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I am back in Kathmandu after my Tibetan adventure. It was an interesting 16 days over there, not quite the mystical land one imagines but certainly a very special place.

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The Friendship Highway

It is only possible to enter Tibet as part of a group tour and so we all jumped on a rickety bus in Thamel early in the morning and made the slow drive up to the Chinese border, stopping for a free breakfast en-route. In my group was a Canadian guy who was born in Korea, Jae, and a Australian couple Justin and Megs who I got on well with. The two Czech sisters that I
trekked with around Annapurna also made the trip on the same day but in a different group, we would meet up at each stop!

Crossing the Friendship bridge was like stepping into a new world, gone were the muddy streets full of waste, shopkeepers shouting at you to visit their shop, stalls on all the sidewalks, welcome to an orderly country where the streets are clean, the sidewalks paved in pretty patterns and people speak only when spoken to! We even had to record out temperature before being allowed to cross. Also of course a country where the government controls everything and, with regard to Tibet, oppresses and dilutes regional culture. The time in Tibet is that of Beijing and so even thought he trip from Kathmandu to the border is almost due North, the time is 2 and one quarter hours ahead. This means it is still dark at 7am and at 9pm it feels
like 6pm. At 6pm the sun is so hot you risk solar radiation from the altitude!

The trip to Lhasa took five days. The first day was spent getting to the border, crossing, being ushered into an expensive restaurant, an attempt to extract money before anyone can get used to the new currency, though I escaped and bought some Chinese dumplings from a stall for about 10p! We then descended from the border town of Zangmo to the first stop at Nyalam.

Not much to see in town, just a convenient stopping point. I ate with Jae, we ordered spicy beef noodle soup but the owner decided it was not for us and twice brought us bland vegetable noodle soup! A good start! The next day we crossed the Lalung-La pass, at 5050m which was an amazing view, looking back over the Himalaya and able to see the Xixipanga peak, at 8013m the only 8000m peak wholly within China. Later on we were able to see Everest and its sister peak Lhotse, although of course the peaks themselves were covered in cloud. That was the third time I was in a position to see Everest and be
denied by cloud cover! It took us around 12 hours to reach the next overnight stop at Lhatse, the road is in truly terrible condition, two Taiwanese ladies on my tour fell ill from the road and the altitude. The third day was shorter however as we drove for just five or six hours to Shigatse, the first big town and the first example of the way the Chinese
have promoted mass immigration, smothering the beautiful, ancient Tibetan architecture with soul-less, efficient buildings. Shigatse is also the site of the Tashilumpo monastery, but at over 6 dollars entrance we consoled ourselves with walking around the kora (pilgrimage route) circumnavigating the monastery in the clockwise direction, following the prayer wheels and flags. The next day was the very short ride into Gyantse. This town also has interesting sights in the Phalkor monastery and Kumbum chorten which Jae, Justin, Megs and myself managed to get into for free as the guide ushered us past in the commotion! Good work! It was the former home of the Panchen Lama before he was kidnapped and the monastery is covered in amazing murals and Thangkas. Gyantse was also the sight of the British "expedition" into Tibet, perhaps if we had continued our advances it may have fared better under British rule? The final day of the tour, the long ride into Lhasa, but at
least by now the road had improved, passing the Yamdruk-Tso lake, nomads offering Yak rides at the viewpoint, descending into Lhasa at only 3600m!

Potala, Lhasa

Entering Lhasa you can be forgiven for feeling a slight wave of disappointment as the outskirts are all ugly Chinese department stores, factories and supermarkets. It was so surprising, China is supposed to be a communist state and yet the lust for money and the marketing of brands is more prevalent than almost anywhere in the world. Tibet could never, ever be
freed because of the mass immigration of Chinese, motivated by tax breaks and other incentives from Beijing. But don't tell all the celebrities, god forbid they miss an opportunity to boost record/box office sales with some Free Tibet publicity!

Settled in the far nicer looking old town I met up with Monika and Lenka (the Czech sisters) and we wandered around the old city, passing the Jokhang monastery and somehow entering for free (usually 75 Yuan) but not being aware that normally there is a fee we did not take advantage of this point! To celebrate reaching Lhasa the two groups met up in the evening to drink Chang, the local tipple, a rice millet beer that I think tastes like the liquid in the bottom of a tray of chips after the salt and vinegar has drained through, but very nice!

Jae and I decided to head straight for Nam-Tso lake and the next day we set out, taking a bus to Damxung and from there hitching the last 66km to the lakeside village of Tashi Dor. It took about 5 hours, most of the trucks would stop for us although getting pulled out of the mud by a JCB and sitting in the back of an asphalt truck were not highlights! The lake itself is one of the most beautiful sights I have ever seen, it is massive, 80km by 40km in places and is surrounded by snowy peaks of over 7000m. The colour of the lake changes from a deep, dark blue through greys and greens to a bright
turquoise depending on the time of day, the weather and the viewpoint. Around the lake are a few trails to walk, although at 4700m it is not easy trekking! All the accommodation at the lake is in Nomadic tents and we had brought ramen noodles (again!) for meals. I spent the evening sitting in the main tent with the family, and half of the villagers, they had all come to
visit because the family had just received a DVD player and had some Chinese films. Needless to say I got to bed early! The next day we hitched back to Lhasa, taking 10 hours in total. More trucks, one guy picked us up twice as we had not got very far by the time he had finished work and drove us back to Damxung, having to drive in the river for long stretches due to the
roadworks! He was supposed to drive us all the way back to Lhasa but there were so many Chinese army and police around, showing off their 200 new vehicles, that it was not possible. A local bus picked us up and we were back in Lhasa by 10:30pm.

Nam-tso Lake

Meeting up with Justin and Megs again and inviting the Czech girls we had a small party in our dormitory, lots of beers and watching the French Grand Prix on the TV. Back in Monika and Lenkas hotel the party continued as there were three French guys on their tour that were leaving the next day. At the end of the night there was only Monika and I still standing and we decided to visit the Jokhang monastery at 2:#0am, which of course was closed. However we could hear some music from somewhere and, like the Pied Piper, we followed it. We came to a Chinese cabaret club hidden in a building. Somebody offered to buy us drinks and instead of buying us one each, he bought us five between the two of us. They had singers and dancers and in between people would get up to dance on the stage. When Monika and I danced the other patrons came up to us and draped white silk scarves around our necks, a ritual normally reserved for monks in the monastery. We must have
been good dancers. We rolled back to the hotel at around 6am, of course it was still pitch black.

At 9pm the next evening after a dinner of Bobi, like Tibetan Fajitas, I decided to go trekking with Monika and Lenka, so off we went to find a sleeping bag for me to hire. I had to break the news to Jae who had been chasing around Lhasa trying to find people to join us to visit Everest base camp. I did not really want to go to Base camp though because the permits
are really expensive and my luck with seeing Everest is not very good. Also it is a jeep trip, nobody should get to Everest Base Camp in a vehicle!

The next morning we set out early for the Ganden monastery, around 30km from Lhasa and the start of the Ganden-Samye monastery trek, the most popular in Tibet. You would think being most popular it would be a well worn trail and
easy to follow. It was not. After a morning of steep ascent along a ridge and plunging into the valley to the village of Hepu we set out to rise through the valley and set up camp at the bottom of the first pass. The way was rough marshland, we met one family that offered us the local snuff, some sort of ginger concoction and pressed on to find a good place to pitch the
tent and start a Yak dung fire. This stuff is amazing for burning, all over the Himalaya it is the preferred fuel, though it does have a pungent aroma! It was a cosy night, three of us in a 2-man tent. The next day we reached the Shug-La pass (5250m) after another 3 hours trekking, crossed it and found ourselves looking down into another valley. Lenka decided to descend,
Monika and I decided to traverse the face. We met a small boy, a Yak herder, the first person we had seen for 24 hours, and he gave each of the three of us different directions to Samye. We had to guess. I climbed another pass, found a lake surrounded by mountains and ushered the girls up. We set up camp on a small island surrounded by rock pools, great to wash the dirt and the smell of the Yak dung fires away. Camping above 5000m, very cool. Choosing a pass the next morning and fueled by Nutella and Oreo's (as well as more ramen noodles) we started to climb. The relief at crossing the pass
soon turned to despair as we were faced with an unexpected valley and pass in front of us to the South, the direction we should be heading, OR following the river round to the East and see what turns up. We chose the river and slogged along, criss-crossing it along the valley. The stones in the river were all a luminous shade of green. A few hours later we saw a
nomadic tent. An old lady came out shouted at me in Tibetan and stuck her tongue out (a sign of respect). After the usual communication across languages we found that we could reach a Lhasa bound road by following the river. We were so happy and the family looked on bemused. This for me was more important than visiting the monastery, seeing a family that lives hours away from the next human. We had not seen anyone for over 36 hours, since the small boy. They are living in a tent with holes in the roof and a Yak dung fire burning in the middle, maybe 6 people in the tent. Nothing from
the west has ever reached here. All they wanted to do was offer us Yak butter tea and goodwill. We bade them goodbye and continued on, finding a good spot for camp by the stream and settling in for another dinner of noodles and black tea. In the morning I washed in the stream, looking down the valley and seeing the white peaks in the distance, an epiphanal moment.
Que bonita! We reached the road in the afternoon, having reached some small villages and the Katsel monastery, so our trek did go from one monastery to another after all! Two shiny new vehicles, a Buick and a Land Cruiser if you want to know, full of rich Chinese businessmen stopped, gave us a lift and fed us a grand Szechuan meal in a roadside resort. I love hitching with girls, they get the best lifts! We were back in Lhasa for the early evening and promptly got lost trying to walk back to the hotel, we had made this trip so many times before! We even found a mosque. A Tibetan mosque!

Ganden to Samye Trek

Two days of sightseeing in Lhasa, the massive Drepung monastery, the Sera monastery with the debating monks (the same as in Dharamsala) and views of the majestic Potala (the historic home of the Dalai Lama) from all around. A final night of Chang with Justin and Megs and the next day we set out to reach the Nepal border. First a bus to Shigatse, slightly delayed after a puncture and then we started to hitch, within three vehicles we had a ride to the border, although we did have to pay for it. The long drive to Lhatse and there we found a small bar, or maybe it was just a house, and the Tibetan family fed us bread and gave us three coffee pots full of Chang, recently poured from the paint stripper bottles they ferment it in. At the
end they would not accept any payment for the food and drinks. A final example of Tibetan warmth and kindness. If it had been a Chinese run restaurant they would have been counting every Mao (1/10 of a Yuan).

The last day in Tibet, a long, long day on the worst roads, at one point we had to get out to break rocks in the road that were stuck fast in the mud. At 9pm we reached Nyalam and decided to head straight for the border. At 10pm we were stuck under a waterfall as an oncoming truck had broken down and blocked the road. By 10:30 we were back in Zhangmo, just time for some Chinese street snacks, all sorts of meat and vegetables on sticks for only 1 Yuan each, a last Lhasa beer and we crashed out.

We crossed back into Nepal the next morning and took the long ride back to Kathmandu, it is only 120km but because of all the checkpoints it took around 8 hours, with frequent pokes in the arm from the barrel of the guards automatic rifle.

Back in Kathmandu Monika and I celebrated with a bottle of red wine and watched a band rip some classic songs to shreds. We again went to the swimming pool, the only one I have ever been where you are watched over by a soldier pointing a machine gun at you, although it always a female soldier.

Monika and Lenka left yesterday and sometime soon I must leave. I think Kathmandu is now the place I have spent most time in all my travels, maybe except Bangkok. I will be back in India very soon. I am looking forward to returning to India, yesterday we found an Indian dhaba in Kathmandu and it was great to once again eat Katori and samosas.