On our first full day in Mongolia, we made our way to Terelj National Park, just a short distance from the capital, Ulaanbaatar. There was a direct bus at midday, but we wanted to make the most of the day so we opted to depart at 7am and take three separate buses. The first city…
Tag: photography
The Hottest Town In China Is Built Below Sea Level
Turpan is the second-lowest depression in the world, making it also the hottest place in China. The town sits in northern Xinjiang at 154m below sea level, and when we arrived it was a sweltering 43°. I didn’t check the real-feel, but as we stepped off the train, a strong wind hit us, and it…
Desert Landscapes and Silk Road Sights | Gansu, China
Slot canyons and red rocks aren’t something people picture when envisioning China, but it’s actually home to some spectacular desert scenery. While in northern Gansu we explored a couple of stunning sights which we accessed from the friendly town of Zhangye. The first park was Pingshanhu Canyon, and it sat just a stone’s throw from…
Tibetans And Their Incredible Monasteries | Shigatse & Lhasa
It was a long drive from Everest Base Camp back to Shigatse where everyone fell asleep in the van, exhausted from a night without any sleep. We stopped for lunch where our guide chose an extremely overpriced restaurant. Previously they arranged a bunch of shared dishes and a reasonable price for us to pay per…
Struggling With Altitude Sickness At Everest Base Camp | Tibet
Reaching Everest Base Camp in Tibet involved a long drive from the city of Shigatse toward the border with Nepal. We broke up the journey with a pointless stop at a roadside mile marker for Highway 318 which is the longest highway in China at 5,476 kilometres. It comes all the way from Shanghai to…
Yamdrok Lake and Mighty Glaciers | Tibet
After a couple of days exploring the sights of Lhasa, it was time to join the rest of our tour group and spend the day driving to Shigatse, the second-largest city in Tibet. There’s a fast road leading there, but we were taking the scenic route, via Yamdrok Lake. It took a few hours to…
Potala Palace and Barkhor Street | Lhasa, Tibet
The only way for tourists to visit the Tibetan autonomous region, is by going on a tour – which we despise doing. We’ve already spent a lot of time in the Tibetan autonomous prefecture in Sichuan, Yunnan, Gansu, and Qinghai, but we figured it was time we finally bit the bullet and visited the spiritual…
Taking The Highest Train In The World To Lhasa, Tibet
There are two main ways that tourists reach Lhasa in the Tibetan Autonomous Region; by plane – which is risky due to the high altitude, or by train which helps gradually adjust the body to the elevation change. We opted for the cheaper train, which was due to take 22 hours, travelling from Xining in…
Desert Landscapes And Thangka Art | Qinghai, China
It’s our first time in China’s Qinghai province, which is larger than any country in Europe. It occupies a large chunk of the Tibetan plateau, and to Tibetans, this land is known as Amdo, one of old Tibet’s three traditional provinces. Our first stop was the town of Tongren, or Rebkong in Tibetan. For several…
One Of The Most Important Tibetan Monasteries | Labrang
As soon as we arrived in the monastic town of Xiahe in Gansu, I just knew I’d love the place. For starters – it’s the first place we’ve come across where some of the monks wore fuchsia pink robes. Many were still wearing the classic red ones, but the occasional pops of pink thrilled the…
