emilyonearth

When you read this, I’ll likely be either in an airport, on a plane, or already back home. The last two weeks have been crazy travel weeks, doing some pretty cool stuffs to celebrate my last two weeks in Asia.

The journey began in Chengdu, Sichuan Province, where we spent a couple of nights. The main attraction here was the Panda Breeding Centre, but it was also a necessary stop to pick up our Tibet permits. We really only had one day, as we arrived late on Sunday and left early on Tuesday, so spent most of out time visiting the pandas and wandering a bit in the city. I have approximately 3 billion photos of pandas, so I’ll try to limit myself.

Next stop, Lhasa! And our first “at altitude” destination, as it’s 3650m above sea level. As I’m sure we all know, the Tibet situation is still somewhat controversial, and so to enter Tibet as a non-Chinese visitor, you must have a travel permit. To gain this travel permit you must have a guide throughout your time in Tibet, and so we were part of an eight day tour, travelling overland to Nepal from Lhasa. We were in Lhasa for 3 days to begin the acclimatisation process, and have a wee look around the city.  Although temperature-wise it wasn’t as hot as Shenzhen, the sun was super strong, and the heat seemed almost as intense. We visited a few monasteries, wandered around the city centre, and generally tried not to get too short of breath.

After Lhasa we were on the road, passing through Gyantse, Shigatse and Tingri, along the way visiting monasteries, stupas, Yamdrok Lake, and Karola Glacier. Each day we were driving around 5-7 hours, and reached altitudes above 5200m. The altitude meds definitely helped, but had the odd side affect of inducing pins and needles in your extremities which was a bit odd at times. They seem to have pretty strict speed limits in Tibet, and also reasonable regular police checkpoints. To enforce the speed limit they don’t have speed cameras or police out on the roads like most other places seem to. Instead, they calculate what time you should arrive at the next police checkpoint (all of which you need to check in at to show permits etc), and then you get fined if you arrive too early, as that would mean you have been speeding. Does this stop speeding then? Of course not. Drivers, including ours, go at their own pace, and then stop a couple of minutes away from the next checkpoint for 15-20 min, or however long they need, and then once they’ve wasted enough time, carry on to the checkpoint in the appropriate time. Interesting system haha. Some of the views along the way were gorgeous, though photos through a car window unfortunately don’t always come out the best.

From Tingri, next stop was Everest Base Camp, a nice change a I was feeling a bit monasteried-out by now. To say the ride was bumpy would be a gross understatement, and the 100km drive took approximately three hours (a very pretty 3 hours, though). It was pretty cloudy when we got there, so no Everest views yet. we got set up in the tent we were to be staying in, had some lunch, a wee walk around, some people had a nap or read or just hung out. Later on in the evening the clouds moved a wee bit and we got our first glimpse of the tip of the mountain. We went to bed that night with plans to get up and see the sun rise, but again it was all cloudy. Lucky for us though it cleared up pretty quickly and after making our way up to the second base camp we had some lovely lovely views. Then, in the late morning it was back on the road, headed to Zhangmu, the border town next to Nepal. It was a crazy wee town down the side of a pretty steep slope. Don’t think I have any pics from there though, as we arrived late and left early the next day.

And so then I left China for the final time (on this trip, at least), and hopped over the Zhangmu-Kodari crossing into Nepal. Our whole tour group (eight of us) squeezed into a car that we had organised the night before, and headed Kathmandu way before heading our own ways, and this is where I spent my last few days before heading back to Hong Kong, and then New Zealand. To be honest Kathmandu was a rather lazy time. I wasn’t feeling so well for a couple of days, and it was hot (and unlike my place in China, no Air Con in our hostel :( ), and there was so much going on it was all very overwhelming! On our first night we met up with the rest of our tour group in a bar to say our goodbyes, and the next morning headed out to Pashupatinath Temple, apparently one of the more important Hindu temples out there, and also the site of about 75% of Kathmandu’s cremations. They were just setting up a cremation when we arrived, and so we were able to watch from the other side of the river. This may seem quite a strange thing to do, and it did seem quite weird at the time too, but we were assured that we were not intruding (there were people hanging over the sides of buildings to watch etc) and that photos are ok and everything. Quite strange. Had a look around the site of the temple too, although we weren’t allowed in the main religious parts, as they’re only open to Hindus. Next day the morning was spent hiding in the hostel, and a quick look around Thamel (the area of town we’re staying in) in the afternoon. I wasn’t really in the mood for shopping, too overwhelming, but I found a Crunchie bar!!. Ariel also went home that night, which was quite weird. On our third full day we almost ventured out to go and find the Boudhanath Stupa, Nepal’s largest stupa, but it started storming just as we were leaving, and after standing outside in the rain for about 15 seconds we decided to try again another time. Another time never really came though, as Alicia left the next morning and the taxi driver I found to take me there got lost somehow and ended up taking me to the other side of the city, at which stage I was frustrated and over it so I gave up haha. I did make it to Durbar Square though, where the old royal palaces are. Finding my way there was interesting, and I’d probably rather not know what fort of stuff I was walking through haha. There was some sort of celebration happening in the city, and everyone was dressed up in pretty clothes, and there were decorations in the street. Once I found it I had a wee walk around, and a look in the museum there with an American guy I met at the ticket office. On my way back to the hostel I got well and truly lost, though ended up seeing some parts of the city that I wouldn’t have seen otherwise, I guess, so it’s not all bad :D That was my last full day in Nepal though.

Now I’m about to head out to the airport. Have about a 6 hour layover in Delhi, then 12 hours in Hong Kong during which time I’ll have to blow the rest of my Hong Kong Dollars to get to HK Island and pick up the rest of my luggage, then back to the airport, repack all my stuff so it’s under wight limits,  grab some dinner, and then fly back to NZ! Seems very strange to be headed home.