It had been a long day on the road when we finally arrived in Shigatse, the second largest city of Tibet, just in time for one of the included meals on our tour. We were booked in for a Tibetan style hotpot and a cultural performance as entertainment. There was a huge variety of vegetables and meat in the hotpots, and it was all delicious. Probably worth mentioning that by this point I had already given up on my idealistic vegetarian lifestyle. I was finding it far too difficult to avoid eating meat in Tibet / China, it seems that vegetarianism is very uncommon here, and combined with the language barrier and confusing menus it seemed impossible. I had gone over a month without eating any meat, and it felt good, so I will definitely revisit it again once we are finished travelling. This meal was also the first time Alice had drunk alcohol in 3 months, thanks to the included beers! The friendly waitresses were very interested in us (note from Alice - especially interested in Josh) and spent lots of time smiling at us and hanging out around our table. At the end of the night while we were enjoying the cultural performances, one of the waitresses told me to come with her, and when I asked her “Where am I going?” she responded “No English, just go!”. So I found myself standing on the stage with three Tibetan musicians who were rapidly strumming their instruments while singing and dancing. In front of a packed Tibetan restaurant I struggled to keep up with the fast paced dance, while the crowd cheered at, laughed at, and filmed me. 

The next morning we woke up bright and early to go and walk Kora around the Tashi Lhunpo Monastery which we were scheduled to be visiting at 8:30am with the rest of the tour group. This monastery is historically and culturally important in Tibet, founded in 1447 by the first Dalai Lama, it is the traditional monastic seat of the Panchen Lama.

Kora is the meditative act of walking clockwise around a sacred site, such as a monastery, stupa, or even a mountain, often accompanied by mantras such as the auspicious Om Mani Padme Hum, and the spinning of prayer wheels. The clockwise movement mirrors the sun's path and the movement of stars across the Tibetan sky (symbolising harmony with the cosmos) and the circular path represents the cycle of rebirth (samsara) and the path to breaking free from it. The belief is that each circuit done with the intention of helping others erases collective karmic debt, and purifies the soul. Kora is practiced daily by Tibetan Buddhists usually early in the morning and in the evenings. It was a really beautiful experience to join such a peaceful and meditative Tibetan tradition at such an important (and beautiful) monastery.

We met the rest of the group at the entrance and started our tour of the monastery. It was a really beautiful place, but very busy with lots of Chinese tour groups visiting. We were on a timer as there was a lot planned for the day, so after a quick tour we were back on the road again, next stop Gyantse. This small town between Shigatse and Lhasa is home to the stunning Palcho monastery and the imposing Gyantse Fortress (which was actually conquered by the British in 1903 during a British expedition to Tibet). This monastery is home to the largest and most famous Kumbum in Tibet (this is a multi-storied stupa-like structure you can walk up). This structure was very beautiful and intricate, and we were allowed to climb up to the top level for panoramic views of the monastery and the fortress on the hill. Unfortunately, most of the statues in the Kumbum were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution in China, and have been replaced by clay replicates which lack the artistic merit of the originals.

After a quick lunch break for some noodles and coffee we were back on the road again. The landscape in Tibet is so beautiful and we were totally in awe as we looked out the windows of our van. We passed over multiple 5000m+ mountain passes, all of which have smooth roads with endless switchbacks that would put the Crown Range in New Zealand to shame. We stopped on one of the scenic mountain passes to admire a magnificent glacier, and Yeshi confirmed for us that just like everywhere else in the world this glacier has also retreated much in recent years. 

Our next stop was at a lovely Tibetan family home on the forefront of the picturesque Yamdrok Lake (one of the three largest lakes in Tibet), for a delicious home cooked dinner. This lake is one the sources of the Yarlung Tsangpo river which flows through Tibet into India and Bangladesh where it is known as the Brahmaputra. China has just started construction on what will be the world's largest dam on this river in Tibet, costing an estimated 167.8 billion US dollars. The electricity produced by this dam is estimated to be enough to power the entirety of the UK with room to spare, but has also sparked significant environmental, geopolitical, and humanitarian concerns. We had already seen early indicators of this with the incredible infrastructure and feats of engineering to literally pave highways over numerous 5,000m plus mountain passes! After our delicious dinner with the lovely Tibetan family by the lake, we all hopped back in the van for a final drive through to Lhasa accompanied by loud car Karaoke to ABBA. It had been a long and incredible day filled with such beautiful scenery, awe inspiring monasteries, and so much kindness from the lovely Tibetan people.