From the little town of Zuogong we took a truck to the beginning of Bomi county Alpine scenery and a lake, more tranquil or impressive is hard to imagine In Zuogong Britta had found a nice guesthouse and although there was a lot of army no obvious police presence. She had got a Yak skin [...]

Entering the Autonomous Region of Tibet at night past the checkpoint we found ourselves cycling in one of the worlds most spectacular areas. White capped mountains, huge gorges and pine forests formed the backdrop for our first few days in Tibet. September 1999 Resting for at a convenient rock by the side of the road [...]

The shangri la. Lijiang the last major tourist town to dechin and the Tibetan border takes us through some great mountain scenery glaciers etc. and past some police checkpoints! Leaving Lijiang first a climb out of town for a few km., being the lazy bastards that we are we took the help of a passing [...]

Dali the travellers center in Yunnan county in South west china to Lijiang a traditional Chinese town with minority Naxi peoples. This is a two to three day ride on good Tarmac roads. After the long rest in Dali due to the loss of Rolands bike outside a cafe, which he had to go back [...]

Arriving in Kaili a major town in Guizhou the group stumbled on a local festival. To celebrate the traditions of the local minority tribes the festival, which runs every August, includes dance and bullfights.  The bullfight is a competition between two huge water buffalo which face off in front of an enormous crowd that cling [...]

Right from the start the trip had an air of excitement about it. Having met each other only on the net by email, our first meeting was in a Hong Kong hostel. Although we knew each other from emails, we had never heard or seen each other before and didn’t know for sure that anyone [...]

The only legal routes into Tibet are:  1. Via Chungdu where you can buy an air ticket for 3000Yuan ($375) This allows you to travel around Lhasa. 2. Via the Golmud to Lhasa highway. From this remote town on the borders of Qinghai and XinJiang there is a 35 hour bus route to Lhasa. Although [...]

At present entry into Tibet is controlled by the  ‘PSB’ public security bureau that requires travelers to possess a permit of travel. more information: Areas in China/Tibet open to foreign travellers Getting a permit means you must be in a group so if you want to travel independantly from China to Tibet it has to be [...]