Darran's Diary (London to Beijing): See the sights and rest 10th

First thing to do was to have a lie in and regenerate the energy levels especially as a few of us went out to a few bars and had a little drinking session. Had the cameraman, Adam, in tow to capture our silly actions especially the rickshaw racing down the High Street.
After just making it into the restaurant for breakfast, before it closed, the only food available was toast and coffee.
Next thing was to start updating the blog as it is severely behind where I am now.
Time to go to the Moslem area and have another cut throat razor shave and have my head shaved as well. All done making it nice and cool in these much warmer climates and now we are stopping in hotels, I can hopefully keep on top of shaving it myself, but we will see.
We all caught up with Max who had come here due to Altitude problems and he came out for a few hours to drink water with us. He definitely has pneumonia and he is going to call a halt to the trip. He is improving and he will be fine after a couple of weeks. The problem is if he pushes to hard and is in dirty air environments, he can have a relapse which is much worse than the original infection and can be up to 2 months on oxygen in a hospital.
He will fly home on Sunday and see his own doctor while his bike is freighted to Beijing and will come back with all our bikes in the container.
I hope he makes a full recovery and itr is a shame he will miss the last part of this trip
That is two people out of the Adventure!
Normally there is a welcoming ceremony to the hotel but as we arrived earlier than expected it was put off until the following evening
Staff sing some song which is a Tibetan blessing while holding some emblem things and present you with a white silk scarf (Fake)

Out for group meal we pass through a lot of the side streets on the way to the restauarant and you get a real feel for the city

It was all Tibetan and it was surprisingly good, the usual thing of the meat on the bone meant you had to watch out for bone splinters which stick in your soft pallet
It was also a roof top restaurant which is on the pilgrimage circuit that goes round the oldest monastery in Tibet called Jokhang.

There are Chinese soldiers everywhere, in the street under umbrellas on every street corner and above the pilgrim circuit, armed soldiers are watching from the roof tops. This is due to the uprising they had the other year.

These are very difficult to get as if caught the camera is confiscated and the whole group could be deported from China. Ooops!
The pilgrims have various ways of praying and one of them is to lay out stretched and lay a pebble in front of you, then get up and walk to the pebble, raise hands in prayer position above your head, then bend down again and push the pebble forward. They will do many laps f this and come prepared with gloves knee pads, leather aprons etc,

This is all going on amongst the crowds of people who are walking around the Jokhong
After the group meal we all ended up at a bar owned by a Dutch guy (Fred) playing “Pink Floyd – The Wall” from Berlin.
There are jobs on the bike to be done so not too late
After another lie in and then for breakfast, a check of the bike for any problems and to tap the dust out of the air filter. This goes against the grain for me as i would rather put a new filter in. With the entire off road work we had done, it makes sense to tap them out. Ironically very little came out. Everything ok, then it is off a 13:00 for our booked slot to visit the Potala palace. This is very restricted due to the main areas of the palace being built of wood and a limit has been placed on its loading capacity, apparently! To get to the main towers is 375 steps so here we go for the lungs and heart to take a pounding as we are still at 3600m

Once at the top of the external stairs there are more inside and thankfully it is lovely and cool. We are limited to only 1 hour to get round the tour of the palace and if we are late the local guide will be heavily fined. He tells us that if we have any questions then to ask after the tour is out of the palace. There is basically two palaces of white and red and if you look at the picture from the street, the Red palace is the one in the middle. White is for living and this where the Dalai Lama would have lived at the top of the left had white tower and the Red palace is where all the tombs of the previous Dalai Lama’s are except for No.6 (they are on No.14 at the moment)
The existence of the Dalai Lama is greater than God and is only under Buddha himself and his duty is to gain Knowledge and with Knowledge, comes happiness.
OK let’s move on from the white tower to the Red palace with all the chapels and tombs and there is so much Gold and precious stones which is looked after by 74 Monks . The tour is son over and the usual ban of photography has been in place. It is quite remarkable considering it was built from the 7th Century.
The views from the palace are wonderful and we are hatching a cunning plan to get a picture of the bikes outside the palace but the road is heavily policed in front

The only way to travel is the Rickshaw and is really cheap so if you do not want to walk in the heat, then get on one of these and watch the world go by as he fights his way through the crazy traffic

The evening was at a Tibetan musical about their culture and life which is around 2 hours long. This was very good and gave an explanation about all the traditions and beliefs. Yet again no photos but well worth seeing called “The road to Happiness” as this is the backbone of their beliefs.
One more rest day which will mean a wander round the shops before we start travelling again off the plateau and into China proper