We have adventures as we approach the border trying to get the truck past trade trucks waiting to get checked by customs. It is only a narrow village road, so there is a lot of tooting and bullying cars out of the way to get to the border check.
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| the view from the bridge before the entering Tibet |
Border controls take the expected many hours, with the Chinese checking all of our rucksacks. They are mainly concerned with literature. They are suspicious of Shay’s book ‘A Secret History’, which is only a novel set in an American university. They take off the back cover and rip out the map of China in Caroline’s ‘Lonely Planet’. This is because the map refers to Taiwan, not ‘Chinese Taipei’. Ironically, later we will find that you can buy lots of Lonely Planet’s in China, but not the one on China.
Tracy has two copies of the Kama Sutra on her which she is not sure what they will make of (one was a birthday present to her, and the other my birthday present to John). In the event, the official has a look through and sniggers when he realises what it is.
Over the border, the road is either in middle of being rebuilt or in middle of collapsing. We rise up the valley into a traffic jam caused wholly by intransigence. There is a bottle neck where only one truck can pass. The trouble is, every time a truck facing one direction lets one from the other go through the bottle neck, the one behind moved to overtake it. This happened on both sides until there were at least ten vehicles on either side of the bend. We waited for an hour before trucks behind us start to back up and we are able to reverse to let traffic through.
Further up the road to a town apparently called Dam, we stop in a hotel because the road further on is closed to entering traffic during the day. This means we have to get onto it before 8am the next day.
We are entering China on a group visa, which means we are all missing the stamp in our passport. As a group, the government have required us to have a guide to take us through China, as well as an additional guide for the Tibetan leg. This turns out to be a good job, as Tibet / China is the first place we are entering where English is not commonly spoken.
Our Chinese guide, Kevin, is in his mid-twenties and speaks very good English. He escorts us to a restaurant and orders for us as a group. Dinner is good and a nice change, the local food in Nepal not necessarily having been a highlight. I have chicken curry, hok choy and veg.
Back at the hotel, we find a cat in our room. I don’t blame it as it is very cold outside. We are now dressed in our cold weather gear.
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