News at Everest!

And now for some good news....

It happened the next morning after we arrived at Everest. We awoke to a cloud-filled valley and no sign of Everest, but it soon burnt off and we had blue skies and amazing crystal clear views. For breakfast we took our block of cheese and biscuits up a small hill overlooking our campsite and of course, Everest. I was feeling nauseaous and dizzy from the climb at altitude and all I wanted to do was rest. Martin on the other hand wanted to take more photos. Hadn't we taken enough?, I said. (Of course we had!) Did I want to take my big fleece gloves off?, he said. Why? They look silly, he said. OK, 'whatever', I thought. I was feeling quite ill at this point. Anyway, with the camera ready on its tripod on timer, Martin rushed over for the photo, but instead of standing beside me, he got down on one knee. I couldn't believe it! This photo was of that very precise moment. Of course, I knew what it meant but I was SOOOO shocked I didn't really hear what he said and it's a bit of a blur. For once I was lost for words... although I did manage to blurt out a 'yes' through my streaming tears. It took me a few days to get over the surprise, but it was nice to share it with Alan, and later with Amy and Sarah (who had stayed lower at the monastery). What a great location for a proposal! *Mush

And so to Everest! Tibet.

We steadily made our way to Everest through the lonely lunar landscape that makes up most of Tibet. Imagine empty and desolate gravel plains - a barren wasteland with no trees just patchy scrub - as far as the eye can see with an horizon of snowy distant peaks. Every so often we would reach the top of a pass or an edge of a glacier generally always marked by sacred stupas and tattered prayer flags flapping madly in the wind. The gravelly, pitted, bone-jarring roads left us exhausted after only a few hours in our Landcruiser. The dust was amazing too - even with our windows closed it still managed to filter into the car and stick to us. Add to this the heat from the intense sun and by the end of each day our hair would be stiff with dust and sweat. Urgghh!

Our first glimpses of Everest were of it far off into the distance but still really AMAZING. Another breathtaking moment of our trip without a doubt! We really couldn't believe it! We arrived at Rhombuk monastery that marks the start of the foot of the mountain in this region mid-afternoon. At 4900m - about 17000ft- we decided to take a horse and cart up to the base camp instead of walk - our bodies certainly not ready for anything remotely strenuous at this altitude. Don't worry, we weren't going to climb Everest - just going to camp overnight. Base camp was another 200m higher and was mainly made up of a row of large tea tents and guest houses. Unlike the Nepali side of Mt Everest this base camp was pretty clean and litter-free - probably because there are not as many expeditions from the north side of ther mountain. We set up our tent a bit passed the guesthouses with a wonderful, undisturbed view of the mountain out our tent door. The grey moraines and screes of rock leading up to the mountain were barren and bleak even with the sun on the snowy capped peaks. We watched the last of the sun go down at the very top of the northern face, and then the bitter cold set in. We wrapped up well in our layers and had a surprisingly warm night. *Mush

Gyantse Fort and Palchoi Monastery, Tibet

Day 2 began with a tour around Gyantse. It is one of the least chinese influenced towns in Tibet and it thankfully, still retains its Tibetan charm. We walked the streets past the old fort on the hill (in the background) and down to Palchoi Monastery, checking out the local street life. The chorten (big stupa-thing in the foreground) was huge in Palchoi and we were able to climb up the floors to the viewing platform near the top (Michelle, Amy and Alan pictured here on top). Cameras are not allowed inside, so I went to the neighbouring hill to take in these views back to town. A couple of cameras were snuck in, but the Nazi monk busted Alan with his up top, while Michelle found some sneakier tactics of escaping him.
Unfortunately, we didn't have time to climb up to the fort/castle as our driver was ready to leave. But it was a short day of driving today, only a 2 hours to Shigatse on which we entertained ourselves with a little game of "I Spy"!! (not very creative , I know!)

Shigatse, the second largest town in Tibet, has the very famous TashiLumphu monastery, home of the Panchen Lama. Panchen Lama is a title like Vice-President or Prime Minister that Tibetans give to the second greatest leader of Tibet. Panchen means "Great Scholar" and Lama is a word Tibetans use for a religious teacher. We were disappointed that we only had a short time at this monastery because it had an excellent vibe to it as we got caught amongst the flow of pilgrims when the doors opened. The pilgrims with their wrinkly old faces from decades of exposure to the elements, and dangling pigtails, wearing blackened sheepskin coats were excellent. We followed them on their circuitous route around the temples and dark shrines as they spun their prayer wheels or rubbed their prayer beads, yak butter candles and money donations at the ready to adorn each and every shrine. *Stub and Mush

Yamdrok Tso, Tibet, China

After some serious planning, many changes, gear sorting and translating to our Tibetan driver, we were off on an 8 day overland adventure with the highlight destination of Everest Base Camp. Michelle and I piled into a Toyota Landcruiser with Amy and Sarah from Australia, Alan from England, and Lhakpa, our driver.
Day one took us from Lhasa, up a really steep pass and to this location overlooking Yamdrok Tso. Another stunning colourful lake, and of course, all the locals up top wanting you to take photos with them and their animals for money. You can sneak a few shots in though! The lake is in the shape of a scorpion - 150km around. We had planned to camp in the valley, on the lake, but when we arrived at our intended location, the rains hit, so we decided to push on.

A super rough road followed, but with spectacular mountains and a fantastic hanging glacier behind a stupa with prayer flags. It was only a single lane dirt road, crossing rivers, along steep dropoffs and slicing through the mountains. I think our driver digs the offroad, as he seemed to go faster on the bumpy roads than on the flat asphalt! We did hit a bit of a snag when the single lane was blocked with a fresh load of dirt for construction. I gave them a hand shoveling briefly and then we pushed on 30 minutes later!
We arrived in Gyantse about 9PM, through some sort of dust storm and the skies were light and dark all at the same time. Very cool light. It was a good first day, but we found out our driver was a little finicky (sp??) and needed things his own way. This was obviously a little difficult as he spoke no English, but thank goodness for Sarah, as she was much more fluent in Chinese than she led us to believe. I don't know where we would have been without her - literally!!!! *Stub

Shooting Some Stick at NamTso Lake, Tibet, China

Mush and I joined an English friend Alan in renting a Landcruiser for an overnight trip up to NamTso Lake. Leaving from Lhasa at 3700m, I was a little worried about the altitude gain as we would be sleeping at 4800m that night. The drive up was quite spectacular, through mountains, plains with Yaks, and following the brand new Golmud-Lhasa train line (just completed) that they are testing trains on right now! As we were driving up to the pass, we heard a pop, and then steam came bellowing out of the engine. We had blown a rad hose, but no worries, the driver wrapped it in duct tape and some rubber strip, and we were on the move again one hour later! A pitstop at the pass at 5190m must have been my highest bathroom break to date. It did give us views over the deep blue lake surrounded by colourful plains and snow capped mountains.
Nomad tents throughout the plains led us to the tent town at NamTso. We booked in to the Sheng Shui Hotel and Tea Pub - tent hotel - for the night before wandering around the little settlement. Yaks a plenty, offering rides to the sparse tourists. We did climb up the hillside behind, an exhausting little walk at this altitude. The lake is quite large - (90km long) and in true Chinese style, they advertise it as the highest lake in the world. I guess it depends on what you classify a lake! The views were great as we were standing on a peninsula with the lake wrapped around.
Prior to dinner, I challenged Alan to a few games at the pool table with the best view I have seen!! Tibet was pool crazy, and there were outdoor pool tables in every town, village, farm, etc! While Alan and I were playing, we had to take a time out as a yak walked through! During this, Michelle was playing with a really cute little local girl, who was mimicking her every move. The girl joined us for dinner, kept warm by the yak dung stove in the centre of the room.
A cool night awaited us, and a brisk morning with excellent morning light on the flocks of sheep in front of the mountains. Mush's favourite little girl and her family were moving tent that day, so we helped them lug things about 200 ft to their new location. Funniest moment was watching 4 men lift a huge bag of dried yak dung on to a WOMAN's back, and she carried it across!! They were all surprised at our help, but thankful!

Our ride home was uneventful (no breakdowns), but we did stop at a hot spring at 4300m. A huge pool of hot water, right next to a really ugly geothermal energy factory - only in China!!! It did feel good afterwards, but not the most scenic, unless you look over the factory to the moutains! *Stub

The Roof of the World!

Greetings from the Roof of the World! Yes, we're in Tibet! We have to keep pinching ourselves to remind ourselves that we're in Tibet! Yeay! SOOOO excited to be here. The city of Lhasa sits at 3700m or about 12,000ft - that's 3 times the height of Ben Nevis (in Scotland, you non-Europeans) and about the same size as Mt Adams in Washington State (near Portland). So, we have been acclimatising and chilling out, touring some of the city a little. The very impressive Potala Palace looms high over the city. It is a monster of a place, and is apparently 13 stories high, but I'm not exactly sure where they measure that from as it is perched on a hilltop. We did a tour around the palace which was unfortunately under renovation so only half was open to the public. The Potala Palace is one of the most sacred, holiest places in the world. It used to be the winter residence of the Dalai Lamas until the recent one was banished to India by the Chinese government. So, we toured through some of the Dalai Lama's residences and saw some impressive tombs. The 5th Dalai Lama had the most incredible stupa, adorned with loads of precious stones and about 3700 kg of gold. And down below, hundreds of pilgrims were all circling the palace in a clockwise direction, spinning their prayer wheels as they walked. An interesting trip to the holy palace - it was seriously impressive!

For those concerned, Martin is doing better regarding his tummy problems, but he is taking it easy on the food front - nothing too fancy and exciting - just dull noodles and pasta with veg. Can't have him being ill at Everest! ...which we are trying to organise at the moment. It'll be an 8 day trip in a Landcruiser with a group of 5 of us heading to Base Camp at 5200m (about 17,100ft) and spend 2 nights in a tent up there - very excited about that prospect. Might be a little cold though! *Stub and Mush

Mixing with the Locals, Shangri La, China

We had had such a nice time that we were very sorry to leave Mama's and Lijiang. But it was time and we left to the usual loud departing words from Mama, "Lessa go. Lessa go", but this time she bundled us off with a bag stuffed with pancakes and bananas followed by a big hug and a "Gooda lucka. Gooda lucka". Now, here we are at 3200m - that's about 10,500ft above sea level - in the town of Zhongdian - THE Shangri La apparently. Though you wouldn't think it if you saw it!! It's small with a pretty standard chinese block-brick new town. As for the quaint 'old town' - well, it's small, quaint with lots of character.... and still being built!! Ha ha! We thought we had left the rain and cold of Lijiang where I wore long-johns and my down-feathered socks to bed on our last 2 nights, but no, the weather has been cold and wet here too. Thankfully, our guesthouse has electric blankets that have saved us! Scarily, early evening yesterday there was a power cut and we almost didn't get our electric blankets! Now that would have been disastrous for my feet!

The last few days we have just been chilling out and acclimatising at this altitude in preparation for Tibet - just watching DVDs, walking around town, mixing with the locals (note this lady's single, solitary tooth, and my nice new pair of sunglasses - pair number 6!), and watching them gather and dance in the old town square, visiting the local monastery perched on a hill, catching up on internet.... and taking Martin to hospital to try and sort out his persistent tummy troubles. He had been doing great for about a week and then it took a turn for the worse 2 days ago. Hospital was scary as no-one spoke english and we had to point to things in the phrase book. Lisa, one of our travelling friends speaks a good chunk of chinese and helped us out no end. She had also been to the hospital herself that week and so knew the procedure of doctors, stool test and blood test counters to visit, pointing out even the direction of what was to be Martin's second worst toilet ever (he was pleased about that!), and desks to hand over money, before getting treated... We think (!) he got some antibiotics and a saline drip, and then he got given a whole stash of other stuff to take for the next few days to bung him up, rehydrate him and settle his nausea! The whole thing was not a great experience - it was a bit miserable sitting in a cold and not very clean(!) hospital with a cold drip going through him for 2 hours. Hopefully though, this'll sort him out ready for Tibet!

From China there are several routes into Lhasa - some more $$$ than others. Zhongdian is really only a popular town because it is one of the hopping off points to Tibet by road. In the end, we finally decided that we would fly - a bit cheaper (at $250 U.S. including the elusive foreignors 'permit') than overland which costs about $700. We should be picking up our flight tickets this afternoon, so fingers crossed! Once we arrive in Lhasa it's a few days acclimatising - especially for Martin bearing in mind his previous altitude sickness experience. Then hopefully, it's a trip to Everest base camp possibly by jeep which takes about 8 days from Lhasa. Depending on the altitude and how fit we're feeling, we'd like to walk part of the way, but we'll see on that one... *Mush

Walnut Garden Village, Tiger Leaping Gorge, China

Our first night we stayed at a small guesthouse with a great view of the mountains across the Gorge, and in the morning the clouds magically lifted for only a few minutes to reveal wonderful sharp, craggy tops. By the time we departed, they had lowered again. The second day's walk was flat and easy which meant we could enjoy the views of the HUGE mountains and cool steep cliffs more. Still had to watch our feet, though, as there were some pretty steep drop-offs at times. 'Jade Dragon Snow Mountain' is just under 18, 000ft and we had a cool view of its sheer face from our guesthouse in Walnut Garden on the second night. The food and toilets left a lot to be desired at Woody's G.H., but you couldn't deny its superb location!

We wanted to try a different route home, but weren't able to find anyone to share a taxi with us to the ferry (Sandra, Eda and Joel were going the other way). We decided on the taxi anyway only to be told that there was only one taxi and the others had just taken off in it! Bummer. So, knowing that there were buses going that way we had to head back the other way - the way we'd come. We ended up hitching a ride with a man and his family in their little minivan going that way. Mum and the two little girls in the back while Grandma was in the front seat being carsick, hacking and spitting away. Nice! The girls were sweet though and we had a lot of fun with them - they kind-of made up for our disappointment. When we got to town we saw the minibus lady that had brought us up, so we flagged her down. We waited for her to eat lunch, and then we took off for Lijiang - or so we thought! She stopped a 100 yards down the road only to explain that she needed to wait to pick up more passengers! We were not very happy and weren't going to wait until she'd filled her bus! We found the local bus to get us home instead - good enough for us and better than waiting! * Mush

Tiger Leaping Gorge, Yunnan, China

Over the next few days Martin slowly recovered from his tummy troubles and felt strong enough to go for a 2 day walk through Tiger Leaping Gorge. So to the usual loud departing words from Mama, "Lessa go. Lessa go" (meaning "Let's go - it's time to catch the bus") , we left by minivan to 'Tiger' (as she calls it). Legend says that a big tiger leapt across this huge gorge for some reason, hence the name! If you're crazy enough to want to see the legendary rock from where the legendary tiger leapt, you can get to see it for a charge, of course, by the locals. It seems that this tiger did a lot of leaping from a lot of different rocks!

We took off with Joel, Eda and Sandra on the trail. It was a good, fairly strenuous walk. At one point we hit some switchbacks - 31 to be exact! We took our time and they were a lot easier than I was expecting them to be. Still hard work though. Phew! Earlier on the trail, I started to get quite annoyed with a local horseman who followed us with his mule hoping that we'd get exhausted and want a ride. The horse had an annoying clanging bell around its neck; so much for peace and quiet! "This is China", I reminded myself. After not too long I waved the guy to go ahead of our group making it very clear that we didn't require a horse, thank you! He went ahead only to clang along in front of us while he persistently pestered a chinese couple ahead. Of course, they didn't want a horse either, but he would not be convinced - although we all tried to convince him. FINALLY, he gave up shouting expletives (I'm pretty sure!) at us and the other couple, and horse bell clanging all the way back down the trail! * Mush

Red Lanterns Everywhere, Lijiang Old Town, China

Lijiang's old town has a great feel to it. Full of boutiques, cafes, bars and restaurants with lots of red chinese lanterns swinging away, it is a very lively town. It's a crazy maze of cobbled streets cut with little waterways and little stone bridges. It's really great. Being so close to Tibet, the locals have quite different faces. The local Naxi women - old and wrinkly, with toothless smiles - dress in their traditional blue and white dress selling their wares - mostly roasted pumpkin seeds, postcards and dried yak meat! (Haven't tried it yet - still plenty of time for that). Our timing wasn't great though, as we arrived during National Holiday Week - a week that most Chinese take off. This meant that it was super busy. Pretty nuts. People absolutely everywhere! Most of them making merry with lots of singing and dancing, competing with one another from bar to bar across the little waterways and streets. Pretty funny. Of course, the prices were jacked up for the week, but since we arrived at the end of the week Mama's prices were on the way down starting at 25 Yuan each down to 15 Yuan ($3-2! still pretty cheap). Even with the masses of tourists, Lijiang still manages to keep its charm and great atmosphere. Our favourite town in China by far - Lijiang gets the thumbs up! * Mush

Baisha, Yunnan Province, China

After a couple of days, Martin was still not well enough to venture out, so I spent an afternoon with Pelle and Ulla, a nice young Danish couple staying at Mama's. We rented a couple of rickety bikes and made our way to the small village of Baisha north of Lijiang. Views of Jade Dragon Snow Mountain ahead of us were fantastic as we rode along. The cobbled streets of Baisha were lined with stalls - people selling local junk - old Chinese coins, red Tibetan jade (not green like normal jade), batique dyed cotton tablecloths, and Mah Jong sets made out of yak bone. Nice! Another attraction about Baisha is Dr. Ho's clinic - a Chinese Herbal doctor made famous by the media because of his successes in curing people with various diseases such as leukemia and MS. Contributing to his fame have been visits by John Cleese and Michael Palin too (both of Monty Python fame). Anyway, his son, Hu Shulong, danced around a 'lab' of large red plastic tubs full of powdered herbs concocting a remedy for Martin's funny tummy. When I delivered my gift later on Martin was not particularly impresssed with it - it makes a pretty disgusting tea, apparently! * Mush

With Mama Naxi, Lijiang, China

So we're still in the province of Yunnan in the South. From Dali we headed to the town of Lijiang, but after about 5 minutes on the bus I realised I had left my lightweight, very expensive camping towel back at the guesthouse. Duh! To replace it in China would a) be difficult (not many outdoor /camping stores), and b) if we found one, would be very expensive! So after weighing it all up, we decided to get off the bus to retrieve the towel. Tickets for the next bus cost us $9, so not too bad and worth it for the towel.

The journey to Lijiang was stunning with amazing views over valleys, streams and mountains. The town itself is very quaint with a nice feel with lots of local traditional curly-roofed architecture. Interestingly, this area is populated mostly by the Naxi (pronounced Nashi) minority people -- which is perhaps the last remaining matriachal society in the world. Yes, that's right... women rule the roost here. Completely! The women own and inherit all property, have as many lovers as they wish... and 'own' their offspring as well. Any disputes are sorted by senior females, and their language even gives 'stronger' conatations when a word is prefixed/suffixed with female. (ie, a rock that is described as female is a 'boulder', whereas a male rock is just a pebble!). I think they've got it right! haha!

Anyway, the next few days we hung around Mama Naxi's - our guesthouse. Martin has been enjoying the delights of traveller's diarrhea on and off for the last 2-3 weeks (I'll spare you the details) . Anyway, it took a bit of a turn for the worse and we decided to stop and rest for him to get better. He has been drinking lots of salts and water and taking some of our medicine that we carry. Mama Naxi has been keeping an eye on him too and has given him some of her remedies. Mama herself is a wonderful, wonderful character. You have to see her to believe her! Once you've gotten over the initial shock of her loud and abrupt manner, the next thing that gets you is her english: although she understands you perfectly, her english is VERY broken and close to impossible to understand! You do get used to it after a while, but it's comical to watch the puzzled looks on the faces of her new guests. Above all though, the biggest thing that hits you about Mama - is there's no doubting her heart of gold. During the day she comes out with fruit and snacks and keeps feeding everyone, regardless of if they're hungry or not! Reminds me of my mum!! ha ha! Home away from home! She is great to be around, and everyone calls her 'Mama' and treats her with total respect. Dinner in the evening is cheap ($1) and crazy busy with everyone staying there all sitting down together at tables scattered throughout the central courtyard. The food is very tasty and never-ending (something that Martin is bummed about missing out on). All this, along with Papa in the shadows with his pleasant disposition, the girls that work for Mama doing the cooking /making the beds etc, the cats and dogs and new kittens gamboling everywhere, and the traditional Chinese courtyard setting, Mama's has a welcoming atmosphere and is a great place to chill out and get better. * Mush

Chinese Characters

So, after our horrendous start to our second stint in China, it's characters like this that made us realise why we came back.
We arrived in Dali Old City - finally, and the following day the sun came out. With Stiffler, we rented some bicycles and decided to tour the countryside. Our first stop was the 'Three Pagodas', but not realising the exorbitant price of entry, we gave it a miss and viewed them from afar. Good enough for us. Believe me, in China there are plenty of pagodas! We continued 18 km, and on the way we came across a market where we sat and watched the people. Some great, weathered faces, funny hats and toothless smiles. This fabulous guy was curious while we were getting Martin's backpack repaired for the 6th time at a little shoe repairman at curbside. He came up stared, laughed and smiled this great grin. How could I resist not taking his picture! He loved looking at his picture too as if he were a supermodel!! He was just so cheerful and pleased to see us.
We parted ways and continued up the road to Xizhuo (pronounced 'She Jo'). Riding through all the fields, the local Bai people were either planting rice or harvesting wheat. When they gathered the wheat, they laid it all out on the road, we think so that vehicles would help thresh the grain from the stems. It was tough to ride through and you had to clear your chain of wheat after each pass.
After a wrong turn, we ended up in a man's front yard right beside the lake. He couldn't have been friendlier, and welcomed us to have a drink with him. We sat in his drive way on little wooden stools trying to communicate. Through our broken Chinese and him pointing to our phrase book, he invited us to dinner. How sweet was that!! It would have been great, but we still had to ride back the 20+ km to Dali City before dark. Mr. Li was such a sweet man and Michelle wanted to take him home! So after such a nice afternoon we were reminded how much we liked the people of China. Good to be back! *Stub and Mush