At camp No. 121, on February 3, we left Tundup Sonam and Tashi behind with our own yaks, which were so exhausted that they could be driven only very slowly. The men were given money for their keep, and were ordered to move on towards Shigatse at a very slow pace. The rest of the caravan set out early, in good weather and at a minimum temperature of only 11.3°.
Our course is south-south-east and afterwards east. All the valleys are full of ice, which we strew with sand as the caravan passes. The pass to-day is the Dangbe-la, decorated, as usual, with a cairn and streamers; its height is 17,224 feet, or much less than that of the preceding pass. It is interesting, as lying on the watershed between the Bup-chu (My-chu) and the Rung-chu. The latter river does not unite with the My-chu, but takes its own course direct to the upper Brahmaputra. When I asked why we could not descend the Rung valley to avoid the two passes in front of us, I was told that the valley is very narrow, is confined by precipitous mountains, and is filled with ice. There is, however, a path used in summer which runs sometimes along the slopes, sometimes over the valley bottom, but is hard to follow after rain, for then large volumes of water pour down the valley, thundering over falls and rapids.
We bivouacked in a locality called Ngartang in the Rung valley, where twelve tents remain standing all through the year. The valley is considered cold, whereas the Sham is reputed warm. Indeed, we had found there some juniper bushes, and were so delighted at seeing them that we had adorned the inside of our tents with branches. It never snows in summer in the Sham valley, but it does in the Rung valley. In many years there is much rain in both valleys.
As though to prove the truth of the Tibetans’ assertions, the thermometer again fell in the night to −19.1°. We were prepared for a long day’s journey and a difficult pass, and therefore it was still dark when I heard the yaks being driven into the camp. After we have left the Ma-lung river behind us we ride up hills consisting of firm soil overgrown with moss, and an inextricable entanglement of mountains is displayed to our view. We ride steeply upwards along the valley coming down from the pass, passing over detritus and among boulders, with votive cairns here and there. A stretch of almost level ground follows, and then at last the path rises steeply to the pass, which is strewn with innumerable blocks of grey granite. This is the Ta-la or “Horse Pass,” and its absolute height is 17,835 feet.
If the ascent among the boulders is troublesome, and both horse and rider have to twist their bodies in all kinds of acrobatic feats, the pilgrim is richly rewarded when he stands at the top of the Ta-la beside the streamer-decked cairn; for anything grander and more overpowering I have never yet seen, unless it were on the top of the Chang-lung-yogma. The panorama to the south-east and east-south-east is so fascinating that we almost forget to dismount. We command a somewhat limited portion of the horizon, for two peaks of the Ta-la crest, like the portal of a great temple, close in the landscape in front of us. Below is a zone of reddish-brown, dome-shaped hills, behind them a nearly black spur, intersected by numerous short transverse valleys, and farther in the background a dark grey ramification. All seem to run westwards and from the watershed, which we have supposed to lie to the east of our route since we crossed the Sela-la. Such scenery as this we had gazed upon time after time. But high above the dark-grey ridge rises a world of mountains which seems to belong to the heavens rather than the earth, so lightly and airily is it poised above the rest of the earth under a canopy of white clouds. It is so far from us that the individual contours are indistinguishable, and it rises like a wall of a universal light blue hue, which, however, is a little deeper than the colour of the sky. The boundary between the two expanses of blue is sharply marked by an irregular bright white line; for what we see before us is the snow-covered crest of the Himalayas, and behind it lies India with its eternal summer. These are the most northern chains of the Himalayas, on the frontier between Tibet and Bhotan. Between them and the dark grey crest, comparatively near to us, yawns an abyss, a huge fissure on the earth’s crust, the valley of the Brahmaputra or Tsangpo. The river itself is not visible, but we feel that we are now not far from our destination. Ah, you fearful ranges and passes which we have surmounted in the Chang-tang, where dead horses mark the miles and show in which direction we travelled, at last we have you behind us, and only a single mountain system, the Himalayan, separates us from India! This view strikes us dumb, and it seems wonderful to me that I have succeeded in forcing my way so far.
Tsering and Bolu now reach the pass with the small caravan. They fall on their knees before the heap of stones and recite their prayers, and Tsering tears a strip off his ragged coat to tie as an offering on to one of the strings. We all feel as though we were on a pilgrimage. The Tibetans who let their yaks on hire see after the loading and unloading, gather fuel, and relieve the Ladakis of many of their duties. The older men of our own people are allowed to ride. They have easier work in every way, but still they are pilgrims on the way to one of the greatest centres of Lamaism. Old Tsering holds his cap in his hand as he goes over the pass, and cannot turn his eyes aside from the dreamy light-blue mountains which gleam in the distance among the clouds. He reminds himself that they rise far beyond Tashi-lunpo and that we have not to cross them to reach our longed-for destination.
But we must leave this grand pass, the never-to-be-forgotten Ta-la. Down we go on a break-neck descent among boulders, between steep cliffs, over landslips and spurs, and the Himalayas gradually vanish from sight. Now we see only the line of the crest tipped with eternal snow; after we have descended a couple of slopes, it also is concealed by the dark grey ridge, and our horizon is bounded by its sharp outline. Kabbalo is a village of two tiny stone cabins in the Permanakbo-tang valley where we encamp. Several Tibetans are out of doors and stare at us; for dinner I have butter and radishes, and see no more of the perpetual mutton.
On February 5 we made a short march down the same valley, which is called Dokang, where we set up our camp No. 124. Forty Tibetans stood at the camp-fire. When I rode up they all thrust out their tongues as far as they would go, and their bright red colour formed a strong contrast to the dirty faces. Those who wore caps took them off with the left hand and scratched their heads with the right—another form of salutation. When we spoke with them they repeatedly shot out their tongues, but only from politeness and friendliness; they could not do enough to show their goodwill. Near the camp are the ruins of a dzong, or fort, which is called Dokang-pe, and a deserted village called Arung-kampa testifies that the valley was formerly more densely populated than now.
The march on the 6th is one I shall never forget; for now we rode down the gigantic staircase, the edge of the Chang-tang, into the Ginunga gap which we had seen from the Ta-la, and in the depths of which flows the upper Brahmaputra. From the camp we marched towards the south-south-east, leaving our river on the right, which, cutting through the mountains in a deep ravine, flows to the Rung-chu. At the entrance of the narrow valley stands a small temple, the Chega-gompa. A pack of wolves howled dismally in a gorge. The ascent to the pass La-rock (14,567 feet) is short and easy, and before we were aware we were up at a great cairn amid smaller heaps of stones, where the tarpoche (votive pole) stands grey and cracked, and much worn by wind and weather (Illustration 100). Several blocks of stone lying in heaps on the east side of the pass were white-washed on their upright sides. We had to cross over two more smaller ridges before we had a free and uninterrupted view. The scene is grand, and reminds one of the landscape seen from the palace at Leh. The northern ranges of the Himalayas were distinctly visible, but heavy clouds rested like a canopy on their peaks. Mount Everest, therefore, the highest mountain of the world, could not be seen. The Tsangpo appeared as a very small bright riband, still at a considerable distance. Below us flowed the Rung-chu, which we could see from the place where it emerges from the mountains. Most imposing are the colossal offshoots and ramifications of the mountains lying to the east and west of our position, which fall suddenly to the valley of the Brahmaputra like an endless row of tiger’s claws.