Xian and on

A hot and hungover day in Xian was thankfully rescued by the hazy memory that we did in fact win the match after all that, and the reason for my fuzzy head was because the hotel bar was offering all you can drink beer for 20 kwai. That’s about £1.33, and boy did we make the most of it, some of us more than others! Some stayed up until 5am to watch the end of the Sweden v Paraguay game, and the bar stayed open!

Anyway we recovered from our British beer swilling football watching personas and did do something cultural in the end. We visited the Muslim Quarter and strolled around the tranquil grounds of the Great Mosque, a beautiful and peaceful place. Afterwards Grem indulged in her obligatory shopping fix, buying left, right and centre in the fascinating market area around the Muslim Quarter.

We boarded our overnight train to Lanzhou and after a brief stop for breakfast we boarded our bus for a bumpy 7 hour ride into the mountains through the stunning scenery to our next stop, Labrang (or Xiahe as the Chinese prefer) in the area known as Amdo Tibet. Our bus started overheating after half an hour but we made it! We met our Tibetan guide Atisha, who led us on the Kora of the focus of our visit here, the Labrang Monastery.








The Kora is the Buddhist ritual of circumambulating a monastery or other symbol of religious significance. In this instance around the Labrang Monastery there were over one thousand large prayer wheels (see pictures below) and during our Kora Gremlin very proudly turned every one (resulting in one very sore right arm). Surrounded by the breathtaking mountains we rubbed shoulders with numerous pilgrims, monks and local villagers each taking part in the Kora that evening. I am sure there will be many times that I will say this about our forthcoming experiences in Tibet, but it was a truly mesmerising experience.





The next day we toured the inside of the Labrang Monastery guided by an English speaking monk. Of its many notable features this monastery is the most important one outside of Lhasa in Tibetan Buddhism and is one the six great monasteries of the Gelukpa, or yellow hat, sect. Labrang is second only in size to the legendary Potala Palace itself in Lhasa and houses up to 2,000 monks. We visited a number of temples within the monastery grounds and witnessed hundreds of the monks a prayer, chanting, beating drums and cymbals, and smelt the soon to be familiar scent of yak butter and incense burning. Amazing.

Next stop Langmusi across more stunning scenery, dodgy roads and on to another awe-inspiring monastery!