Strands of Intensity II

The most conspicuous strand is that of the land, the landscape, and the scenary. The landscape around Xining is scrubby desert once one gets up on to the plateau. The landscape is dramatic with passes to get onto the plateau and passes when on the plateau. Going southeast to Chengdu in the train, is moving from medium altitude (2200m) to low altitude (541m). It is also moving from desert to semi tropical landscape; from average temperatures at this time of year in the mid 20s, to ones in the low 30s. The crops slowly change from wheat (inferred, not seen) and scrub to rice and bannanas.

The landscape from Chengdu into Kham is constantly varied and interesting. From Chengdu to Kangding goes ov er one of the most scenic and spectacular passes I have encountered. It is a high pass (approx 5000m). Unlike passes to the north, it is covered with vegetation right over the pass - starting with semitropical vegetations and becoming more temperate as the altitude increases. There are masses of crops of all sorts

(one of the local plums/peaches is fantastic. It is incredibly juicy; the flesh is tightly attached to the stone; the skin is bright, almost strawberry red; it is impossible to eat gracefully or without juice going everywhere, fingers, hands, arms, clothing and seat; with a taste exactly mid way between that of a plum and a peach. But absolutely delicious.)

There were also multiple sites containing bee hives - usually 50-80 at a time (and Chinese beekeepers seem to wear exactly the same clothing and use exactly the same equipment as English beekeepers).

Once over the pass I was into a series of vallies and passes, gradually getting higher, and presenting new vistas at every change from valley to valley. These started off comparatively small and got deeper and narrower as I went on. The first series was almost a continuation of the pass though at a lower level. Then came the high level grasslands, followed by a series of valley systems, all different, but all recognisably forming part of the overall landscape. In turn these gave way to Alpine like steep gorges with sharp edged, high mountains plunging down to the rivers in the valley bottoms. On from Kangding, and getting very remote, this system of vallies eventually led to the gompa vallies. These are vallies that are very reminiscent of the Lake District - if all horizontal dimensions are multiplied 100 fold, and all vertical dimensions 10 fold. They are where the majority of the Gompas (monasteries) have been built. In a given valley, and these vallies can extend for over a hundred kilometers, there might be a stupa, a gompa, or a temple every five to eight kilometres on both sides of the valley.

All in all, a very beautiful landscape, of infinite variety, and increasingly remote.

Yet another stream is that of Buddhism and Tibetan culture. Chengdu is a very large Chinese city which is a major transport hub and which has always been seen as the gateway to Tibet. Nontheless it is purely Chines and there is no Tibetan influence to be seen. It is the provincial capital of Sichuan (Chinese local government structure goes, in descending order of size and importance: province, prefecture, county) and is the most modern, western, consumer based city I have encountered in China. Kangding, a prefecture capital, is about 50/50 Chinese and Tibetan. Most of the Tibetans live in the Tibetan quarter, which is older, poorer, and located on one of the steep sides of the valley rather than the valley bottom, where most of the Chinese live. There are a number of temples and monasteries, all of them that I saw with a substantial Chinese influence in their internals and iconography. One of the temples was supposedly a temple where love and relationships would be sought - the main element of the temple was a partially nude female figure, with in front of it a standing, one third size, nude adult male Buddha figure. Though both figures had been draped with muslin they represented no aspect of Buddhism I have previously encountered. Many of the businesses and property has been taken over by the Han Chinese. There is a superb Tibetan museum, and I spent over an hour talking to the English speaking director of the museum, his sister, his brother, and a Tibetan monk, none of whom spoke English, so there was a lot of translation going on.

TaGong was pretty solidly Tibetan, though on one of the main Chinese students' tourist routes. There are a few Chinese shops, but not much other visible sign of Chinese influence. The Chinese authorities are on occasion very visible - armoured police columns running through the town. There is a very old monastery (founded about 600CE); together with a number of other monasteries and nunneries close to the town, and a Tibetan school. There is some traditional Tibetan costume worn, but not a great deal. Moving onto Ganzi, this town, a county capital, showed very little Chinese influence. The majority of the people appeared to be Tibetan, with most in traditional costume. The Kham men were their usual selves - displaying their costumes, their beauty, their coral, turquoise and amber jewellry, and their hair; while letting their women do all the heavy manual labour. A very substantial number of people seemed only to speak Tibetan - spoken Chinese was very scant. This extended to the bus service which is controlled by local government, and so would be expected to do all its dealings in Chinese. In fact not only were all the dealings conducted in Tibetan, I had the impression that the bus station staff did not speak Chinese. There were a lot of monasteries, temples, and stupas, in addition to Tibetan medicine hospitals and other Tibetan institutions.

The final strand brings together culture, religion, politics, charitable work and my activities in the UK. When trekking, and talking to the Tibetan guide, it was evident that Tulku Akong Rimpoche's (the founder of the Tibetan Buddhist monastery in Scotland) is very well known. His name evokes immediate recognition in Tibetans, and also evokes mention of  his charitable work focussed on education. When I got to TaGong, I had problems with my foot, as so for the first couple of days did not do a great deal. On the third day, wanting something gentle, I went to have a look at the Buddhist school behind the town. When I got there, I thought I recognised the new statue of Guru Rimpoche at the school, As a result I did some checking when I got back to the guesthouse I was staying at. It is indeed the first of the 15 (?) statues that Akong Rimpoche has committed to place across Tibet. In checking up on this, it was apparent that Akong Rimpoche's name was as well known here as in Amdo. This means that his name is known over an area of at least one million square kilometers.  The reaction to his name here, his homeland, was initially the same - commenting on his educational charitable work. The follow up reaction was a little more complex than in Amdo. Every body lauded his educational work, then mentioned the fact that he had spoken at the Chinese governments celebration of the 60th anniversary of the liberation of Tibet by the Chinese. I could not tell whether these comments were intended to be complimentary or condemnatory. I assumed that the comment had implications that were hidden from me. There was then one more reaction - comments that building statues was a peculiar use of an educational charities money. This reaction only came from Westerners resident in TaGong.

Strands of Intensity

Going to Chengdu, and then on deeper into Kham, has substantially changed the nature of my trip. While I was in Xining, I was only nibbling at the edge of the Tibetan Plateau. Now I have moved on from there, I am seeing more and more of Tibetan culture, tradition, religion, architecture, politics; together with scenery that is just mind blowing. These have provided strands of experience which taken together provide a very intense experience.

The first and most obvious strand is my methods of communication. As I am getting more and more remote, my opportunities for hooking up with the internet are also shrinking. This is not helped by the fact that I have lost my international SIM card, and can think of no way in which a replacement card can be provided to me as I travel. I can now only communicate if there is a free Wifi connection - preferably broad band though this is not essential. In Xining, there were multiple Wifi servers - nearly one for every room. In Chengdu, free broadband wifi was available in all the public areas of the hostel. In Kangding, there was a Wifi broadband in the main public area. In TaGong the only connection available was based on a per megabyte charge, so the owners both had to charge (a fairly substantial 10Rmb per hour) and ensure that the connection was set up by them, and that no pictures, downloads, or videos were accessed. Here in Ganzi there is one place in town (a town of approx 65000) that offers free Wifi - and I am sitting in it, and staying here. Beyond here, I don't think there is a connection, until I retrace some of my future route. If this is correct there will be no more blog entries until I reenter the appropriate area, though I will still be writing them and storing them up for future publication.

Another obvious strand is transportation. The journey from Xining to Chengdu was soft sleeper, taking 27 hours. This is a (reasonably) fast, good quality service, that is efficient and punctual. Onward from Chengdu to Kangding was a nine hour bus journey, reasonably broken into stages by a stop for lunch and toilet purposes. The vast bulk of the trip was on high quality roads - comparable to a good single carriageway A road in the UK. As a result it was fairly quick, not massively uncomfortable, though the seats had been designed by a very perverted sadist. Onward, and downward. The journey to Kangding was a two and a half hour shared minivan cab. These are prevalent in this part of the world. Six of us shared this journey, which was in a newish van in good condition. These vans have six passenger seats, plus the drivers seat, plus a little fold away seat for an occasional seventh passenger. This particular one was comfortable and capable of taking all six of us plus all our luggage. Tagong to Ganzi was a slightly differnt matter. A nine hour journey, arranged by a local hostel owner, six of us tried to hire a van for the journey as we had done for the previous one. The driver agreed to the hire, and we agreed a cost, but the driver reserved the right to fill the seventh seat. In practice this meant that the foreigners had to use the jump seat, because the front passenger seat was reserved for whoever the driver got to fill the space. The minivan that turned up was slightly smaller in all dimensions than the previous one, and it was only with a major effort, and discomfort for the whole journey that we got all the luggage packed into the van. And so we set off. The journey started off crowded, but tolerable. At LuHuo, which is about the half way point, we were informed that that was as far as "our" van was going, and we would have to transfer to another van. This van was definately in much worse repair than any we had used up to that point; was smaller still than the one we had just got out of, and where the same arrangement applied to the jump seat - but this time the jump seat was supported by the internals of a cable reel, and the legs of the person behind it. Then for the latter half of the journey, which was all on roads being upgraded Chinese style. This involved driving through 125Km of road works (no nice diversions, or lanes closed off - you drive through the actual road works). This was ferociously uncomfortable; to the point that I had to stop the van after about three hours because it was so painful.

One of the strands that has changed intensity substantially is awareness of the application of governance in this area. In Xining the worst effects of the control mechanisms were when the regulations changed for getting into the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR). Suddenly a lot of backpackers; solo and couples travellers; mixed nationality groups were barred from getting tickets on the railway to travel to the TAR. Add in to this the sight one early morning of a military convoy, consisting of police cars; troop carriers; armoured cars with light cannon; and CCTV vans - vans with at least four cameras mounted on pylons, used when there is a disturbance to identify and control anybody who (in Chinese eyes) might be encouraging a disturbance by photographing it with a long lens, or a video camera. This convoy was obviously going somewhere a long way away. (I learnt later that it was probably joining the three other such convoys present in Lhasa on the day concerned). All in all not a big impact. In Chengdu, again the main impact was on travellers who were being prevented from entering the TAR - this time by air from Chengdu airport. I have an idea that this is the only airport that flies into Lhasa. There was also a response from hostels using notice boards to bring together groups of five plus individuals of the same nationality, to get round the current regulations. By the time I got to Kanding, the specific implications of travel restrictions were becoming visible and important. One of the towns accessible from Kangding is on the main route for travellers heading south. On one day, one of the guests in the hostel I was staying at went to buy a ticket for the following day, with no problem at all. The following day, a couple trying to do the same thing were refused bus tickets at the ticket office, because foreigners were not allowed to visit that town. The owners of the hostel were spending a good deal of time advising people what routes to take, to try and avoid trouble. In TaGong, there was not much overt control in place; except for the armoured column going through (a smaller one than spotted in Xining) at about five in the evening - and they weren't messing. They were travelling fast, and appeared to be going somewhere local. The journey to TaGong was a very different matter. First it was deliberately routed through DaoFu (DaWu) in order to avoid going through DanBa (Rongtrak). DanBa has been a site of several protests, including several immolations. The first check point we came to the driver appeared to lie to get us all through the check point, though in fact he told the police that he was going to the point where we changed cars, because his permits only allowed him to go that far. The second check point was in DaoFu. This is very heavily policed - there are multiple police stations; police staging areas; vehicle yards, where some of the specialist vehicles are stored (armoured cars; CCTV vans; control vans; troop buses); many police; and a checkpoint. Here we were checked thoroughly - our passports taken away and checked for a long time (all except the sole Israli on board, whose passport was returned instantly). We were sitting in the van in the sweltering heat; being captured on CCTV, while the driver was questioned at length (though because this was taking place some way away, they might have been discussing the weather). Scary. Here in Ganzi, all routes out of town have to be checked before they are taken - even if walking to a local monastery - to ensure they are open to foreigners. The hostel I am staying in took it as normal business that foreigners would be "registered" with the police, not in the normal fashion, but by payment to the local police officer.

This has turned out to be much longer than I anticipated, so my next blog will be part two.

And into Kham

Over the last few days I have visited some of the tourist sites of Kangding, including the museum, where I spent a happy hour or so talking to the museum owner/director, who had passable English; his brother and his sister, both of whom help him run the museum, but spoke only Tibetan; and a monk, who may or may not have been related to the rest, who also spoke only Tibetan. He was the second Tibetan, 1000km apart, to instantly recognise the name of Tulku Akong Rimpoche, and catalogue the superb work he is doing in this area, particularly in the field of education. I had not realised how famous Rimpoche Akong was. He is certainly very well known amongst Tibetans, and Kham Tibetans in particular.

I then travelled onto a small town called Tagong. This is very much Kham, the part of Greater Tibet I have seen least. It is just starting to be opened up for tourism, and is being marketed as the "Wild West of Tibet". Apart from the fact that it lies in the eastern part of Greater Tibet, this is quite apt. It is a nomad town, so the evening rush hour consists mainly of horses, both ridden, walked, and pack animals returning to Tagong, accompanied by men and women in traditional costume. I am staying in what is now a guest house, but which started life as a Tibetan woman opening her house to visitors. She only provides rooms, but all the rooms are the traditional fully painted panelled Tibetan rooms. There is one cafe/guesthouse run by an American which serves western food, one decent Chinese restaurant; one reasonable shop; and the rest is moderately dismal. I am starting to get really remote - the only way here is by one of the small communal hire minivans that act as a sort of taxi service here, but will only go any where when they have a full van.

DO NOT Release Back to the Wild

In current concerns for ecology and conservation it is easy to forget that there are some things that should not ever be released back to the wild. In my travels so far, I have encountered three such things.

The first, and probably the most insidious, but least vicious, is toothpaste. This normally makes its break for freedom in subtle stages. The first is nearly always into and onto the surface of a surrounding container. Toothpaste has a natural affinity for surfaces, but is especially at home in the interstices of a mesh surface. The second, and much more disturbing phase of such an escape, is when it makes the transition from the interior surface of the surrounding container fully into the wild. It is a much under appreciated fact that 2mg of toothpaste can cover the surface area of a small island, and all the flora and fauna that lives there. This is why such accidental releases (and nobody in their right mind would ever do this deliberately) are so harmful to the habitat. Imagine everything you touch, including the things you touch trying to wipe the toothpaste off, coated with a thin but unmistakable layer of toothpaste.

The next such escapee is far nastier, and much quicker acting. This is Deet, the insect repellant. In the UK this comes in a variety of strengths - I believe from about 10% to 50% - I have the strongest "Jungle" strength which is 50% w/w. Australian brands tend to be stronger and should be labelled (though they aren't) biological warfare defcon 1 through 5. The strongest I have seen on my travels was australian, and was 90%.

Anyway on many bottles of Deet, though not on my current one and not on the Australian one I have seen, there is a warning against using it on artificial fabrics. I had a squirt bottle, with a protective cap on it, in a waterproof stuff sack. Somehow during my trek, the protective cap came off; the squirter got pressed; and the top quarter of the stuff sack got sprayed. I discovered this on the penultimate day of the trek. The result was to cause the (artificial) fabric of the sack to partially melt; to stick to the other surface that had received a squirt; to shred the sides of the sack; and when opened to destroy both sides of the sack. (And by the way, you are supposed to apply this stuff to your skin to deter insects!)

This led to the first major rearrangement of my luggage since leaving England. When I got back to Xining, I had to empty the stuff sack; clean thouroughly everything that had been in it; and throw out the stuff sac. In the process, I determined that, even if I do more trekking, some of my cold weather clothing is now redundant, so in Kangding I have disposed of a fleece, a pair of fleece lined trousers, and a pair of heavily insulated gloves. These have gone to the owner of the hostel, who does a lot of climbing; is involved in the nascent mountain rescue effort in this area; and is involved in various Tibetan charities. He can put them to good use, and I don't have to carry them round Vietnam and other South-Eastern Asian countries.

Every guide book and source of information I have seen describing the Tibetan Plateau, has had a comment about the dogs on the plateau. 95% of all dogs on the plateau are owned, and are chained. This still leaves very large numbers that by one means or another are no longer captive. Dogs on the plateau are largely of two breeds. Both have been bred, and trained, to guard flocks of sheep, yaks, and nomadic camps. The smaller dogs are Chow sized, and look like Chows - they may even be Chows. Like their bigger relatives, they have a large ruff of fur on their neck protecting their head and neck. These dogs are intended to guard against wolves and foxes. The larger dogs are the Mastiffs. They are very much rarer, loose, than the Chows, partly because they are so valuable. There was a local report as I started trekking, that one of the golden mastiffs had been sold to a Eastern Chinese for breeding purposes for 1,000,000Rmb - about £100,000. These are huge dogs - they seem to come in two sizes - the black mastiff, which is the size of a Great Dane, though a very different shape; and the golden which is slightly larger than a lioness. These have been bred and trained to guard against the big predators - Snow Leopard; Himalyan Black and Brown Bears; and Man.

All the dogs, because of their breeding and training, are fiece and aggressive. The Chows will have a go at humans but are often deterred by making a stone throwing action. Those that are not deterred by this will usually be deterred if an actual stone is thrown at them. The larger dogs will attack humans, and are rarely deterred by stone throwing or stone throwing actions. They are capable of (at best) severly mauling a human, and (at worst) killing one. The recommended defense is to run away - their weak point is their stamina - they can only chase you for a very short period before running out of puff. This is done much easier if you are on a bicycle, than if you are on foot.

Anyway the recommended approach to where there are dogs barking is to ensure that you have one or two hand sized pieces of stone with which to threaten or to actually throw if it becomes necessary. I did this, and would do it again - it is the best (only?) way of dealing with the animals. However, this is the first time in my life I have ever made preparations to defend myself by potentially harming another being, and it felt very peculiar to be doing so. Fortunately the precautions were not needed, but if intent is relevant to a situation - and I think it is - I had the intent of possibly harming one of these dogs. Very uncomfortable.

All Train Journeys in China Last 24 Hours

Woken by a very loud American making his daily call home earlier than I had expected, but still about 06:30 - 20 minutes before I had to get up anyway. Finished packing, checked out, did my flashcards and waited. Taxi (private hire car) very early drove like a madman through heavy traffic. Through travel validation, with them not having the slightest interest in me. Into the scrum that is a Chinese queue to wait for 3/4 hour for the train to Chengdu.

The train line runs east of Tibetan Plateau and we are heading south. By 16:00 everywhere the train line went was green with lots of trees and lots of crops. The hills still a little mottled.

Train stopping for long periods at important places - Lanzhou - and apparently uninportant ones - such as a platform in a cutting; with no house or buildings visible. It is possible they were changing engines or adding an engine.

My Legs are Revolting

Our camp site was close to a spring regarded as blessed. Vehicles containing Tibetans, including monks, would stop while the occupants filled bottles with water from the spring. As a result it became both a place where there was on occasion a lot of traffic, and a lot of locals, all of whom were curious about us and spent time chatting and quizzing our driver and (eventually) our guide on these strange people who were in a fairly remote area of Amdo.

Part of the end of our trek was through very steep, wooded and rocky, vallies, following rivers; snaking backwards and forwards. The views were spectacular.

I only walked for two hours today, riding the rest of the way because my legs have decided to mutiny - they are not doing what I want them to.

Scrappy Day

A little poor planning struck this morning. The stove had been very difficult to light due to the rain clearing off from last night - it rained all night. In addition there was something of a wind, so trying to use the stove was using a lot of gas. We ran out of gas - someone had not weighed the cylinder before we set off. As a result breakfast was a non-event, and it was all a bit scrappy. We walked for a couple of hours to a Tibetan village, Here, our guide demonstrated that what he had been saying about Tibetan networking was true - he walked into someone's house, that he had never met before and took over the stove in order to provide us with brunch. This was not only regarded as normal, but so commonplace that it was unremarkable. We had our meal while the patriarch of the household, a 78 year old, crippled man, lay on his bed sewing prayer flags onto the cord that would hold them up when they were in position on a stupa or mountain or pass.

This village did show evidence of development Chinese style - a complete row of brand new shops and apartments standing complete, but empty. Obviously developed as a speculative opportunity which has not yet paid off. This all in a tiny village about 70K from the nearest towns.

I was feeling both better than yesterday, and simultaneously, less able to walk. I managed only about four hours out of the eight intended for today, before having to take a ride from the driver who had been staying in a local town; and who was called in to provided us with a new gas cylinder and to act as my chauffeur.

Most notable wildlife features of the day was watching eagles soaring overhead, and spending time with the driver, once we got to our campsite ahead of the others, watching marmots fighting, displaying, mating, and playing.

I am learning a lot from this attempt at a kora, and will probably be able to write many blogs on the basis of it.

It's All Downhill From Here

Today was the day things were going downhill metaphorically and literally. We have been walking down hill for much of today, though in total we have not lost more than about 400m.

There have been two occasions on which I have sun burnt. The first was on the eighth day of working as a student in a market garden, bent backed in the direct sunshine for 10 hours a day. The back of my neck got slightly sun burnt. The second occasion was today, but rather than a slight sunburn, I have burnt my forehead, nose, and the backs of both hands. I suppose I must accept that it is possible for me to sunburn. It has taken two long days of being out in direct, high altitude sunshine, but I can burn.

Then I started to have problems walking. About a month before I left England my doctor diagnosed me as having Plantar fasciitis in one foot. This wonderful sounding diagnosis seems to mean "your foot isn't working properly". One of the recommended ways of dealing with it is rest. Then about four days later, at the start of March, is when I had the fall that very badly strained the same foot. Well, an obvious course of treatment is to go high altitude trekking in fairly tough terrain. I started having problems with both aspects of my foot, but could live with this. Unfortunately these plaints caused me to walk oddly, which in turn meant my muscles, tendons, and cartilages were acting with odd strains and stresses on them. In turn over the course of a day or two this meant my muscles going into spasm from achilles tendon to groin. It is very difficult to walk under these conditions, and I found it impossible to walk at more than a snail's pace (almost literally). As the afternoon wore on someone offered me a lift in a pickup truck to our eventual campsite. I accepted this because it was becoming impracticable for me to continue walking.

All this came after a lot of high-falutin' thought about what a Kora was, and what benefit one could get from it, and how the benefit accrued.

  Anyway whilst preparing the meal, some of the very rare gazelle, specific to this area showed up. I show the three (yes there are three in this picture) we watched and photographed for some time. Don't think too badly of the quality of this shot - it was taken on my longest lens, hand held, and the image shown here is a small centre section of the overall picture. They were very wary of us, even though they were a very long way off, so the wonder is not that the quality is so poor, but that there is an image at all.

Silence is Snow Coloured

Plant and animal life on the Tibetan Plateau is very sparse, but highly varied. On the run in to our campsite last night, we saw marmots contesting, displaying, and just going about their lives; a number of small hamsters with grey fur turning to greenish on their backs, with little black and white collars; a small gazelle; two foxes; two buzzards; and a large number of small birds.

This does have implications when trekking, particularly if on one's own, as I was for much of the day. The day is completely silent, except for the very occasional sound of the odd small bird; the even more occasional sound of the odd insect - mainly solitary bees; and (when getting within half a mile of human habitation) dogs barking. But mostly silence. It is difficult to imagine just how deep the silence is until you have experienced it. There is no sound.

This was particularly the case today because this is a very slow group: normally I am one of the slowest in a group (and usually THE slowest) but this time I am the fastest - just a question of keeping going and not stopping.  It did mean I was walking by myself for much of the time. Add in glorious sunshine; high altitude; no wind; snow covered mountains - what more could one ask for?

We only covered 16Km in 7 1/2 hours, so it was pretty slow - though we did have a 1K ascent to a pass at 4600m. We are camped just below the the pass which was the first time I have seen a golden stupa.

Overnight and this morning I had slight effects of the altitude - very minor headache; sinusitis; and mouth and throat very dry. The bottle of pee I generated during the night, froze solid (estimated temperatures -8oC).

This picture captures everything about why I am doing what I am doing.

Amnye Machen

Finally set off for the trek part way round Amnye Machen - one of the Buddhist Great Protectors. I have been looking forward to this as one of the highlights of my entire trip, though I realised as some point that there is only one thing that can make this a highlight, or a disaster for that matter, and that is me. I finally got to meet the people I will be trekking with at the offices of the travel agency on Saturday, together with the guide for the trip. We sorted out the itinerary; some of the equipment being supplied by the travel agency, including measuring me in one of the sleeping bags to ensure that it was long enough. We then chatted and agreed to meet on Sunday in order to purchase the food for the trip. (This is one thing that I have found odd, compared to other things I have done - the trip (and ones like it here) all expect the food to be purchased by the participants, with aid from the guide.

On Sunday, four of us were traipsing round a Chinese "Life Style Market". In essence this is a supermarket, but a big one and one that is well up market for the Chinese market. We bought fruit, both fresh and dried; an absolutely huge loaf (that was to survive all six days of the trek, and there was still about 45% of it left); various sausages; noodles; rice; biscuits; custard buns, chinese style; and a whole range of vegatables - spring onions, chinese green leaf, cucumbers; and a large variety of sauces - soy, spicy, and so on.

On Monday it all kicked off. Though the organisation was well up to what I have come to expect from Tibetan organisations - everything gets done, but it's never clear by whom, or how. The driver (of a Toyota Land Cruiser, what else) picked me up, but managed to leave at my hostel, the representative of the travel agency. She then had to take a taxi to her offices, but had no money, so had to borrow off the driver of our vehicle. We then took all the equipment from the office - cooking equipment, tents, gas cylinders, insulating mattresses, sleeping bags, blankets, all the food we had bought - plus the equipment of the couple I was going to be trekking with from their room in the hotel. We also left in the offices the surplus equipment of the couple (a German couple Lena and Sheng (he being German-Chinese)).

Then everything loaded into the 4x4 which with five of us, plus all the equipment we had, completely filled the vehicle.

Truck stop - Tibetan style

Then we set off on a typical journey in this part of the world to get to Amnye Machen. First of all a drive of about 600Km on fairly decent roads, though most of them were single lane. Then a drive of about 50Km on what might be considered a reasonable rural farm road - it was not essential to have a 4x4, but without one, drivers would have to be very cautious. Then into a small Tibetan town to meet our horseman, who was supplying the horses and the yaks for the trek. The last 15Km to where the horseman's family were camped did need a 4x4 - and even a land cruiser was taking it very gingerly. The family is a nomadic one, with a large number of yak, a motor cycle, and a large number of dogs.

We had a meal, socialized with the family, and then erected the tents and went to bed.