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Published: March 6th 2007
Beautiful tibetan children
We stumbled across this outdoor festival on the road between Yandrok-tso and Shigatse. A chance encounter with some very welcoming and lovely people who were enjoying the singing and dancing whilst drinking barley beer in the sun. Bliss!With some careful planning and extensive research we came to a compromise that our mini trip within Tibet would be from the 2nd - 9th August and take in the following destinations:
Lhasa - Yamdrok tso - Shigatse - Lhatse - Rongpu monastery - Everest base camp - Lhatse - Sakya - Shigatse - Lhasa. Having now returned tired but totally satisfied I thought I should let you know that for whatever reason we were blessed with the most amazing weather on our trip which we got back from this afternoon, 9th August.
Everest of course was everyones main goal and did not dissapoint. It really was fantastic. We arrived at Rongphu (Rongbuk) Monastery on 4th at about 3pm and by 3.30pm we were packed and walking up to base camp.
We were told the trek/stroll should take 1 1/2 hours but we struggled to make it up there in 3 1/2!! Whether it was due to the altitude I don’t know but it was bitterly cold and raining, with a strong wind. I think we started at Rongphu at about 5,000m and ended up at base camp which sits at an altitude of 5,200m.
It was hard
Our jeep!!
Total freedom with no tourists (except us!) on our way to Shigatse on day 1. work and I have a stinking cold anyway which wasn't helping. A cold at that height actually felt more like flu, and it can't have been altitude sickness because we've spent the best part of 2 weeks at altitudes of 4,000m and higher, so we were pretty much acclimatized already.
I caught the cold from Anya, a German girl whom we walked Tiger Leaping Gorge with a couple of weeks earlier, how annoying to get ill and such great timing too! Not her fault though...obviously!
It was so much fun staying at Everest base camp, even though everything in the big tent we were staying in stank of yak hair and yak butter. I can't quite describe the smell but it really gets up your nose and sticks to your clothes and hair! In fact it makes everything smell. You would think that after a while you would get used to the smell...but no! It lingers!
We were all absolutely freezing and wet when we arrived despite the use of waterproofs, the wind seems to cut straight through you. We had some jasmine tea and fried rice straight away to warm us up. There are no showers obviously
Oohh the colours!
The festival we stumbled across. Two colourfully clad local tibetan women realx on their picnic style spot watching the dancing on stage. Notice the sweet little boy with the even sweeter mini cowboy hat! and the loo, well, how do I describe this!?
It was a loo with a concrete divider in the middle but no hole to poo or pee in so instead just a steaming mound of waste on a slab of concrete. Some people had clearly taken one look at this and decided they didn’t want to do their business on top of the already large mound so instead they had just gone everywhere around the loo and the surrounding area. This made the matter of negotiating the entrance something of a mine field! Again, I seem to find the worst loo's possible, lucky me!
Anyway after the loo break I looked hopefully at the sky and saw only thick white snow clouds hanging where Everest should have been. The weather here at 5,200m is unpredictable and ever changeable so luckily we waited it out in our very cozy tent snuggled up under blankets and duvets. Made all the more cozy with the central sheep poo fuelled fire/stove roaring away. The central stove which is used for both warmth and cooking does tend to make the tent rather smoky though. Although I have no idea I likened it to a
Looking across the crowd
The festival on the way to Shigatse. dark, Smokey teepee. Very rustic and basic but so exciting and a real pleasure and generally an incredible experience to sleep in a Tibetan tent, all covered in yak hair and colourful Tibetan symbols.
Andreas and Camilla, the Chilean couple we were traveling with, both suffered from altitude sickness and no one really got a good night sleep that night, banging headaches all round. Its funny the altitude makes you need to pee all the time, and all the way through the night too, so annoying!
The alarm went off at 7am to check to see if Everest had appeared! James was nominated to go and investigate (much to his disapproval) but he came back cold and grumpy, grunting something along the lines of "noooo" before crawling back into his sleeping bag and hiding from the early morning sunlight that was shining only on him through the plastic tent window.
We got up and pottered around, tried to avoid the loo until we were at the critical stages of necessary excretion and ate breakfast in out little tent cooked by our very sweet 17 year old Tibetan host.
At about 10am after checking on the cloud situation
Motorbike and tibetan tent
The festival on the way to Shigatse. we all agreed that we could see a damn sight more of the glorious mountain. And by 10.30am we had the most magnificent views over the mountains. Although not completely visible you could see enough of the one thing we were all desperate to see, a beautiful Everest, all clad in freshly laid snow, glistening in the extremely bright sunlight. It was amazing.
We pranced around for a long while and took pictures. All feeling a little delirious about the fact that it was so incredible and we could actually see Everest. Maybe we were a little crazy because we had all had a lack of sleep and the altitude was playing games with our minds! The one thing that was annoying though is that it’s still so far away and you just want to run up and touch it. It seems such a silly thing now but you really want to be on it or near the mountain, or at least within reach. It’s a very odd and mesmerizing thing when you are finally faced with the highest mountain in the world, you have this niggling urge to go and climb it there and then! Ridiculous really I
know but there you are.
Anyway so on that basis we persuaded a Tibetan guy to guide us to the glacier, a 4/5 hour round walk to get closer to Everest. It’s a risky thing to do because if caught by the Chinese police who patrol regularly, you get fined 200 USD per person. This is because it’s a restricted area, only to be used by people embarking on an expedition. Luckily for us we got away with it scott free and sat close to Everest and watched the glacier while being subjected to freak weather conditions including hail, snow, rain, sleet, strong winds and just a touch of sun and blue sky in the space of maybe 1/2 hour.
Needless to say it was just incredible, and I wish that you all could have seen it. For some reason it was a very humbling experience. Maybe it's a combination of the way in which these delightful people live in blissful squalor or the sheer presence of natural beauty. It has been one of the most eye opening and memorable experiences of the trip and my life. Just amazing, and I wish I could do it all again.
Shigatse fort
A little ruined by the addition of scaffolding! In between Everest and Lhasa we visited several road passes that exceeded 5,000m, visited many Tibetan/ Buddhist monasteries, which are incredibly colourful and ornate, that is when you ignore the fact that some of the monks are Chinese government spies and the Chinese have installed hidden cameras and sound equipment around the monasteries so that 'big brother' is always watching. Other than that they can be very peaceful and sobering places.
Little hunched over old ladies carrying prayer wheels as big as their arms around the kora, constantly rotating them and chanting mantras, they all have extremely long dark hair braided with bright green, turquoise or blue thread into the plaits and either wound around their heads or trailing down their backs. So beautiful, I wish I could take a picture to show you but it’s not really the done thing.
We are all absolutely exhausted now, having slept in Tibetan houses and dorms for last few nights and you'll be happy to know that I didn’t shower for 5 days and lived to tell the tale. Sadly I should have been clean sooner but when we arrived in Lhatse last night they had showers with hot water
Shigatse fort 2
A little ruined by the addition of scaffolding! and everyone in the jeep apart from Andreas and myself got to have one before all the water in the town went out. So I didn't shower until this evening. My hair and skin felt horrid! Not an experience to be repeated.
On a last note we listened to mainly Tibetan music in the jeep but our driver was partial to a bit of Michael Jackson and so I whipped out my no. 1's album and he was bopping along and singing, even though he doesn't speak a word of English! A really sweet guy, with a very tolerant spirit!
We all agreed that we were very lucky with our group. And it will be very sad indeed when we all must finally part company having been together now since first meeting on the train from Chengdu to Lhasa.
An incredible experience, overall. The pictures sadly don't do the places or people justice at all. It is really one of those occasions that you have to be there. Everest and Tibet as a country are far too incredible to explain in words or capture on film....so people there's your que, get out here and see it for
Tashilhunpo Monastery, Shigatse
The entrance way to this lovely monastery which sits on the hill behind the town. yourselves. You won’t be disappointed.
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