29.6520 N, 91.1721 E / HIGH POINT 3,656 M
Tibet
Thin air, enormous sky, slow arrival.
- BEST SEASON
- April to October
- IDEAL LENGTH
- 8 to 12 days
- SLEEPS AT
- 3,656 to 3,977 m
- PACE
- Gentle
- BEGINS IN
- Lhasa
Your first day in Lhasa is slower than you expect it to be, and that is deliberate. At 3,656 metres a flight of stairs asks a question of you, so we leave the day almost empty: sweet tea on a rooftop, an hour watching the pilgrims turn the Barkhor, and light coming off the whitewash hard enough to make you squint.
Tibet sits higher than almost anywhere people live, and it feels like it. The air is thin, the sky is enormous, and the Potala Palace still rises over Lhasa the way it has for centuries.
Travel here takes planning, and that is exactly what we are for. We handle the permits and the altitude-friendly pacing so you can give your attention to the monasteries, the pilgrims and the road across the high plateau.
What we plan here
- Potala Palace and Lhasa
- Altitude-friendly pacing
- Monastery visits
- Overland routes
THE SHAPE OF THE DAYS
Eight days on the roof of the world
Four nights in Lhasa before the road climbs anywhere, because the passes are far kinder once your body has stopped arguing with the altitude. This is one shape the trip can take. Yours will be its own.
DAY 01
Arrive in Lhasa, do very little
We collect you from the airport and drive the hour into town, then leave you alone with a flask of sweet tea and one short walk around the block. Dinner is early and bed is earlier, and that is the whole plan for today.
SLEEPS AT Lhasa, 3,656 mDAY 02
The Jokhang and the Barkhor
Your guide walks the Barkhor circuit with you clockwise, the way everyone else is walking, past juniper smoke and the slap of prostration boards. We time the Jokhang for mid morning, when the butter lamp hall is at its warmest.
SLEEPS AT Lhasa, 3,656 mDAY 03
The Potala, slowly
There are a great many stairs and only so much air, so we book the earliest entry slot and climb them in pieces. The chapels inside are dim, close and thick with butter, and nobody is moving you along.
SLEEPS AT Lhasa, 3,656 mDAY 04
Sera and the debating monks
Sera's courtyard fills after lunch with clapping, shouting and laughter, which is what a philosophy exam sounds like here. We get you there before it starts, so you have a seat in the shade rather than a view of the back of a crowd.
SLEEPS AT Lhasa, 3,656 mDAY 05
Across the Kamba La to Gyantse
The road switchbacks up to the Kamba La at 4,794 metres, where Yamdrok Tso opens out below in a turquoise nobody quite believes at first. We stay up there as long as you want, then drop west to Gyantse for the night.
SLEEPS AT Gyantse, 3,977 mDAY 06
Gyantse Kumbum, then Shigatse
The morning is for the Kumbum, a stupa you climb floor by floor past chapel after chapel of painted eyes. The afternoon is an easy road west, and we keep it loose in case a village market gets in the way.
SLEEPS AT Shigatse, 3,845 mDAY 07
The long road back to Lhasa
We take the river road east, following the Yarlung Tsangpo past ferry crossings and barley fields. There is no fixed list of stops, so tell your driver when something is worth pulling over for.
SLEEPS AT Lhasa, 3,656 mDAY 08
Fly out over the plateau
Ask for a window seat and the high peaks line up along the wing for a good twenty minutes after take-off. Permits, paperwork and the airport run are ours to worry about.
SLEEPS AT Lhasa, 3,656 m
Altitude does not care how fit you are. It only asks that you go slowly, and everyone learns that in the first two days.
Field notes
Tell us where your mind keeps going.
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