Hi .
Sunday was temple and palace day. Danzeng went to the Potala Palace early to get our tickets only to find it wasn’t opening till 12.00 due to rehearsals for the 70th anniversary celebrations.
We started the day visiting the Jokhang Temple built in the 7th century. Danzeng gave a great narration as we walked through the palace with the crowds due to the Palace being closed. we entered the Temple past all the people Prostrating with some of them in the process of completeing 1,000,000,000 Prostrations during their life. Once inside there is no Photos sorry,
At the Potala Palace ticket office, Danzeng queued while we sat in the shade of a tree. Just as well we didn’t have to queue in the sun because the 12.00 opening didn’t eventuate till 1.30. Then the climb started which we both handled a lot better then expected, maybe the fact that we have been at over 3000 metres for a week paid off.
The Potala Palace also dates back 7th century in parts with it mostly being 17th century forward with bits added by each Dali Lamas until 1959 when the current Dali Lamas left for exile. I enjoyed the tour greatly however I did struggle to keep up with the history of the Dali Lamas’s, however the one things that I was in awe of was all the scriptures in the walls and some dating back to the 7th century.
Monday was planed as a driving visit to Yandork Co Lake however we call this off after Julie and I enjoyed to many cups of Chia Marsala tea which later found out is loaded with tea and caffeine that kept us both unable to sleep till 5.00am. We were too tired and had a late start wandering the alleys of the old town around the Jokhang Temple. This lead to some interesting shops brining discovered, like stumbling upon a shop that was carding the bags of wool for a local farmer so that it could be spun and woven in the village, a very small factory pressing Rape Seed for oil, and then an area that was the main market for trading dried Caterpillar Fungus, some web sites have this as the viagra of China and trades at twice the price of gold.
However the highlight for Monday was in a back alley near a hand craft shop we visited we came across 10 or 12 local working on beating brass sheet and casting lead moulds while making Buddha’s of different forms. The horse statue in the photo we found out had taken them over 2 years to complete
You can always count on local Workplace safety being a low priority when you see the cranes being used for building repair work and all the pedestrians are just walking around and under them as life goes on regardless.
Today was spent just wandering around town a while Julie visited the Nunnery then it was lunch before getting the car organised ready for an early start tomorrow, this took longer then planed with all the visitors and questions from both tourist and locals with one remembering the RallyRound group that was in Lhasa in May,
Tomorrow we head north to Yangbajing for hot springs then over Shuga La Pass at about 5400 according to the maps we have looked at.
The next post will most likely be after we have visited Everest on Friday. The weather is not looking great for this Friday but we are keeping our fingers crossed.
