On the kora: walking in circles in McLeod Ganj

Om Mani Padme Hum in Tibetan characters is carved on most stone
  offerings placed along the kora. Chanted and written it is the
heart mantra of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, emanation of
the Buddha of Compassion.

Tsuglakhang Temple is the heart of the Tibetan diaspora, and circling that heart is the kora. 

Strung out along forested ridges in this ex-hill station town, McLeod Ganj, home of the Tibetan government-in-exile, in no way resembles Tibet, but the old ways of Buddhist devotion are maintained. Clockwise circumambulation - or kora - around a revered site like the Tsuglakhang is a popular devotional practice that combines a daily constitutional with walking meditation. 

Getting to enlightenment - how to do the Dalai Lama’s teachings

Grabbing a good spot at Tsuglagkhang

People come from all over the world to listen to His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama teach in the Tsuglagkhang Temple in McLeod Ganj. This is the exiles’ concrete equivalent of Jokhang Temple in Lhasa, and it is the hub of the world for Tibetan Buddhists for a few days every October when HHDL comes home from travelling and teaches to his home crowd and many fervent students like me.

You won’t find out from this post how to achieve liberation from samsara, but there are things it helps to know to make your teachings experience easy and more enjoyable.

What you take

A cushion, a mug, an FM radio and headphones, an exercise book and pen. And to get your spot in the temple, you need a texta pen, a flattened cardboard box, a roll of packing tape. 

Don’t take your phone or a camera - you can’t take them in with you and you will have to leave them at a deposit office.

Partial gear failure #2: digestive system

Kullu Valley people are rightly proud of their apples.

After surviving a month’s altitude sickness and the night mini bus from Leh to Manali that follows the switchback, dangerously unmade road over snow-swept Rohtang La (bone-shaking, exhausting and spectacular,  Lonely Planet’s usual hyperbole; I’d accept unhygienic, tiring and cramped), I thought I was going to bound out into Himachal Pradesh’s Kullu Valley like a new being.

Not quite.

The snow on the pass transformed to pouring rain by the time we got to Old Manali and the Dragon Inn so we and our bags were soaked. Whether it was the soaking or the veg burger for lunch, I had typical travellers gastric upset by the end of the first day. 

Into thin air - hiking the Markha Valley

“There is a griffin vulture.”

Stanzin hands us the big binoculars and we stand for a long time in the middle of the arid valley path, beside the tumbling stoney river, watching the wide wingspan cut the bright blue sky and the zigzag mountain range tops. 

Chotak the porter points to another part of the sky - he has picked up on our excitement and being a local wants to show off his valley - he has spotted a lammergeier circling even higher.

It’s the third day of the Markha Valley hike and we are having the best time. 

The Sham Valley is the real deal

When I signed up to do the Sham Valley trek, also known as ‘the baby trek’, I expected a gentle 3-day amble along a river valley; a pleasant stroll through a Ladakhi Dovedale with stepping stones and shady willows.

I organised to go with a female guide from the Ladakhi Women’s Travel Company who I hoped would hold my hand and gently encourage my confidence to return after my recent brush with bad altitude sickness.

That’s not quite how the Sham Valley trek turned out. The ‘baby’ trek’s dusty rocky paths cross 5 passes in 3 days - and Lazes, my young guide, was blunt about telling me what to do.

La La Ladakh

Author's note: there are no photos loaded to illustrate this post because of Ladakh's woeful lack of internet capacity. See point 3 of this article. Sorry about that.

Simon: What are you going to write about Ladakh?

Me: I just can’t get my head round this place.

The reason I can’t work out my reaction to Ladakh, and its main city Leh, is because of its weird juxtapositions.

Peace and war

Ladakh is where the nuclear-armed forces of India, Pakistan and China stare each other down over a disputed border. The uneasy truce often descends into stone throwing, armed incursions and threats of annihilation. 

Last seen in Lhasa

Canggu nunnery: nuns prepare mantras

We got a couple of extra days in Lhasa because we didn't complete the Kailash kora - I think we put the time to good use. 

We wind through the back alleys to Ramoche Temple, a tantric university where lamas come to learn to lead chanting, to sing internal complex tonal harmonies and manage the rituals of their own monasteries. 

Gear failure No. 1: lungs

Kailash: worth the effort

I had thought I might write a post or two about the inevitable gear failures that always happen. (I’ve already bitched on endlessly about how my boot soles peel at inopportune moments.)

I hadn’t anticipated that the first bit of equipment to fail would be my respiratory system. 

Yup, sadly Altitude Sickness scotched my intentions to hike the kora around Mount Kailash. I got as far as the first valley but, as elderly fat Hindu ladies in bedroom slippers sprinted past me, my oxygen levels plummeted, I started to cough, my legs stopped working and we all turned round and came back.

Peak Practice - at Everest Base Camp, Tibet

Interested in getting to Everest Base Camp? Don't want to hike for days to Namche Bazaar? Don't like dodgy mountain hygiene or the risk of avalanches? Like to sip a hot drink in comfort while viewing the Mother of Mountains?

At the end of the bus route

Biggest travel tip ever: if you can get into Tibet (ok, it’s a big IF), get a comfy car, drive along good roads to Rongbuk Monastery, stay in the guest house which serves great lemon/ginger/honey tea, and take the shuttle bus to Everest Base Camp. Look down the valley. 

In good weather, there is Everest/Quomolunga looking as if it is 10 minutes stroll beyond the glacier moraine. 

High plains drifting - across western Tibet

The pass overlooking the holy lake 

Leaving Lhasa we head west in our 7 seater van down to Xigatse, Gyantse and Sakya. The roads are good, and the public toilets plentiful even if they are only a concrete slab with 4 to 5 slits to squat over and a low wall between each. Communal, but the smell and lack of facilities doesn't encourage lingering to chat.

We enter tourist country. The famously fierce flock protecting dogs that keep the sheep safe from wolves and snow leopards now pose for photos with dyed yak hair extensions and sloppy tongues. 

A sense of devotion - moments in Lhasa

.

Lhasa is a flat modern Chinese city. Creamy mid-rise apartment buildings; giant malls under construction; long straight highways run into the city streets that are organised by traffic lights and lane markings. All drivers ignore the rules.

The Potala is almost too big to comprehend.

We slip into the remaining Tibetan quarter of rendered row houses and shops, laneways and courts, tiled roofs, white wash walls and hopper windows with painted black window surrounds under fluttering pleated window curtains. And over the next few days in Lhasa and beyond we gain a sense of the city and valleys as home to ancient culture and still living religious fervour and devotion.

The middle kora around the Jokhang Temple

In the still-beating Tibetan heart of Lhasa, there are three koras (ritual circuits around spiritual places): inside the 7th century Jokhang Temple; the middle kora around the walls of the Jokhang in the old Barkor market; and circling the entire city in the outer kora.

Kathmandu corners - little bits of beauty

A welcoming offering to guests at the
entrance of the hotel.

Mud, mosquitoes, and mould. That's Kathmandu's monsoon season reputation.

Added to the year-round chaotic traffic congestion, why come to Nepal's capital in the wet season?

Don't get me wrong, I have always enjoyed my time here. As we got off the plane on Friday after crossing a couple of time zones sustained only by the queues, dubious vegetarian meals and dodgy in-flight movies provided by Thai Airways, a blast of city dust and humid air hit me - and I realised I was wearing a great big smile. Happy to be back.

Kathmandu has a way of charming visitors. The careless and careful placing of flowers in water at entrances to delight your senses. The patience and humour of Nepali people in the face of crazy rudeness by us foreign tourists.

Leaving on a jet plane

That's the packing and prep done,
now we can start the travelling.

And we are off!

The apartment is clean, the fridge is kinda empty, there's a cardboard box for the tenants to put our mail in.

Our bags are zipped and padlocked for the last time.

Now there is just time to sit in the departure lounge listening to Simon cough (because he finally came down with the respiratory tract infection that has knocked me around for the last 3 weeks), and wondering why the Bluetooth keyboard won't talk to the iPad. 

Is this a harbinger of future tech snags and gear failures?

And there might be a problem getting our Tibet visas .....

The joys of travel. 

What's your worst departure experience?