haggle....so Phil enjoyed buying a pair of non matching engraved vases for two thirds of the price on the label - he felt he got a good deal.

We didn’t spend as long shopping as they thought we might and had allowed for, so ....... We went in to another Temple....of Longevity, passing rows of Prayer Wheels again and then into the Temple itself, with its many Buddha statues and colourful paintings and silk banners.

After this we walked back through the streets and onto our restaurant for lunch....this time Tibetan Indian..... similar to last night really. Again we had a bit of time to kill after lunch before going onto our next stop, so we wandered up and down the road. We passed some groups of school children, quite a few who said ‘hello’ and ‘nice to meet you’... obviously keen to practise their English. Then we passed a small park area where there were lots of younger children, again many calling out ‘hello’ to us.

This afternoons visit was to the Sera Monastery.... again very interesting. During it we had some more instruction in Buddhism from our guide. This monastery now has 400 monks living there. The highlight of the visit was to watch the Monks Debate. At 3 pm, many monks congregate in one of the courtyards, and in pairs, ‘debate’, one sitting on a cushion, the other standing and moving around a lot. I’m not sure it looked much like a debate going on, but it was certainly something completely different. This is the only monastery that allows people to watch it..... and we were allowed to take photos, but only from phones - not cameras!

After the Sera Monastery it was back to our hotel for an hour and a half to rest, bearing in mind the altitude we are at - 12600 feet and then out to dinner. At lunchtime we had been asked if we would like to pay for a show of traditional Tibetan music and dance, with the highlight being Yak dancing! We all agreed, so went to a particular hotel for dinner that would also do this.

Tonight’s food was Tibetan Chinese - first off was a bowl of Yak yogurt - of those who tried it Phil was the only one who thought it was any good. Next we could try Barley Beer, a small egg cup shape cup - it was very nice. Then Yak Butter tea - not so good! We also had Jasmine tea on the table. They then started bringing out dish after dish of food.... all very nice. Near the end of the meal the entertainment began.... very colourful costumes, dancing and music. The Yak dancing - very pantomime horse like, was quite fun.

No of steps walked today - 12164

Day 10 - Lhasa - Friday 14th September 2018

Top of Page

Today’s itinerary consisted of visiting both Summer and Winter Palaces of the Dalai Lama.... the Winter Palace - the Patola Palace has a timed entry of 2:20pm, and we had to have our passports with us to enter. Therefore we were visiting the Summer Palace - Norbulingka Palace this morning -and so were allowed a later start.

Summer Palace - It was a very pleasant Park with the various buildings in, originally started by the 7th Dalai Lama as a summer residence, and one building built by the current - 14th Dalai Lama in 1954. There were a few Western influences with the architecture of this building, some of the furniture and a few oil paintings.

However, in the other Temple we visited again there were a lot of Tonka paintings, both on cloth decorating the Temple and directly on the walls of the buildings. These paintings are done by Tibetan artists using only natural pigments and are unique to this area.

Back to the bus and onto our lunch restaurant - the same one we went to on our first evening here. It was quite early for lunch, but we needed to eat and walk to the Patola Palace for our time slot.

Entry to the Patola Palace was with individual tickets with our Passport number on, through lots of security checks, although they didn’t seem to be that rigorous - as you weren’t allowed to take any liquids in - and when we got back to our hotel I discovered I had left the sunscreen in my bag and that went through ok!!

This Palace is built on a hill, and in order to get inside the actual buildings on show you have to climb up 500 steps, and then down 400 to exit. Our guide had been telling us about this for the past couple of days, and describing the climb - you have a time limit on doing this, they are very steep, the last section is more like a wooden ladder, and obviously with the altitude as well, the option is open to you if you want to try or not! We had decided yesterday that we wouldn’t attempt this, especially when he told us that the only things to see, that would be totally different to what we had seen in other Temples was tombs of the various Dalai Lamas. The plan was that Bill, our UK guide would be staying with those who weren’t climbing, to see the Museum at the bottom and a look around the grounds there, and Basang, our Tibetan guide would go with those climbing. So, of our group of 12 just three were brave enough - or stupid enough to go - all of them Aussies! We have two Australian couple with us. They all seemed to think it was worth it and not as bad as had been made out to us, but I think we made the right decision.

So the rest of us had an hour to look around the Museum, which had various artefacts from the Palace, the third level having some costumes and grotesque masks on display. We then had a coffee in the courtyard, before going for a bit of a wander around, and finding the Mint/Treasury building.

A little later we met up with the others outside the Palace, and walked to the Patola Square, which gave us some wonderful views of the Palace. This Square is built on what was a large man made Lake - there is now just a much smaller Lake. There was also some lovely fountains in the Square.

After this it was back to our hotel for a break before out again for dinner. On the ride to and from the restaurant, and waiting for the bus to pick us up after dinner, was a good opportunity to people watch..... the roads are manic, with cars, buses, motor bikes and people everywhere! There doesn’t seem to be much logic in where you go sometimes - and there is a lot of horn blowing.

Back now to the hotel to repack our bags, we are off on a three day tour of Tibet tomorrow, coming back to this hotel for the final night here. As our bus isn’t very big we have been asked if we could leave bigger cases here in a secure room, and take just smaller bags with us. Also, we have been advised to buy small individual oxygen cylinders for the trip as we are going up higher again - so this should be interesting..... the good news is the weather forecast is good so hopefully we should have some spectacular scenery.

No of steps walked today....13078

Day 11 - Lhasa to Gyantse- Saturday 15th September 2018

Top of Page

So we have had a wonderful day of scenery... and weather to enjoy it by. Our trip from Lhasa to Gyantse took us around 9 hours, covering 270 km, with a few stops along the way. We set off from Lhasa on a new road, built about 10 years ago to go to the airport. After following the wide, fast flowing river for over an hour, we turned off to the rural road, heading South. From this point the road was much bumpier, and in a few places had large potholes, where water had washed away the surface!

The views all day have been stunning, rivers, lakes, mountains, glaciers, alongside, sheep, cows, yak, a few horses, and the odd goat. We climbed three passes, the first to 4998m, the second 5560m Kharola Glacier, and the third 4353m above a man made Lake.

So climbing up the first pass was interesting with loads of switchbacks, and cars, buses and lorries all overtaking each other at any point on the road... they didn’t seem to need to know there was nothing coming! We even saw a cyclist , although he was resting at the time!

At the top we stopped in a very crowded pull in, and had magnificent views back the way we had come. There were a few stalls trying to sell local jewellery, and also various locals wanting you to pay to pose with either yak, a local breed of dog, or miniature goats!

As we summited this pass, we looked down onto Lake Yamdrok Tso... turquoise lake....and it really was. The colour of the water was spectacular. This lake, a sacred lake, is huge.... 72km long, and we followed alongside it for quite some time.

It was around this time we were given our individual oxygen canisters in case we needed them, but thankfully we haven’t used them yet!

Leaving the lake behind, we stop for lunch in a small village.... it seem most of it is undergoing construction, the road off the main road, between shops was only half complete, and we had to climb over pipes, and onto freshly laid concrete to reach the restaurant - which was ok - although the food is beginning to get a bit monotonous! But the highlight here, was they also brought out a bowl of chips! After a while someone came to see if we wanted a refill of any of the bowls of food, and the only one requested was more chips!

After lunch we climbed the highest pass of the day, and had fantastic views of glaciers on either side, they were really white, much more so than those we have seen in Iceland, and Switzerland. We had a short stop here, and luckily just beat the short sharp shower which arrived shortly later. At this point we were at the same altitude as Everest Base Camp! However, we were not about to embark on an expedition.

Also, Basang had been explaining to us about the Prayer Flags...... they are renewed each year, on the second day of the Tibetan New Year - which like the Chinese New Year is lunar based, and lasts for 15 days. The flags are printed with Buddhist scriptures, and the colours are representative: White - Clouds, Blue - Sky, Yellow - Earth, Green - Water and Red - Fire.

Further on again and our last stop was overlooking the man made Lake, dammed for hydro electricity and crop irrigation, and there was a lot of crops growing in this area, we saw lots of hay stooks beside the road.

So we finally arrive at our hotel in Gyantse, and the interior is quite elaborate.

No of steps walked today 9415

Day 12 - Gyantse and Shigatse -

Sunday 16th September 2018

Top of Page

This morning we started off by visiting the Old town of Gyantse, on our way to the Palkhor Chode Monastery and Kumbum Stupa. We walked down a street that obviously had people still living there, calves tethered to the walls, hay there for them to eat, a lady washing rugs in the middle of the road with a hose by the drain.....it was different.

Reaching the Monastery, one of very few that house different sects, it was good to discover we could buy a photo permit here...... not available anywhere else we had been. So we spent 20¥ on a permit for the main assembly hall, where the monks gather to pray early in the morning and again in the evening. It was much the same as others we have visited.

Moving onto the Stupa, this is a unique example of Tibetan architectural skill, in the shape of a three dimensional mandala, symbolising Mt Meru. Again we Paid 10¥ for a permit for this, climbing steep steps up to the first level, walking around the outside and looking into the many small Chapels. Up more steps to level 2, but most of the Chapels on this level were either closed or being renovated. We decided we wouldn’t climb higher, as the steps were so steep, and the views would be the same, but it was a different sort of Temple to see.

We then had lunch in a nearby restaurant before setting off in the coach for the hour and a half trip to Shigatse. This was through a wide flat bottomed valley, with mountains on both sides, very fertile with irrigation channels and lots of cereal crops, both being cut and already stooked. We saw quite a lot of cows in amongst the crops and some sheep.

The small towns that we passed through were all like building sites! There was piles of earth and rubble, bricks, pipes, cars, motorbikes a, tractors, diggers, cows, ....you name it, it was there! There seemed to be quite a lot of building going on.

Bill, our guide had picked up that we were all feeling somewhat ‘Buddha’d’ out.... and so suggested to Basang that this afternoons tour of another Monastery could be changed. Therefore we arrived in Shigatse about 2:30, checked in and had an hour or so spare, and then met up to go for a walking tour outside the Monastery instead of visiting inside. This was a brilliant move and I think everyone enjoyed it more, and it was good to stretch our legs, although it was quite a steep climb up behind the Monastery outer wall. All along the way there were Prayer Wheels.

Up on the mountain behind there we lots of Prayer Flags, and Basang told us that this was the mountain used here for Sky Burials...... which he had explained to us previously. After someone dies, the undertaker takes the body up to the designated mountain, always near the Monastery, cuts the body up into small pieces and the vultures eat it. This is done early in the morning. And between 80 and 90% of people still practise this. Unsurprisingly he also said there are difficulties getting undertakers!

We had a good walk, up behind the Monastery and back down, with wonderful views put over Shigatse. On our way back to our hotel we went through a small bazaar, with the first area selling meat still on the carcass.... not too sure what it was, but Phil thinks maybe dog?! Not the best thing we’ve seen. Back along a more Main Street with lots of shops, all selling the same things again. Tonight’s meal was a distinct improvement on last nights. Here’s hoping the bed is more comfortable too!

No of steps walked today 12991

Day 13 - Shigatse to Lhasa- Monday 17th September 2018

Top of Page

So today’s itinerary was driving from Shigatse to Lhasa..... the third side of our triangular trip around Tibet. The start of the journey followed a wide open valley, similar to yesterday, with a very fast flowing river.

About mid morning we were due to have a ‘family visit’ where we could see a typical Tibetan home. Basang had spoken to the lady yesterday who has a contract with the Tour company, and she said she might be at home or she might be out in the fields harvesting! Well, we turned up and there was nobody at home.... she was in the fields...harvest is more important than her tour contract!

Not to worry, said Basang we will find someone else! And he did, stopping at another home a little further down the road, and finding a lady who was willing to let us into her home and look around. We went up steep stone steps at the side of the house, having gone through a small doorway, and into a courtyard, quite ornately decorated with pictures and colourful patterns. The rooms all went off this courtyard,.....a kitchen, a chapel, a sitting room and bedrooms. Directly opposite the steps up, was a small area with a fire going, burning yak dung, and boiling water on top. Through this area was the toilet...... open air, and four slots in the stone floor, down to the compost area! Certainly a loo with a view!

This home had the lady and her husband, their two daughters and their husbands, and each couple had two children, so 10 people were living there - it wasn’t that big! We didn’t actually find out what occupied the ground floor, but I imagine it was for animals..... outside we saw some chicken, a dog and a few cows tethered by the roadside. Apparently all homes have a chapel room, with statues of buddhas in a small case, and this is where the monk sleeps if they come to stay. Nothing looked terribly comfortable.

Travelling on from this, we continued to follow the river, and also the railway line in places, although that often went in tunnels through the mountains. At one point we had to stop at a police check area, and they wouldn’t accept Basang’s copy of the group permit and so he had to take all our passports in to register them. There were a few small shops beside this area and we all got off the coach to stretch our legs, and most bought an ice cream! Our first of the holiday.

A little further on and we stopped for lunch in a small village. Again the food was very similar to what we have had for the last few days. However, the difference was they only supplied chopsticks! We actually both managed quite well. Leaving there the scenery changed a bit, as we entered more into a gorge, with the road beside the river. It was a pretty area. The afternoon passed by with more of the same.... river, animals, fields of Barley, small villages, until eventually we arrived back at Lhasa. We were back in the same hotel as before, reunited with our suitcases and a chance for a shower before going out for dinner.

No of steps walked today 4539