Interesting holidays

[Bixxer Bob]

I've been away for a couple of weeks, went to Tibet of all places.

Tibet is a worry to China because Tibet considers itself a seperate country whilst China considers it a province.  Anyway, things got so bad a few years ago that the spiritual leader of Tibet, the Dahli Lhama, had to flee the country.  There were protests, but China crushed them in time-honoured fashion.  The result is that there is a very high military and security presence in the country and the only way in or out by air is to fly all the way to Behjing and then get an internal flight back again to Tibet.  The long term solution appears to be that China is flooding the country with money (infrastructure improvements) and Chinese nationals thus diluting the Tibetan population, traditions and identity.

We had a couple of days in Bejhing first, visiting Tiananmen Square where, as a token white-haired white man I was something of a novelty and invited to apprear in several family photos.

We then went on to Lhasa, the capital of Tibet and spent 4 days visiting Buddhist monastries etc and the Potala Palace, a steep 373 step climb to the top (no mean feat when you have mild altitude sickness, height is over 12,000 ft).

Highlight of the trip though was the plateau train journey (max height 17,000 ft - oxygen supplied) and then the Terra cotta warriors at Xian on the way back to Behjing.

Not something I would do again, but a fascinating few days.

[Chris Canning]

Sounds interesting,I can just about manage a skiing holiday,but other wise if it don't involve bikes I ain't going  :roll:

[Nick Calne]

Photo's?

[aeronca]

lucky guy - i would love to see all that.    PIC'S!!!

[Timbox2]

Did you get mobbed by school kids John?
Me and the missus did a China trip back in 2003, we started in Shanghai then made our way over to Sichuan Province, we looked into going to Tibet, but at the time only official Chinese approved tours were available, a bloke in the Hotel we stayed in Chengdu said he could get us an overland trip by Jeep, about £200 then, but, the big but, if we get caught its the Beijing Hilton for a few years, we skipped it :shock:

Did the Terracotta warriors though as well, and met one of the Farmers who discovered them, we also then went to Beijing but finished the trip with an amazing train journey from Beijing-Shanghai, Our own first class cabin, about 1200 miles, how much? About £25 each, listen up Virgin!!!

I loved the experience, hated the food,well, most of it, and even worse was the pollution, glad we went though, I would have liked to have gone South a bit, but the SARS epidemic had just hit, so we skipped that aswell.

Funny thing about the SARS was that at the time the Government was blaming foreign tourists for its spread, so when we got on the subway in Beijing and couldnt get a seat, the missus started coughing, nearly cleared the carriage, brilliant :lol: