by Nick
Today began with the four of us loading our rucksacks into the Landcrusier for the long journey towards Mt. Everest Base Camp.
After departing from Shigatse, Tibet’s second biggest city, we drove for approximately 4hrs until we reached Sakya Monastery. This monastery was significant due to the fact that it is the oldest monastery in Tibet and survived the Cultural Revolution. The monastery follows the Tantric sect so over the next hour we wondered around the various dark and grim chapels full of protector deities and more chanting monks.

by Lianna
On Saturday we departed Lhasa for the rest of our Tibet tour. Leaving early in the morning we drove for about 6 hours with stops along the way to take pictures. The most amazing stop was when we stopped to see Yamdrok lake. The lake and rivers in this area look like turquoise paint was poured into them, or as I said it looks like really thick blue Kool-Aid.

After our train journey the day before, our group of four decided we would spend our morning strolling around the back alleys of the Barkhor area of Old Lhasa. The streets smelled of yak butter and incense while hordes of pilgrims shuffled along the main Kora around Jokhang Temple known as the spiritual heart of Lhasa.

Alleyways are shared with an endless number of vendors selling everything from relgious artifacts to tacky english t-shirts shouting whatever English they may know as we walked by.

We boarded our second 24 hour train ride, this time to Lhasa! Our journey to the Himalayas had begun.

The train from Xining to Lhasa leaves in the evening so that the boring scenery passes by while you’re asleep, and when we woke up we were on the Tibetan plateau. The set-up was a cubby with 3 beds on each side.

After physically ripping Lianna from her warm bed yesterday morning and grabbing a quick breakfast in the Everest cafe of French Toast we ran into Ben, our travel companion on the bus from Xining to Xiahe. Ben’s plans were similar to ours for the first half of the day, so at 9:30am the three of us headed off for a tour of Lobrang Monastery lead by an English speaking monk.

It was up before the sun this morning as we had a bus to catch at 7:15 am for Xiahe, 6 hours from Xining. We knew from our fellow passengers that we were heading to an unusual place right from the start as many were Tibetan nomads dressed in sheep skin clothing and prayer beads.

We boarded our train at 1:47 and that was to be our home for the next 24 hours while we journeyed across China from Beijing to Xining.

After having some difficulties booking our train due to the National Holidays where most of China is on the move, we finally got a spot on the top bunk of the hard sleeper class. We shared our corner of the train with 4 more Chinese who were occupying the bunks below us. Our train experience was similar to being in jail with a …

Yesterday was a beautiful day so I decided it would be a good day to go to the Summer Palace. The Summer Palace was designed for royal families to escape the heat of Beijing, and is ranked among the most beautiful gardens in the world. As you can imagine, the Summer Palace is supposed to be a tranquil beautiful area to walk around. Bringing back the fact that it’s a national holiday this week, the Summer Palace was a big disappointment.

Nick and I estimated about half the …