An easy pleasant pass the following morning led us down in 2½ hours to Tinki. Here we met the Dzongpen of Tinki for the first time. He was an extremely pleasant individual, and the most friendly and intelligent official we met in Tibet. He helped us in every way, and had previously helped Strutt’s party on their journey through. We heard excellent reports also of him afterwards from the advance parties. When we had gone through in the spring this Dzongpen had been away collecting his dues for the Tibetan Government. Tinki was a very different place, very green, and altogether very lovely. Before travelling in Tibet we had heard so much of the wonderful colour of Tibetan scenery. It was only on our return journey when there was a considerable amount of moisture in the air, when clouds rolled up from the South, that one obtained a real notion of what Tibet could be like when at its best, and Tinki, which had been an absolute sandy waste when we marched up, was now covered with beautiful green grass and flowers. Nor was the air of that horrible and rather irritating dryness, but was almost balmy, considering the height of the country.
Two days later we reached Khamba Dzong. The Dzongpen was absent, but his two head men helped us in his place. We had pouring rain the whole of the following night. There must have been from 1½ to 2 inches of rain, a most surprising experience in Tibet and one for which we were hardly prepared. The men had been breaking out a little again, and one sportsman had broken out considerably more than anybody else. For purposes of letting the porters down easily we never considered a man was inebriated as long as he could lie on the ground without holding on, but this man for three days in succession had been hopeless, giving no reaction whatever to the smartest smacks with our sticks, and finally having to be brought into camp and giving a great deal of trouble. So we determined on an exemplary punishment. The other men who had broken out badly had all been given loads to carry for a march, but the next day this man was condemned to carry an enormous load from Khamba Dzong to Phari. Considering what his condition had been we were absolutely astounded when the following day he carried the whole of well over 100 lb. for a 20-mile march to Tătsăng, over a pass of 17,000 feet, grinning and smiling the whole way as if it was the finest joke he had heard of. Everybody “pulled his leg” on the way, but nothing could possibly interfere with his good temper. He was condemned to carry this load right into Phari Dzong, crossing the three high ridges of the Donka La, and never for a moment did he lose his temper or bear any ill-will. This is characteristic of the people: as long as your treatment of them is understood by them to be just they bear no ill-will whatever, nor does it interfere in any way with one’s friendly relations; but still, for all that, it seems to me that they are unkillable. After his behaviour and the condition he was in for so long, to do such terrific hard labour as we condemned him to do without the smallest sign of fatigue was pretty remarkable. But, after all, my own particular Angturke had only complained of being a little dazed after falling 60 feet on to his head at the time of the accident.
We camped at Tătsăng, and here we parted with Noel, who carried off his own people and left us for Gyantse; he was very much afraid of bringing his cinema films down into the warmth and damp of Sikkim until they were properly developed, but not only this: it was now the season of the great meetings and dances of Gyantse, and he hoped to get first-rate studies of Tibetan life generally. The climate and accommodation also at Gyantse would just suit him, and he would be able there to put in a full month’s work completing his films and adding immensely to his collection of pictures of Tibetan life. He accompanied us for 5 miles, almost up to the camp we had occupied on our arrival in the spring, and we left him with great regret.
In Kampa Dzong.
We had a long march that day from Tătsăng, and again crossing the ridges of the Donka La a very cold wind and sleet and rain overtook us. It was the last shot at us the typical Tibetan weather had, and considering the time of year it did its very best for us, but we camped that night under the Donka La at a great height, not far from 17,000 feet. While we were waiting for our luggage we took refuge in a Tibetan encampment. The Tibetans were out with their herds of yaks, grazing them over the hillsides. We were rather amused to find that they had guns in their encampment, which they evidently used for sporting purposes, and we thought regretfully of the limitations which had been put on our expedition.
Next morning we had a delightful march crossing the last and highest ridge of the Donka La and camped half-way to Phari, finally reaching Phari Dzong after a very pleasant morning’s ride over delightful green turf and passing immense flocks of sheep grazing on the hillsides.
Here, on July 20, we found a welcome post and spent the day in great comfort in the Phari Dzong bungalow. Two days later we reached Chumbi and met the Macdonalds again, and were, as usual, sumptuously entertained by them. Here our transport had to be reorganized to take our still rather large convoy down to India. Geoffrey and I climbed the neighbouring hills and really revelled in the whole journey down, which had been very reminiscent of the Western Himalaya in summer. Chumbi is wonderful; even in the rains the climate is delightful. It cannot have more than one-third of the rainfall which falls only 20 miles away on the other side of the Jelep: in fact, when two days later we crossed the Jelep, we were immediately involved again in the mists and rains and sleets, and were again in a completely and absolutely different type of country.
We arrived at Gnatong on July 27 in pouring rain, but next morning it had cleared, and on the way down as we started the clouds showed signs of really lifting. On arrival at the ridge over which the road crosses before beginning the long descent to Rongli Chu, about 400 feet above Gnatong, we were lucky enough to come in for one of those sudden breaks which occasionally occur during the monsoon, and if one is at the moment in a position to profit by them one obtains one of the most glorious sights to be found in this world. Such was our luck this morning. Standing on the ridge we were able to see the plains of India stretched out beneath us to the South, the plains of Kuch Behar with the Mahanadi River running through them quite clear, while on our right Kanchengjanga rose through the clouds—a perfectly marvellous vision of ice and snow, looking immeasurably high. The clouds were drifting and continually changing across the hillsides and the deep valleys. The extremely deep and, in places, sombre colour, the astonishingly brilliant colour where the sun lit up the mountains, and the prodigious heights, made a mountain vision which must be entirely unsurpassed in any other portion of the globe. It was a moment to live for; but the moment was all too short. In half an hour the vision of the plains and the mountains was completely blotted out.
At Lungtung we visited the little tea-shop where we had all collected, as we had promised the patroness on our way up. There she was again, full of smiles, with her family round her, and we all stayed there and drank hot tea, which we thoroughly enjoyed after the cold and driving mist, and the flow of chaff I think even surpassed that of our first visit. So exhilarated were we that Geoffrey and I ran at top speed down to Sedongchen, which is only 6,000 feet, tearing down the hillsides, and by so doing, although we occasionally took short cuts over grassy banks and through forest where it was not too thick, we arrived at Sedongchen, having entirely baffled the leeches which swarm in this part of the forest. Not so, however, Wakefield; he also had been exhilarated and had taken a short cut down, but he had been too trusting, and he arrived with his legs simply crawling with leeches.