Day 1: Fly to Lhasa from Chengdu
Taking the flight into Tibet upon your arrival. Local guide will meet you and transfer you to Lhasa. On the way, you can enjoy the heart-beating highland view along the Yarlong Tsangpo river( the longest river in Tibet). The rest time is free for relax and more oxygen.
Day 2: Potala Palace, Jokhang Temple, Barkhor street
The first day of sightseeing starts from Lhasa's cardinal landmark- PotalaPalace, a structure of massive portions. Its towering image already appearing on various occasions, but your first sight of the Potala will still be an awe-inspiring moment. It takes at least a good 2-hour to visit those rooms, halls and chapels In the afternoon, we will drop a visit of the JokhangTemple, the spiritual center of Tibet. Everyday, pilgrims from every corner of Tibet trek a long distance to the temple. The temple is the product of Han, Tibetan and Nepalese architectural techniques. Then we will visit Barkhor, the oldest street in a very traditional city in Tibet
Day 3: Drepung Monastery, Sera Monastey
About 8km west of central Lhasa is the Drepung, once world's largest monastery with about 10,000 monks. This day's sightseeing begins with these white monastic buildings piled up on the hillside. Walking up to the hill is a pleasant thing, an easy break from the solemn ambience inside the halls and chapels. At the plat roof of hillside, you can have very good views of the whole Lhasa city and the distant mountains. Drepung is one of Lhasa's two great Gelugpa monasteries, the other is Sera. Around 5km north of central Lhasa, Sera may not be as grandiose as Drepung, but is more serene surrounded by many small temples. The 'Buddhism Scriptures Debating' in Sera is very famous.
Day 4: Lhasa-Gyantse
Today you will drive about 300KM to Gyangtse. Take a look at YamzhogYumco Lake on the way and overlook Kalais Kora Glacier. YamdrokLake is a coiling, many-armed body of water shaped like a scorpion. It doubles back on itself on the western side, effectively creating a large island within its reaches. For Tibetans, it is one of the four holy lakes of Tibet. And the home of wrathful deities. The lake lies several hundred metres below the road, and in clear weather is a fabulous shade of deep turquoise. Far in the distance is the huge massif of Mt. Nojin Kangtsang (7191m). In the afternoon, you will arrive in Gyangtse and go for the tour of Palkhor Temple, built in the 15th century, is situated in the west of GyantseTown with mountains enclosing form three sides of the east, west and north. Its uniqueness is that its three sects of Buddism-Shaja, Ningma and Guolu stayed harmoniously under one roof.
Day 5: Gyantse-Shigatse
Drive about 90KM to Shigatse which is the second largest city in Tibet. It’s also the home town of Banchen Lama. In the afternoon, you will drop a visit of Tashilumpo monastery. Tashilumpo, sprawls on the slops of Mt.Niser, southwest of Shigatse. It covers an area of about 300,000 square meters. There are many valuable and rare historical articles in the monastery En route, visit Shalu monastery, which the construction was started in 1027. Its architecture is of typical combination of the Tibetan and Chinese styles with archways, carved pillars, tilled roofs and the Song and Yuan style murals.
Day 6: Shigatse-Shegar
Today we drive to Shegar and overnight here. En route visit Sakya monastery, which is divided into the south and north two parts. It is of typical Yuan Dynasty style of resembling castles. There are a lot of historical articles in the monastery, among them are found a lot of the imperial certificates, gold signets, crowns, costumes bestowed by the Yuan Dynasty emperors. It has over 10,000 volumes of Tibetan books on astronomy, medicine, calligraphy, and history. So the Sakya monastery enjoys the title ‘the second DunHuangCave.’
Day 7: Shegar-Rongbuk Monastery-Mt.Everest
Although it's just 100km from Shegar to Base Camp(5200m), it takes about 4 hours since the cracked winding roads demand much caution. But the views are stupendous on a clear day, and feature a huge sweep of the Himalaya range including peaks over 8000, Makalu, Lhotse, Everest, Gyachung and Cho Oyu. When you finally get to Base Camp, the first sight of the mighty Everestsimply leaves you speechless. All the hardship you bear along the way makes sense at this while. The best moments to watchMt. Everest's are early morning and late evening when Everest is shining like a goddess in the sunglow.
Day 8: Mt. Everest-Tingri-Gyirong
Take about 3 and half hours to Tingri, then onward for another 5 hours to Gyirong County. Gyirong means in Tibetan "happy village". And Gyirong County, located in the border with Nepal, is a very different place from the other ones you see on the way. All year round it is green with rains most of the time, a type of sub-tropical climate. Its altitude is 27 meters high above see level, known as the important trade town with Nepal.
Day 9: Shegar-Rongbuk Monastery-Mt.Everest
Drive to FriendshipBridge at the border, our tour guide will see you off here, and you need cross the border by yourself. And you can take a minibus, taxi or ask us for arranging border transfer for you. Tour ends.
Dear Janet, I would like to thank you and your team for a wonderful tour setup. Begging with your professionalism, warm support and willingness to make our group tour successful one.And great thanks to Dhargye our tour guide who took care of whole group and especially myself during a night of vomiting. He and Mr. Namla- the driver were superb. I will send you some photos separately. Feel free to use them on your company's website. Am happy to give references as required.
Dear Janet,We are safe and sound home and are looking back at a very impressive trip to Tibet and Zhangye. We have between us some 3000 pictures – some quite stunning. Yesterday the four of us expressed what an unforgettable trip this has been. We want to share our appreciation for the way the trip has been organised. Like clockwork. All guides appearing at the right time and place. Everything was very well organised. It was a bit double for us when we were in Lanzhou hearing about the earthquake creating havoc in Nepal, but not leaving Tibet unaffected either. Thank you again for a trip to be remembered for a long time.
Dear Nancy,I feel embarrased that I am answering only now but another couple of weeks of travelling and the beginning of the next semester at the university made me really busy. However, me and Olaf wanted to thank you for the amazing trip we had in Tibet! The organization was simply excellent, thank you for a very quick and informative communication from your side. Many thanks go also to our guide, Danluo as well as to our driver; both of them acted very professionally and kindly towards us. It was really great that our guide was of the Tibetan origin, providing us with a unique cultural insight and first-hand information. His English language skills were just perfect and the communication with him very pleasant.