Travelling to Tibet

Previous page - Travelling to Nepal

 

Driving Through Tibet

Our Nepali guide will drop us off at the Friendship Bridge, we will walk across and then be met by our Tibetan guide who will accompany us for the long journey into Lhasa. We will have a guide and a driver and will be in a four-wheel-drive for the journey. The driving days are long but we won't be covering a huge amount of terrain. The roads are quite bad and driving is a slow business in Tibet. For example on day 1 we need to travel 156 kilometres but it will take 6 - 8 hours to do this.

The first few days in Tibet will find us in the southern parts of the country. From the time of crossing the border into Tibet, It will take us 3 days to reach Everest Base Camp. We understand accommodation is these areas is very basic and I think that is putting a positive spin on it. We can expect cold bedrooms, a lack of hot water and intermittent electricity. We've been told some toilets are outdoors. We've read other people's blogs and some tell of bed linen that is not clean, windows with holes in them that let icy gales blast into the rooms and insufficient blankets. Lets hope that the blogs were old and that things may be a tad better when we get there. If nothing else it will be memorable.

We are expecting the most fabulous scenery. On day 2 we will travel over the highest plateau in the world - no wonder they call this area the roof of the world!

We will be visiting Everest Base Camp but we are not doing any trekking. We are more interested in the scenery, the social side of life, the food and all the unique buildings we will see, especially monasteries.

After seeing Everest Base Camp we continue our journey on to Lhasa. We will see the turquoise Lake Yamadrok and cross the Brahmaputra River, amongst other spectacular sights.

 

Visiting Lhasa

As per Tibetan law we must have a guide with us when touring around Tibet. The exception is that you can wander by yourself when in Lhasa, the capital, but even so, you can't wander too far away. Plus, you can't go on public transport by yourself. When our long drive comes to an end in Lhasa we have a couple of days there to unwind and see such things as the Potala Palace (I think there is mention of 900 steps here!) and the Sera monastery.

 

Leaving Tibet

We will fly back to Australia from Lhasa via China Eastern Airlines into Singapore and then with Qantas from Singapore into Perth.

We will have been in Bhutan for 8 days, Nepal for 9 days and Tibet for 8 days.

 

Itineraries for the Himalayan holiday

Over the next three pages I will give you our itineraries for Bhutan, Nepal and Tibet.

Next page - Our itinerary in Bhutan

 

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