Tibet Trek #1 - Day 2

We arose from the night sleep at about 9:00. The start to the day was amazing that night I had not realised that the window from the room overlooked the mountains and I was greeted with a beautiful sunrise. Unfortunately the window was too dirty to take a photo .. sorry!

We were told that there was a big festival that day in Reting but when we went to check it out, there was no sign that the festival was going to be starting soon. So we decided to set off for Drepung and then the Tildrum Springs.

The scenary on the way was awe inspiring with the most amazing mountains and blistering sunshine. We passed through crazy rocky tracks along the electric blue rivers that continue down into to China to form the Yangtze River.

After stopping off at a small cafe and having some really good pork with mushrooms (pingo in tibetian) we arrived at Drepung Monstary. The first thing that you pick up on is a sign saying that Sky Burial sites were sacred and foreigners could not visit them, this is as part of the governments protection of minority cultures (sic). I had not heard of sky burials and in case you havent either... heres a little lesson (its not the nicest topic and skip the next paragraph to miss the explanation).

The Sky Burial is a Buddist method of burial and provides the recycle loop for the body to be reused. Basically a family friend hacks the body to bits and is left for the birds to consume. In Buddist religion the body is an empty vessal and the soul has gone on to bigger and better things so the friend cannot show any remorse.

Drepung Monstary is pretty impressive as it sits on the side of a mountain at 4500m overlooking the the small village below. We spoke with the local head monk who greeted us and who I later thanked for having us and shook the monks hand and then realised it was someone completely different (this explained the look of bewildment).

We were now heading to the highlight- Tidrum Springs. I had been talking about the going to some springs since I arrived and these had been suggested by the tour company. I was looking forward to sitting in an Onsen like bath as I had got used to in Japan, especially now that we hadnt showered for a day or 2.

We arrived down a very hilly track - I was convinced that we were going to drive over the edge. But we arrived safely and grab our bags and made it to the hostel. On arrivedal we were showed two rooms the first one didnt look that great until we saw the second one which had more mold and no windows. We choose the best out of a bad bunch and thought ah well we'll go and see the hot springs.

Now I am not sure if you would understand unless you have been travelling but we have got used to being a bit of a celebrity on our trek and people just end up staring at you for example. When we arrived in Tidrum this bloke just came and stood at the doorway to the room and stared at us, watching what we are doing. I guess you get used to it but the thought of being butt naked and having the locals all stare at me, made me think I might not relax as much as I should. This coupled with the fact that the once we walked further around the grounds of the Nunnary the place wasnt the cleanest, with all sorts of rubbish and sewage being put in the river further upstream.

That brings me to the toilets... now sorry, I dont mean to be too detailed but these toilets were the worse toilets I have ever seen, actually they were also the worst toilets Joe and Kate had seen too - it basically stank and there was sh*t everywhere. I really hope I didnt have to properly use the facilities!

Instead, we settled for going for some food and listening to Joe play his guitar... after some Yak Noodles and then Joe being told that he was too loud we decided to retire early, listen to some music and laugh about our situation.

3am - I wake up in pain and think its ok I will be in Lhasa in 10 hours ... just hold on.
4am - I wake up in more pain ..... think its ok I will be in Lhasa in 9 hours ... just hold on.
5am - I wake up in even more pain ..... think its ok I will be in Lhasa in 8 hours ... just hold on.
6am - I wake up in even more pain ..... think its ok I will be in Lhasa in 7 hours ... just hold on.
7am - I wake up... oh no gonna have to use the unthinkable toilets.....
8am - feeling a little better....

And so my second bout of food poisoning kicks in and to be honest I dont have much more to talk about before we got back to Lhasa....