Langmusi, a tiny Tibetan town along the Gansu-Sichuan border, initially seems like an unlikely draw for tourists both Western and Chinese. It’s not much more than a one-street town, with a couple of small monasteries. But it is a terrific jumping-off point for explorations of Tibetan nomad culture in the mountains around town. An enterprising young Han woman organizes horse treks and on-foot explorations of the area, and hostels and backpacker cafes have sprung up to cater to her clientele.
When we scrapped our plan to travel to Xinjiang, being able to add Langmusi to the itinerary almost made up for the disappointment. We arranged to do a two-day hiking trek, which was supposed to take us up a mountain and through nomadic grasslands. Upon arrival in Langmusi, we learned that women were not allowed on the mountain because of a recent religious ritual, but we were still able to visit the grasslands. It was a truly fascinating glimpse of a culture very far from my own. We saw men and women about their daily chores: weaving yak-hair tents, making ropes, preparing meals over dried-dung stoves, tying the yaks down at night and then milking them in the morning. As my friend Hanna pointed out, we will now go about our days knowing just what our host family is doing back in the grasslands.
(If you’re viewing this post in an RSS reader, please visit the blog to see the slideshow.)
Guided hiking and horse treks around Langmusi can be arranged through the Langmusi Tibetan Horse Trekking agency. Our two-day horse trek cost 180 RMB per person. This included a guide, a night in a Tibetan nomad family’s tent, all our food and our sleeping bags. Hiring a horse to carry most of our food and equipment cost an additional 100 RMB.
This is the latest in a series of weekly slideshows spotlighting places I’ve been on my travels, in China and beyond. You can view more photos at To China and Beyond’s Picasa page and Flickr page.
Related posts:
Add to your RSS Reader
Subscribe by e-mail
Follow me on Twitter
Flickr photostream