Chomalungma – Mother of all Mountains (Mt. Everest) and Tibet Countryside

Roof of the World – Tibet Countryside: 24 April – 30 April 2014

Tibet is an amazing place. The birthplace of several of the world’s major rivers (Mekong, Indus, Bhrambutra, Yangtse,, Salween, Ganga) supplying water for most of Asia and of the world’s population, the Tibetan plateau is an average altitude of ¬4000m (amazing to think that we were higher than the highest mountain in Europe for the last 8 days) and easily deserves the title ‘roof of the world’. A devoutly Buddhist place where unfortunately only 45 out of over 2000 monasteries survived or were rebuilt after the cultural revolution in China. The Tibetan people are very friendly and from what we can make out the relationship with China can only be described as ‘unwelcome and coercively tolerated’. The current Dalai Lama has already decided not to be reincarnated in a present state Tibet. To us it feels a little bit like ‘have a little bit of development with your political oppression whilst we mine for your resources and benefit from your strategic importance to the region’s water supply, but hey a new road and electric power line is coming to a remote village near you soon!’. It is rugged, harsh, bare with inhospitable terrain yet immensely beautiful. We still can’t imagine though what was going through the minds of the first settlers when they were pitching their ‘tents’ here.

As we headed west out of Lhasa we passed by one of the three holy lakes (Yamdrok Yutso) after our first high pass (Kambala Pass) of 4794m. We stopped off at Baiju Temple before we reached Shigatse, our overnight resting spot and apparently the party capital of Tibet. The next day we continued due west and reached our highest point of the journey – Gyatsola pass at 5248m (and quite anticlimactic from a scenic point of view). We stopped off at Ta Shi Lhun Po Monastery (which houses Tibets largest Bhudda stature 26m) before we reached Tingri, from where our ‘trekking’ adventure was due to start. We started hiking across a plain straight from our hotel for a couple of hours with the sun beating down on us (and whilst it is mostly cold up on the plateau – here it was actually hot) before we stopped for a nice lunch with a view to our guide’s village. After another hour’s walking across the plain we were picked up and driven to our camping spot. We rejected the originally proposed camping spot on the basis that it looked a bit too cold, windy and a little post-apocalyptic and headed further up the stony dirt track (everyone’s happy we have saved on the trekking, as walking up the dusty road doesn’t seem that appealing). We found a nice spot by a creek and stone fences at 4500m and pitched our tents for the night. It was the first test for our new sleeping bags – would they be warm enough for the night with minus temperatures? As the wind howled around the tent and the thought of needing to go to the loo was quickly supressed in light of the icy temperature outside it took us ages to fall asleep even though we were comfortably warm in our sleeping bags. We made it through the night and were greeted with nice sunshine in the morning. After some coffee we started the second trek across the valley floor for another couple of hours. We didn’t really walk very far or for long before getting picked up by the car, but that was ok with us as doing anything at altitudes of 4500+m is hard work and tough going. We then drove straight on to the Everest Tourist Base Camp Tent village (5100m) where we spent the night in a tent guest-house. Compared to the camping this was warmth and luxury. Seeing Everest - called Chomalungma in Tibet -  was truly spectacular! The next day we went up to the ‘real’ base-camp at 5200m and the view from there is even more stunning – we were so lucky that there wasn’t a could in the sky and we could see the mountain in its full glory. To get the best view you had to walk up a small hill and it was unbelievable how out of breath we were doing that! We have a new found appreciation for our friends who have scaled Everest. Not far from the base camp is also the highest monastery in the world – again with the most incredible views over Everest. As we made up so much time with less trekking and more driving we were now effectively two nights ahead of schedule and needed to make a decision between more camping, more time in the tent guest-house in the tourist base-camp or time back in Tingri. We opted for Tingri - for decent food, a decent basic place to stay and clean indoor toilets – we declined the opportunity of more camping, which also made our driver happy as he had been freezing in his car during our camping night. With the extra time we gained we did a half-day hike up a hill overlooking ‘old Tingri plain’ – it was beautiful especially as overnight there was snow in the mountains and the peaks were prettily dusted in white. During the last few days we learned about the supposed existence of the blood-sucking ‘vampire’ yeti, the fact that Tibet has arranged marriages and that in rural areas the girl, although getting married to the oldest brother, often gets ‘shared’ between more brothers if they all have a good relationship and don’t want to split the family heirlooms! On our final day we drove from Tingri to Zhong Mu – probably our favourite long distance drive of all of the three driving days we did. We crossed another high pass (Thongla Pass 5150m) with stunning views over the Himalaya range and the highest mountains inside Tibet. The whole of the Tibetan plateau is an endless sea of rocks and sands in various different colours, shapes and sizes – in parts it feels like an arid moon landscape. After this pass we ‘dropped’ down nearly 2000m off the plateau and through the long and windy road created by the river to Zhong Mu. At the gorge the climate and ecosystem change completely, everything becomes green and lush with trees, flowers and butterflies – the temperature rose and the air smelt like spring – it looked like a mountain valley in Europe, until you reach the town of Zhong Mu which is a strange little border trading town with houses lining the narrow windy road uphill. It is full of Tata trucks (Nepalese) transporting goods across the border. Compared to the epic countryside, isolation and deep tradition and culture of the previous 10 days, it felt like we were no longer in Tibet. We looked out over the lush valley across to Nepal from our filthy ‘hotel’ bedroom and felt a little sad to have left the plateau behind. Tomorrow we will cross over the friendship border into Nepal from where we will hopefully get picked up and driven to Kathmandu.