The trip was great, starting in Chengdu’s HuaShuiwan mountains in the hot springs, visiting Thousand Buddha Mountain and HeMin Temple. We got to Thousand Buddha mountain later in the afternoon and left before nightfall. The next day our teacher Master Bing Zhou received a welcome from the temple and we were all shown around the library and museum as well as having a great vegetarian lunch and tea session with an audience with the temple’s head.

The hot springs are great, with our hotel we received two complimentary entries a day. We got a big bag of Laoying cha (eagle tea) which is a medicinal tea from a certain laurel tree. I only had some when I got back to Sydney and it is very relaxing so I think I will only have it on weekends. The bag is huge and costs 70 yuan. I think it will last months, we went to Xining on a domestic flight and travelled in the opposite direction we went last time.

Instead of finishing at Qinghai lake we started there heading to Caka salt lake and a salt lake I hadn’t been to before. A lot more happened but it was a blur and eventually we were in Golmud. We were slowly heading into altitude and Golmud is 3400m altitude, so we took off to a checkpoint to get into the Kunlun Mountains. We promised the police we wouldn’t run into Tibet and we went to the amazing Wu Ji temple. I was in heaven. We worshipped and burnt incense. The energy in the mountains is intense.

We saw a lot of wild animals, deer, donkeys, yaks, marmots, and eagles. We went further into the mountains on this trip compared to our last visit. We had a few stops and ended up at a truck stop deep in the mountains. We had great food at the truck stop, dumplings and lamb soup with a couple of vegetarian dishes. We were at this stage 4800 m altitude and we were all doing well. A lovely lady Lisa was doing well. On the last trip she suffered altitude sickness and she had only started Qigong but after four years of Qigong she was so fit and had no issues at all. How great is that!

We went back to Golmud and then caught a train to Tibet, it is the highest railway in the world. I had to try my poor Chinese as I was in a bunk with three other sleeper Chinese travellers I have never met. We got on well, two young people were from Beijing and an older guy was from another city but had been to Tibet when he was younger and Tibet didn’t have roads like it does today. He was suffering from the lack of oxygen. On the train we reached over 5000 m above sea level which is difficult. I didn’t have issues with the altitude but just with the dry air.

We arrived in Tibet after a twelve hour journey and were welcomed by a Tibetan guide, he was all singing, dancing, and a friendly man who took us to many amazing sites. All in all we needed three visas, one to get into China, one to get into Tibet and another for a restricted part of Tibet. It made sense because the restricted part was very dangerous. There were difficult roads, landslides, construction and we made it through and it was beautiful. The road barriers were good but I saw a car covered in rocks and dust from a recent landslide as we drove in at night. 

We eventually drove back to Lhasa for our two last days in Tibet and then flew to Beijing. On our last night we saw some traditional Tibetan singers and dancers which was great. Beijing is amazing as well, it is so busy and we went to Water Town below a section of the Great Wall and visited the Great Wall above, we also viewed the great wall at night which was beautiful. The last day we couldn’t get to the Forbidden city as you need to book a week in advance now. We went to a park where you could view the forbidden city from above and then we went to a park nearby to walk around and soak up the sunshine. We had amazing weather all through China and were very lucky. There were some cold extremes as well in the mountains and in the snow but that is to be expected really. I am glad to be back in Sydney even though I came back to the grime around Central station and meth heads but I am happy within myself.