The Heartland

          Mustard fields and willows by the highway           Nyang Chu valley barley fields           LtoR: Cyril, me, Paul, Anthony - can't remember who used my camera!           Curious kids greet the cars at a roadside water-powered mill           Inside the mill: Water-driven stones grind barley           Gyantse Dzong           Gyantse street life           Gyantse's Pelkor Chode Monastery           Anthony heads for the Gyantse Kumbum's roof           Cyril atop the Gyantse Kumbum Mustard fields and willows by the highway

Today we're heading for Gyantse which lies at 3950m (13000ft) in the Nyang Chu valley. Gyantse is the least Chinese influenced town in Tibet and I'm really looking forward to it.

The drive from Shigatse to Gyantse is a delight. Verdant fields, an avenue of willows thirty kilometers long, splendid Tibetan country houses, Om Mani Padme Hum scribed in white stones on high hillsides, the bells of horses, barley being ground for tsampa in water powered mills.

The Tarboche flagpole ceremony

Saga Dawa is the most auspicious day of the Tibetan calendar and for centuries pilgrims have travelled from all over Tibet and Asia to circumnambulate Mt Kailash on this sacred day. It's the reason we've all travelled so far...

Contemplation

From the journal:

I'm sitting in the shadow of this mighty mountain I've come so far to see...

...I'm so shaken up. We've spent another 9 hours bouncing over the tracks of western Tibet to the foot of Mt Kailash. My stomach is a mess, my emotions are a mess, my body is a mess.

Some serious weirdness on the road

From the journal (expletives not deleted):

Another freezing night.

Found a thermal left on the ground - frozen stiff with rocks glued to it. Ice on the tents again. Slept fully clothed and jacketed.

Huge hares bound around our campsite...

I'm recalling a recurring dream I used to have when I was a kid.

One of those ones where you feel hunted.