Overland Trip from Lhasa to Kathmandu

Well as we mentioned we found two people from Portland, Oregon -- John and Kirsten -- to share a jeep ride with from Lhasa, Tibet to Kathmandu, Nepal. John and Kirsten are good friends who have been teaching English in Japan for the past three years. We clicked immediately and decided it must be something to do with the nature and personality of people from Oregon. What can we say . . . the overland trip was amazing. The first day was long (about 7 hours of driving) through absolutely beautiful scenery. We expected the Himalayan mountains to be snow-caped and green, but we found that the scenery (at least on the Tibet side) resembled eastern Oregon, very dry and desert-like. The driver's favorite cd was the best hits from Bryan Adams and the Backstreet Boys, but we quickly remedied that by tuning in some music from the iPod. Our first destination was Gyantse. On the way we were able to visit a beautiful lake. Since we never made it to Nam Tso Lake because the pass was covered with snow and ice on the day we wanted to visit, it was nice to actually see a turquoise lake on the high plateau. Most of the road was paved until we turned off the main road and was informed by our driver that we were taking a short-cut. Little did we know this was one short-cut of many to come. The short-cut involved 4x4ing through a dried up river bed. It did give us the opportunity to see lots of sand dunes and we wondered what it would be like to ride ATVs at 12,000 feet. Gyantse proved to be a nice town and we got to visit the largest stupa in China there. The next morning, it was only a short drive (1.5 hours) to Shigatse -- our second destination. In Shigatse, we visited the local monastery and walked the kora (the pilgrim circuit) which wandered up and around the monastery and across to the mini-potala palace. The pilgrim circuit was lined with prayer wheels and provided a beautiful view of the city. Day 3 things really got interesting. Our destination was Everest Base Camp. The main road started to get a little bit rougher and to mark pot holes, they use large rocks rather than cones or signs. We were coming up on a rock-marked hole and another vehicle was heading towards us. Normally, the downhill person yields to the uphill person but in this case, the oncoming truck didn't yield to us and we had to stop suddenly. We assumed our driver would continue but instead both vehicles stopped and then backed up so that the drivers were door to door. A few words were exchanged (of course, we had no idea what they were) and then suddenly our driver was inside their vehicle practically on the lap of their driver with a sword (not a knife cause it had a 12+ inch blade) against their driver's neck. We all just sat dumb-founded in the car like where the heck did he have that thing hidden. Our guide got involved and took away the sword so our driver took the other driver's keys and refused to give them back. In retaliation the other driver laid down in front of our car so that we couldn't leave with his keys. Its always interesting to see grown men act like kids. We decided we weren't going to let our driver continue driving until he had a smoke and cooled down. So we all got out of the car and continued to discuss what had just happened. Although we never knew the exact words which were exchanged, we knew that this was more than a mere "he cut me off while driving incident" You see our driver was Tibetan and other driver was Chinese. Need I say more. Once we turned off the main road, the road to Everest Base Camp got really, really, really rough. It was basically cross country on large river rock where I'm sure rivers flowed during the rainy season. This was 4x4 at its best. We got lucky, however, because Everest was absolutely beautiful when we arrived. There wasn't a cloud in the sky (above the mountain anyway). In the tents where we stayed, it was raining/snow mixed. That didn't stop the Oregonians. We jumped out of the car threw on our rain jackets and started walking toward the mountain. Pretty soon we walked right out of the storm. For the rest of the evening we watched the sun cast beautiful shadows on the mountain. So what can I say about Everest Base Camp on the Nepal side. Well we didn't actually camp where the expeditioners camp, we stayed in traditional Tibetan tents about 3 km from the actual base camp. The traditional Tibetan tents formed rows on both sides of the road and were named things such as Hotel California and Himal Friend Ship Hotel. Inside the tent was a stove (in the middle) where they burned yak dung and any other flamable material to heat the tent and boil water for tea and cooking. Around the edge of the inside of the tent were seats covered in cushins. During the day you sat around the edge and at night we slept around the edge. Our host was a really nice guy and his daughter who spoke little English. He loved Tony though and gave him at least five hugs per day. He also never let our tea get low and his daughter who did all the cooking made our beds and tucked us in at night. We stayed here for two nights. At night it got very cold (what do you expect at almost 16,000 feet of elevation) and we really appreciated the three very heavy blankets they put on top of us each night. At night you could also see an amazing amount of stars including the milky way. The stars made the middle of the night bathroom trips bearable. However we didn't dare use the actual bathrooms at night. In Tibet we learned that the world is your toilet and got very used to squating behind a rock or in a river bed during our road trip. Even if it was next to the road with no coverage. The reason we didn't use the actual bathrooms at night is because we were afraid of falling into the 10x10 hole which had been dug into the ground and then covered with very flimsy wood boards (they actually moved when you walked) with slits inside them. The whole thing was covered by a tarp/tent which had a hole cut into it for the door. However nothing held the door in place and so it blew in the breeze and anyone could look inside. It didn't really matter though because everyone shared the slits inside. There was absolutely no privacy so you just basically squatted for your morning poop along with everyone else. After this bonding moment, we realized why they call the road the friendship-highway. Our second day at Everest Base Camp was also clear and according to our guide (who had been to Everest 7 times and never seen the mountain before), we were very lucky. On our second day we hiked the 3km to actual base camp before playing games the rest of the afternoon and being tucked in again at night. On the final day of our journey, our desination was the China/Nepal boarder. First we had to travel the rough road back out from Everest Base Camp. After that we learned that the rest of the Friendship-Highway was not paved. That became the least of our worries. After crossing the last mountain range, the scenery totaly changed. We went from high desert plateau and a few snow covered mountains in the distance to lush green wet gorge. The road changed to and we suddenly found ourselves on the side of a very, very steep cliff. If you've ever driven the Going to the Sun highway in the US, this is worse, worse, worse. I was scared to death. The road was rough gravel and very muddy in places. There was no guard rail of any form and the drop was easily 500 feet. Of course, our driver drove this all the time so he just went for it. In places, the road was barely wide enough for one vehicle. Waterfalls ran across the road, rocks overhung our car and we drove through lord knows how many rushing rivers until everything came to a stop. Why? Landslide of course. These were very common on this road and apparently this one had just happened. We had seen evidence them already. Most of the time it looked like they just pushed the rock from the uphill side to the downhill side until the downhill side got packed enough to drive on. We waited about 2 hours for them to clear the landslide and then we were on our way again. Unfortunately after another hours or so we stopped again. Another landslide. As we sat in our car on this narrow road carved into the mountain, the crew worked 3-4 hours on clearing the landslide. You know how people say they will never forget the sound of something. Well we'll never forget the sound of dynamite going off less than 100 feet from us and echoing up the canyon. It got worse as it got dark and we all sat there wondering if we were going to have to spend the night on the road (although driving down in the dark wasn't appealing either). It was nerve racking sitting there for four hours wondering if the rocks beside the car or under the car were going to decide to give way too. Needless to say they finally clearned the road and we arrived at the boarder town about midnight. After being on the road for 15 hours we were exhausted and glad to hit the hay. The next day we successfully crossed into Nepal and I hate to be stereo-typical, but the moment we crossed the red line separating the countries, everything changed. The Nepalese people are very, very different from the Chinese and Tibetan people. Nepal resembles India. The architecture, the people, the dress, the cars, the roads, the scenery everything changed. It was quite an experience. We are now in Kathmandu preparing for our first trek . . . the Annapurna Circuit. Stay tuned for more adventures. Sorry we don't have any pictures. The Internet here is very slow. We hope to have them up once we reach SE Asia.