“We travel, some of us forever, to seek other places, other lives, other souls.” – Anais Nin
You’re going to miss the trepidation of landing in a foreign country, for which visas you’ve worked so hard to get now finally proving their worth, then searching for foreign cab drivers without knowing where to even begin looking for them (if they were even there in the first place) before walking across Palace Square for the very first time and coming upon the immense splendor of the Hermitage staircase as your first introduction to Saint Petersburg.
You’re going to miss dancing with fireworks among the thousands sprawled out into the night, popping open champagne on the streets while walking arm-in-arm an entire city along Nevsky Prospekt, before finding the only hookah bar open as you celebrate the beginning of a New Year and a new trip with complete strangers and new friends.
You’re going to miss the quiet snowy morning of having a world-class city still hungover from the night before all to yourself, the 15 miles of gallivanting in a single day to explore every corner and every house of worship, witnessing countless gilded mosaics of times past.
You’re going to miss making new friends at the eleventh hour just so you can say goodbye to them when walking together along a snowy wonderland of the Palace Square before embarking upon the beginning of your Trans-Siberian journey.
You’re going to miss making your beds in your new home on the train, ordering breakfast blinis and beer with the help of a good-looking local and his unapologetically intoxicated, inappropriate family, and playing Monopoly Deal to throwbacks from the 90s before waking up at the crack of dawn in a new city.
You’re going to miss hailing Ubers on an unfamiliar street and recovering in a new hostel on comfy couches for an hour while meeting a herd of faceless, local men on Tinder who would quickly invite us, unsurprisingly, all to their beds (you might not miss that).
You’re going to miss the 3 days of freedom among the dazzling lights of Moscow both above and underground, the odd pony on the street, the taste of cheap Soviet hot chocolate and gelato, the mummified corpse of Lenin, the grandeur of Red Square, double facing toilets, the views from Cathedral of Christ The Savior, the overabundance of powdery snow crunching beneath our boots, and saying goodbye to 3 friends on our last night together at the world’s 18th best restaurant, before running into 3 Swedes who we took out on the town as if the town was our very own.
You’re going to miss ignoring screaming babies on your overnight flight to Irkutsk, occupying an entire airport café, slowly waking up to your first Siberian winter morning and driving out into the wilderness to leave 6 days of urban jungles behind.
You’re going to miss sliding down makeshift ice luges, wandering a science museum dedicated to an entire lake, savagely devouring your first omul, hiking up the summit of a random ski resort, and taking in the majesty of the world’s 2nd deepest freshwater lake before your very eyes at sunset.
You’re going to miss figuring out which supplies to horde even though you order too much food anyway at another Chinese restaurant, before getting up too early in a hazy twilight to board your first 24 hours on the Trans-Mongolian Railway.
You’re going to miss driving out into Terelj National Park to spot ancient dinosaurs roaming the steppe, climbing over locked gates to get closer looks, riding Mongolian horses on your own into the horizon, finding common ground with a new friend who had also visited the DPRK, streaking together with new said friend from ger to ger, squatting over the world’s largest pile of frozen poo with nonchalance, starting impromptu massage trains, staying awake to your driver’s snoring nightmares, and learning how to keep a fire going in your stove in order to survive the night.
You’re going to miss restocking on supplies, not missing the alcohol, meeting friends of friends showing you around their native city and sharing their dreams of starting anew, drinking underappreciated beer at the local North Korean restaurant, before boarding your next overnight train for a night of excessive drinking games and embarrassing revelations.
You’re going to miss celebrating when your fellow monsooner gets accepted into Cambridge’s PhD program right before boarding your next train, then waking up hungover (again) in an ancient capital to mark the end of your Trans-Mongolian journey, storing bags away as you walk miles upon miles to see the Temple of Heaven and the Forbidden City before saying our next round of goodbyes to the 2nd round of monsooners to head back home.
You’re going to miss showing off your skills eating live scorpions (again) as appetizers before dining at the original Peking Duck House, and then leisurely making your way back to the train station just to have leisure make turn to panic when you discover you’re at the wrong one. And even though some of us make it to the correct train station on time, the others don’t quite get there as fast and we all ditch the train just so the group stays together and our newest addition gets a proper monsoon welcome, while leading us to temporary physical (and spiritual) shelter.
You many not miss the hurried bookings of hostels, flights, and car services to get to your destination in time, while doing your best to ignore the unhelpful backseat driver, but as they always say: when there’s a will, there’s a way. And when things begin to fall back into place, you’re definitely going to miss the exhilaration of your first real shower in days as the consolation prize, and the 4-5 hours of precious sleep in a real bed before getting on an early morning flight that takes you back to where you want to be, continuing the itinerary as before with no love lost among your group.
You’re going to miss setting eyes upon new friends of friends picking you up from the airport, the relief of getting back on track and in good hands before setting those same eyes on the Terracotta Army for the very first (or second) time.
You’re going to miss bar hopping along the South Wall, playing foosball, darts and pool that would lead to another underslept night before having to catch your second early morning flight, this time to an elusive kingdom on the roof of the world.
While you’re never going to miss the awful hangovers of altitude sickness, you will miss the initial landscapes upon driving into Lhasa — as if you’ve stumbled upon a new world — the majesty of its location in a valley 3500m high, and the next 2 days acclimating the home of the exiled Dalai Lama in the world’s most politically guarded region on its highest plateau.
You’ll definitely miss yak meat.
Tons of yak meat.
You’re going to miss sending off our beloved group storyteller with sensual oatmeal, naps, and Andrea Bocelli’s “Time To Say Goodbye” before heading out on “the other most beautiful drive in the world” from Lhasa to Shigatse, making a 9 hour drive feel like minutes when you stop to witness landscapes you couldn’t have imagined even in dreams.
While you’re neither going to miss lack of heating in your hotel room, nor the bundling up before bed, you will miss waking up to the golden honeycomb dawn of the “gateway to Everest”, immersing yourself amongst the throngs of pilgrims to visit the tombs of the Pachen lamas before returning to Lhasa.
You’re going to miss the last night of the trip walking along the streets of Lhasa with your new travel family, bidding last goodbyes among conversations that would bear one another’s souls on this nude beach of honesty and self-love, and the subsequent surreal early pre-dawn drive among the mountains when an inevitable realization emerged that a life-changing odyssey was about to end.
And you’re going to miss all this long after when we had embraced goodbye . . . that moment when you finally realize that nobody else for the rest of your life will ever fully understand the 18 unforgettable days you had spent with 10 other strangers and new lifelong friends.
Therefore you’re going to miss most of all, each other; the company of diverse personalities united by a perfect marriage of camaraderie and wanderlust, the way we’ll all look back one day and ask yourself: “did we really do all that?”
“Yeah we did.”
Having each overcome enormous physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual investments to get to this point, the 11 of us begin to appreciate how our shared experience on this 7000 km, 3400 mile endeavor would also represent a culmination of 11 different souls coming together – if only for a brief moment – in the belief in that we were really completing personal journeys long overdue . . .
. . . and yet if so they remain so premature, as 11 strangers and now travel family all know . . .
Although the photos near the bottom are of Lhasa at night, it would be a shame to not mention Shigatse in the brief few hours we were there.
Located 3860m (12,660 feet) above sea level where the oxygen content is 67% of that at sea level, Shigatse is the second largest city in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China after Lhasa, the traditional capital of the Tsang province, and is nicknamed “The Gateway To Everest.” It is set to be an important administrative and transportation hub between China, India and Nepal whenever the railway link among the 3 countries is completed (now 3 years behind schedule).
After coming from Lhasa on one of the most beautiful drives in the world yesterday, we turned in last night at our hotel with some decent garlic yak steak at the restaurant next door. They even let us take their food on their silverware and plates (with the help of some saran wrap), knowing that the hotel would return them back anyways.
The heating in our rooms didn’t work, so we all went to bed wearing most of our thermal layers and fleeces. In my case with my sore throat, fever and altitude sickness, I added on my balaclava and wool beanie. I literally went all ninja when I slept.
On the bright side, by the time we needed to wake up the next morning, I was already ready to go! “Calvin, wake up, we need to go.” “Well, I’m already all dressed up…”
The weather didn’t change that much when we drove out on a chilly Shigatse morning:
The main thing to see in Shigatse is Tashilhunpo Monastery, the traditional seat of the Panchen Lamas and the second-highest-ranking tulku lineage in the Gelukpa tradition.
Constructed in 1447 and covering a floorspace of 300,000 square meters, the monastery is the largest in western Tibet and bears the world’s largest gilded bronze Buddhist statue: the 22.4 meter high Maitreya Buddha.
Instead of the tall and grand complexes of Lhasa, the complex here is wide and long. Nevertheless, the Tibetans like being as elevated as possible, so a 5 minute climb up is still required once past the entrance:
Once inside, take your time wandering the open squares…
…linger around hidden corridors…
…and immerse yourself among the throngs of pilgrims here waiting to pay respects to the tombs of the Panchen Lamas…
Thanks to Shanika’s sneakiness with her phone, she was able to get even more great photos of the interiors (photography isn’t allowed, but not many were enforcing the rule). The next 16 photos are hers:
And the the 22.4 meter high Maitreya Buddha itself:
From the complex’s wide squares you can also get a great view of the rebuilt Shigatse Dzong (aka Shigatse Fortress), the site of where Mongol ruler Gusri Khan installed the 5th Dalai Lama as the supreme ruler of Tibet, before it became the residence of the Tsang governor.
The fortress was originally destroyed in 1961 after the 1959 Tibetan uprising and the Chinese Cultural Revolution. The Shigatse Dzong you see today was rebuilt in 2007 on a much smaller scale with the help of donations from the city of Shanghai.
It is sadly mostly empty now, with a small passable museum on Tibetan culture located somewhere inside.
After half a day at the complex we began our drive back to Lhasa, this time on a more direct, less scenic (but still beautiful) highway than yesterday’s drive. It took us about 5-6 hours to get back.
Once we returned to hustle and bustle of Lhasa, it felt like we returned home:
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
But once the night fell, Lhasa would transform into a quieter, calmer, and different city.
We highly recommend taking a night stroll from wherever you’re staying to Potala Palace, even if it’s in the middle of winter:
What country am I in again?
Oh, right.
After making 11 new friendships on this 3 week journey together across 7000 km and 4300 miles, it was finally time to say goodbye for the 5 of us left on this long, physically demanding and emotionally rewarding trip together. To celebrate — altitude sickness be damned — we bought some alcohol from the local supermarket and spent the wee hours of the night psychoanalyzing one another before hopping on a 7:30am taxi to the airport the next morning.
I was the first to go, boarding a 9:40am Tibet Airways flight to Chengdu and arriving 2 hours later on time. Once there and thanks to Amex’s Gold Delta Skymiles Card, I was able to snag 2 free China Eastern flights on First/Business class; one from Chengdu to Shanghai and a long-haul one from Shanghai to NYC. After 3 weeks leading a group of 11 awesome people, a near-miss with Xi’an, a week of sleep-deprivation, and 4 days of acute mountain sickness, I’d say some bougie R&R was sorely needed.
The check-in process already involves a dedicated, fancy lounge:
And the dedicated China Eastern First/Business class lounge at Chengdu wasn’t so bad either:
My flight from Chengdu to Shanghai Pudong:
They’ll take your order before take-off; I had a choice of beef, pork, or chicken with rice and some Pu-er tea:
I got my own dedicated vehicle to transport me from the plane to the airport after landing:
And my own dedicated entry for security:
Hung out at the dedicated China Eastern lounge at PVG airport:
As for the long-haul, 14 hour flight itself from Shanghai PVG to NY JFK, it’s a fully 180º reclinable seat with a complementary bottle of water, slippers, and pouch containing basic amenities such as an eye mask, toothbrush, hand lotion and hairbrush.
The TV pops out:
And they’ll feed you well, and often:
With service staff constantly checking up on you to see if you need anything to drink or if you’re hungry, it’s overall a great hard product. Although it’s no Emirates, it’s not a bad spend if you have about 50-80k miles on a SkyTeam airline.
This one come from Mihaela, who returned to Xi’an after the trip and just so happened needed to retrieve her lost FitBit:
How to get to Xi’an North bus terminal [from the airport]: First off – have yuan bc they don’t take credit. Once ready with yuan exchanged at an airport bank at a rate considered [at a level of physical assault] – leave airport and go across the street to the building with the buses sticking out to purchase your one-way ticket with no option for return.
Bus routes are displayed in Chinese and English. When you figure out which bus you need, attempt to speak to teller in english. Be prepared to be shuffled to other tellers who may or may not speak English. After you finally acquire your ticket go to the gate that is displayed on the board.
When you arrive to your gate, stare at the Chinese characters on the placard above the 3 separate lines that are associated with each gate. Slightly panic until you ask a bus terminal employee which line is your destiny. Finally, arrive at station.
p.s. Oh, and also offered 5 Mongolian Tugriks [equivalent to a fifth of a US penny] for part of my payment for the return ticket.
This one’s from JC; it just warms your heart to hear this:
In Chengdu, after missing my connecting fight and running back and forth between the equivalent of 4 miles between two terminals, a young Chinese Etihad airlines representative, went as far to stay two hours past her shift and ensure the airport hotel calls her to ensure my safety.
She let me sit in her office as I was soaked in sweat and panic she passed a water to me. I haven’t eaten in 16 hours. When I “thanked her so much”, she said, “don’t worry, I’m a good person”.
- At time of posting in Shigatse, China, it was -14 °C -
Humidity: n/a | Wind Speed: 10km/hr | Cloud Cover: clear
The highest elevation on the road from Lhasa to Shigatse just got served, taken by Taylan Stulting
I’ve been on many beautiful drives before, most notably from Argentina to Chile, and the drive from Srinagar to Leh but today’s from Lhasa to Shigatse is now climbing the charts, and we’re still on the road.
We set out from Lhasa this morning at 9am, stopping by at the following vistas within the first few hours:
Wow.
Wow.
Wow.
I can keep going.
Don’t stop there.
Hnnnngggg….
Eventually after a couple of twist and turns, we reached an elevation of 4500m:
At around 1pm we stopped by for lunch at this ghost town of a city, where it was very evident someone wanted to remind everyone what country they’re in:
After lunch we headed out to see gorgeous Lake Yamzho Yumca/Yamdrok Lake, 1 of the 3 largest sacred lakes in Tibet:
What I thought of the views:
But seriously, being here has been pretty awe-inspiring:
After an hour’s more along the drive, you’re reach the highest elevated point at 5000m (16,404 feet) above sea level:
At around 4pm we stopped by Pekor Chode, built in 1418 as a non-sectarian Buddhist center:
Inside the center:
Standing at 32.4m high, the Great Stupa Kubum holds 108 altars where 100,000+ Buddhist images are enshrined as statues and murals:
Climb up the 5 flights for great views at the top:
After about 10 hours on the road from Lhasa, we finally arrived in Tibet’s 2nd largest city of Shigatse at around 7pm.
- At time of posting in Lake Yamzho Yumco, it was -14 °C -
Humidity: 22% | Wind Speed: 22km/hr | Cloud Cover: clear
Despite getting my first 8+ hour night of sleep in probably over a week, I nevertheless woke up with symptoms of acute mountain sickness (a slight fever, headache, dry mouth, not unlike a hangover). So I doubled up on my Diamox from 125mg to 250mg twice a day accompanied by 600mg of Ibuprofen. Along with a little bit of breakfast, this started to get me feeling better in 30 minutes.
Then we climbed up to the top of our hotel for an 8:30am breakfast and accompanying views over Lhasa at sunrise and moonfall.
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
Our first stop of the morning was the top site in Lhasa: Potala Palace.
Originally built in the 7th century AD by King Songtsen Gyalpo for his 2 foreign wives, it was destroyed by lightning many years later before being rebuilt by the 5th Dalai Lama in 3 years, with subsequent extensions leading up to the 13th Dalai Lama to transform the palace into what it is now. It remains officially the winter residence for the Dalai Lamas (and their tombs), with the palace in Norbulinka as their summer residence.
Over 300 steps and 14 stories tall, there are a lot of stairs to climb — Don’t be stupid like me and make sure you are fully acclimated to the altitude before taking this on!
I’ve been wanting to come here for years, so I milk my time here.
The Chinese make sure you remember which country you’re in:
We begin our climb:
Once you reach the floor of the White Palace, photography from here on out is forbidden.
The “14th floor” marks the official residence of the Dalai Lama:
We tried our best to give an idea of what it looks like inside given that the no-photography rule is strictly enforced, but this is the best we could come up with:
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
After spending an hour touring the dizzying array of prayer rooms, residences, meeting halls and tomb chambers of the past Dalai Lamas, we headed back down on the backside of the palace.
We then drove onwards to Norbulingka Summer Palace: the official summer residence of the Dalai Lama with the most recent complex being that of the present and 14th Dalai Lama who fled in exile in 1956.
Photography is also not allowed inside, but enforcement was much more lax here than at Potala Palace:
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
Near the exit stands the official (and yet unused) throne of the current and 14th Dalai Lama:
And if you look closely on the left wall (if facing the throne) is the only photograph of the 14th Dalai Lama allowed to be posted in Tibet:
We recharged with lunch consisting of yak steak, momos, Schezuan noodles at Lhasa Steakhouse:
Our last stop of the day was Sera Monastery, famous for its tantric teachings and the public display of monks who debate with one another in public.
Inside are the mandalas composed of the famously elaborate Tibetan sandpainting:
By the main Sera Monastery is a public park where standing student monks debate intensely over their teachers sitting on the ground, both challenging each other on different ways of thinking and seeing the world:
Then there is the monastery itself, where about 800 monks train and meditate:
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
Afterwards, Melissa and Shanika headed out to a local supermarket next door to hunt for postcards and came back with some great photos. All of the following are Shanika’s:
Tonight is Melissa’s last night as we recuperate in our hotel rooms and reflect on our trip in the past 2 weeks. We’re going to miss you Melissa!
- At time of posting in Lhasa, China, it was -3 °C -
Humidity: n/a | Wind Speed: 6km/hr | Cloud Cover: clear
Struggling with 3 consecutive nights of 5 hours of sleep each night, we all got up again at a ridiculous 5:15am to catch a 5:30am car service to take us to the airport for a 7:40am direct flight from Xi’an to Lhasa. The Xi’an airport was unexpectedly crowded, so I would advise arriving an hour or two earlier as we all almost missed our flight.
While at check-in, security, and just when you arrive, you’ll be asked to produce your Tibet permit. Ours is pictured below.
You can easily get a Tibet permit if you sign up for an official tour with a guide, which is what we did. The reality we got instead in Tibet was a lot of free movement without our guide constantly watching us.
I once again passed out on my flight, waking up 3 hours later when we landed at Lhasa at 10:50am. I was so happy to have finally arrived here after a rough past 48 hours, that this then happened:
Enjoy the scenery of what seems like stepping into another world:
After showing our permit again to finally exit the airport proper, we were picked up by our guide Kendan before taking the one hour drive to Lhasa from the airport.
Lhasa is a bustling, congested mass of humanity set against a gorgeous valley backdrop on an elevation of 11,995 feet, for which we’ve been popping acetazolamide (Diamox) 125mg every 12 hours since yesterday as a prophylaxis for altitude sickness.
The regimen for altitude sickness prophylaxis with Diamox is to start taking it twice a day before ascent and for 3 more days afterwards. Besides the occasional increased urge to pee as one of the side effects of this carbonic anhydrase inhibitor and diuretic, so far we’ve been doing okay — some headaches, bouts of nausea and dizziness but it was nowhere as bad as how we felt when we arrived in La Paz 4 years ago.
We first settled in our digs at Yak Hotel, located in the eastern part of Lhasa where more ethnic Tibetans live as opposed to the predominantly Han Chinese of western Lhasa:
We then walked towards Barkhor Square, the beginning of Lhasa’s oldest street (Barkhor Street), where we had lunch at Lhasa Kitchen:
Yak meat, momos, garlic ginger tea, it’s all here!
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
After lunch, we crossed through a round of security checks to get to Jokhang Temple, arguably the most important temple in Lhasa — The king Songsten Gampo built Jokhang Temple during the era of the Tang Dynasty to welcome his Chinese wife, Princess Wencheng, allowing for the the union of Tang China to Tubo Tibet.
We passed by the hundreds of worshippers in front of the temple:
Once you enter it’s a quiet haven of calmness remarkably different from the outside.
Photography is forbidden inside, but enforcement of such rules was pretty lax:
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
Climb to the top of the temple to get your first look at Potala Palace in the distance:
…and the square below:
Afterwards we decided to take it easy for the rest of the day, walking around Barkhor Street for some haggling (genuine Tibetan goods that cannot be found anywhere else in the world are sold here) and people watching:
Now having dinner with yak meat at a hole in the wall tonight before we turn in and allow for our first night (hopefully of many) of full, restful sleep:
Photo Credit: Shanika Jayakody
- At time of posting in Lhasa, China, it was -1 °C -
Humidity: 18% | Wind Speed: 13km/hr | Cloud Cover: partly cloudy
It was a nail-biting 5 hours of booking last minute hostels, flights, and a 5am car service after our group missed our overnight train from Beijing to Xi’an by a frustratingly mere minute. We ended up at Chinese Box Hostel for the night where we pulled off 4 hours of sleep before getting on a 5:30am taxi to take us on a one hour’s drive to Beijing’s airport for 8:50am direct flight to Xi’an.
I was so exhausted I literally passed out on the entire flight until landing at 10:50am.
When I saw John McGovern — my local contact from YPT (and mutual friend of my travel brother Gareth) — and his local new guide, Estela, waiting for us at arrivals, it was a sight for awfully sore eyes.
Big hugs ensued and we began our hour’s drive to the Terracotta Army.
When you arrive, there are officially 4 pits at the site, 3 of which are open for tourism. Pit 1 is the most impressive, featuring the actual army of 8,000+ life-sized, individualized bronze warriors (no 2 are alike!) that were built one by one to accompany China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang, in the afterlife.
HIs mausoleum nearby remains unopened, due to the fear of ruining what would be inside once exposed to Xi’an’s dry air.
One of our travelers, I won’t say who, took my telephoto lens to prove a point that even the derrières of each soldiers were unique…and shapely.
PIt 2 and Pit 3 are less visually impressive as they’re meant to show what the pits looked like before the warriors were uncovered:
After about an hour here, this then happened:
We then returned to main Xi’an City where we had lunch at a famous Xi’an chain known for their cold noodles.
These noodles were spot on, and so was the rest of the food:
During lunch, I got my shattered lens filter (I had dropped it back in Ulaanbaatar while rushing to the train station) replaced and the sensor of my camera body cleaned within an hour for only $120 USD. It would’ve cost 5 times more back home!
We then checked into our hostel located right by South Wall:
…before heading out again to walk by gorgeous Bell Tower marking the center of the city.
A few meters over is the equally impressive Drum Tower:
By the Drum Tower are the Muslim Quarters, which will dazzle you with its frenetic energy, lights, and surprising genuineness (this isn’t a tourist trap y’all, this is the real deal). Every stall, every person, every bit of food, every snack, every dessert, and everything you can buy here is uniquely Muslim Chinese and halal.
This was my favorite part of Xi’an.
Shanika took a few neat collages, which aptly sums up the energy here:
We had a quick dinner in one of the restaurants along Muslim Street, where we prepared a dish by communally breaking apart this “bread,” of which the pieces then magically turned into noodles when soup was added.
Whoever invented the noodle, I believe Xi’an has perfected it.
After dinner we headed back to South Wall to drink at the many bars there.
After a bit of pub crawling we turned in at 11pm to catch out 7:40am flight to Tibet tomorrow.
Photo credit: JC
- At time of posting in Xi'an, China, it was 5 °C -
Humidity: n/a | Wind Speed: 6km/hr | Cloud Cover: clear
