Tuesday, November 27, 2007

OK, Now I'm Overdoing It

So on Friday it will be two weeks until my flight back to the US. Not that I am counting down or anything.... Actually I am.
Here are some photos of the Ganden monastery outside of Lhasa. Wifey and I took a day trip out to the monastery which is about 1500 meters higher elevation than Lhasa. My dad warned me that it was a bit rough up there and it was. We braved the elevation though and took a walk around the other side of the hill the monastery was on and it had some awesome views. The prayer flags were whipping pretty hard in the wind and it was pretty awesome. The road up to the monastery from the valley floor was this amazing series of switchbacks which looked insane from above. It was literally like 30-40 curves back and forth.






Wifey.
Huffing and puffing.


Yak.
Sheep - there were long haired sheep which looked like mini-yaks. They were hilarious.
Transition to my replacement is in high gear. I also have a midnight meeting tonight combined with an 8am tomorrow. The running joke at the office is that I "used" to like my job. I guess I started that joke....
Meeting time.

8 comments:

robert said...

So how did you get to Gamden? What hotel did you stay at in Lhasa? There was a pretty cool hipster hotel that got us to Gamden monastery by rental car. It was in the middle of the old section of Lhasa. We could smell the incense from Jokhang from there.

Matthew Lewis said...

We rented a Land Cruiser from our hotel. We stayed at the Kyichu hotel which was really nice except for the stairs up to our room on the 4th floor. I think I know which hotel you are referring to. There seemed to be one hub for a lot of the tours on the small street in front of the Jokhang. Kia probably remembers the name....

robert said...

The Kyichu was the "preferred" hotel in the Lonely Planet. How was it? (Next time I'm in Lhasa, I'll try it.) Did they have oxygen available?

Matthew Lewis said...

It was nice. I didn't see oxygen available but I imagine the front desk could have scored some for you if you wanted. It was a reasonable place and our room opened out onto the courtyard/garden in the back which was nice and quiet. The room was fairly large, clean and the staff was friendly. I would stay there again. Wow, that kind of read like a tripadvisor.com review.

Nathan Johns said...

What, no links? If it were a tripadvisor review, it'd have no content, and only links to other stuff. :P

Looking forward to your return man!

Matthew Lewis said...

Wha wha whaaa!? Tripadvisor is legit, they got us through some rough spots with some pretty bad ass hotels.
When I get back I am pretty sure that I owe Dan (and likely the rest of you knuckleheads) a few pitchers. We should get that done before the holidays.

Xiang Meng said...

oh man, didn't figure you'd be a blogger. :D

Matthew Lewis said...

Just because I think myspace is for suckas doesn't mean I can't have a blog....