Camping on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

Brief | Beijing | Xining | Qinghai | Yushu Grassland | Xining/Beijing | Options/Prices

The Litang Horse Festival is one of the more colourful festivals on the Tibetan plateau, held during a period that coincides with one of the most beautiful period during which to visit the area.

July 18: Arrival and transfer to a luxurious conversion of a courtyard home deep inside the hutongs of Beijing. One of the better kept secrets in culturally-rich Beijing, you will be having dinner tonight in this atmospheric hutong. By day, take a guided visit of the Forbidden City as well as parts of the complex typically closed to the public, led by an individual involved in its restoration and conservation.

July 19: Arrive by flight in Xining today, the closest town to the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau. Home of the Han Chinese and many ethnic minorities, Xining was once a major trading area en route to Tibet. After check-in, a visit of Kumbum monastery, a monastery of known for its many figurines carved out of yak butter, is possible. Over dinner, the guide, a native of Qinghai, will field questions that you might have about the journey ahead.

 July 20: After breakfast, we start the 3-hour drive to Qinghai Lake, the largest salt water lake on the Tibetan Plateau attracting thousands of pilgrims year-round. Regarded by Tibetans as the sea (there being no equivalent of a sea due to Tibet's inland location), a number of islands on the surface of Qinghai Lake provide an incomparable opportunity to spot wildlife indigenous to the area. We will descend on one such island, the Bird Island, which, from the months of April to July, attracts thousands of migratory birds. Dinner and overnight is at Chabcha.

July 21st-26th: Begin the long 9-10 hour long road transfer, crossing the Yellow River Plateau (the source of the Yellow River). Climbing some rocky mountains before stopping for a picnic on a spectacular site by a lake in the grasslands, we then cross Bayankala Pass after lunch and the Yangtze River before reaching Yushu County.

Controlling the caravan trails between Xining and Lhasa, Yushu was a trading centre during the Tang dynasty. Dinner tonight is a spectacular affair accompanied by singing and dancing, allowing us to enjoy the inaugural night on the vast grasslands. Based in luxury tents decorated with Tibetan tangkas and comfortable beds, your room will be lit by solar-powered lights and a water tank wash basin with a separate private shower tent and private toilet tents at campsite on top of a communal dining tent and a kitchen. Laundry service is also available at the guests' disposal.

 22nd July: A visit to the local market in the morning with local handicrafts and colorful costumes is possible in the morning. Visiting the Damkar Monastery, a 40 minute drive from the market, to attend the annual Lama dances and special prayers, you'll have the privilege of meeting with a high lama for a private blessing ceremony and discussion before the start of festivities. Taking place every year for the last nine centuries, the Yushu Horse Festival, the occasion calls for major celebrations, with the Monastery lamas dancing the Eight Manifestations and colorful costumes and theatrical masks.
 

23rd July: An expression of the faith of Tibetan pilgrims who'd travelled from Xining to Lhasa, Gayak Mani hosts the largest field of prayer stones in Tibet. You can stop here to place your own prayer stones, some inscribed with entire sections of Tibetan scriptures or with bas-relief images of meditation deities. Before hiking the Lekpa Valley and topping for a picnic lunch along the way, you will have the opportunity to witness cliff paintings and wild animals which can range from and include gazelles, blue sheep, Tibetan foxes and pikas. Then drive to Bida Gorge to visit the Bida Nampar Nangdze Lakhang Temple erected by the Tang Princess Wencheng. Legend has it that the Princess had built this temple after she'd lost her child. The rock inscriptions here are revered as being naturally-occurring.

July 24: We trace an ancient pilgrimage route today, leading through a valley. A 4 hour easy hike, the valley is filled with limestone and sandstone cliffs with scriptures, watersheds and prayer flags. You'd notice carved into the rocks, the mantra 'Om mani padme hum' in Tibetan script.

July 25: The entire day today centres around the Yushu Horse festival, watching horse races, acrobatic riding and shooting(and very frequently a combination of all three). Nomadic families decked in their best gear, monks dressed in their red robes and itinerant peddlers and local traders- all converge at this spectacular yearly festival. Do not be surprised by the number of people who will inevitably invite you to their tents.
 

July 26: The second day of the festival sees the yak racing competition. On the way back to the base camp in the afternoon, we make a stop at a monastery, constrcuted in the 13th century on a site blessed by the master Drogon Choygal Phakpa who'd stopped here on his way to Mongolia.

July 27th-28th: Today we fly back to Xining. After a leisurely check-in, visit the Qinghai Tibetan Medicine Museum to see the 'Tangka of Tibetan Art and Culture', painted by 400 artists and taking 4 years to complete. A veritable encyclopaedic scroll of Tibetan history, religion, culture and folk history, there are also a series of tangkas documenting Tibetan medicine. Dinner tonight is at a local restaurant.

July 28th-29th: Flight back to Beijing. Based again in a courtyard hotel. Free and easy before international flight back the next day.

This trip can be preceded by a trip to Tibet or combined with the naadam in Mongolia. USD6923 per person on a double occupancy basis. Prices include all domestic flights, tours, transfers and accommodations on full board basis whilst camping in Yushu and bed and breakfast basis otherwise. Price also includes SOS evacuation insurance.Price does not include international flights to Beijing, gratuities nor any items of a personal nature. Prices are approximate only.

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Camping in luxury on the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau, this itinerary coincides with the annual Horse Festival set against the picturesque plateau.

  Raise The Red Lantern- An architectural tour covering its ancient and contemporary architectural highlights- from stays in lavishly renovated courtyard homes deep in the hutongs of Beijing to alternative getaways in a winery in Xi'an owned by Qingyun Ma, one of China's pre-eminent architects.

This itinerary departs from the usual Tibetan cities-and-monasteries itinerary, taking in, instead, Bon-po monasteries in Central Tibet and legendary caves by lakesides and monasteries. The trip also takes you to areas where there is still an active nomadic culture, combining some of the most dramatic landscapes in Tibet with cultural interaction. (Thumbnail photo courtesy of Chris Gilbert and C Cardenasm).

An introduction to Tibet, this itinerary places an emphasis on its spirituality as well as determining a comfortable pacing for all travellers. The accommodations range from a hotel that doubles in function as a museum for its wealth of artifacts in Lhasa to an atmospheric former home of a high-ranking Tibetan lama.