Mt. Kailash - Manasarovar Sojourn - 8

It was 9:45 a.m. by the time the convoy left Manasarovar on the 30th of August as we headed towards Mt. Kailash. The road is a good one that is tarred and well maintained. After some 45 minutes to one hour of driving we came across a village called Horchi. That's the name that our driver Pasang seemed to give, but I must caution here that the way these drivers pronounce these names and the consequent spelling that we seem to deduce may differ considerably from the real spelling that is given officially. For instance, Pasang seemed to pronounce the name of a lake as Lake Picuso, but I gather that it is actually spelt Piegutso.

One interesting aspect of some of these towns is that they seem to be straight of a cowboy wild-west movie of the 1960 hollywood style. Horchi town exactly seemed to be like that as is clear from the photograph on the left. The inhabitants too are frequently donned in cowboy style hats of some Mexican style as will be shown in our photographs.

A Tibetan porter with a Mexican Outlaw appearance!

After another half-hour drive we arrive at what is called 'Yamadwar' (Door of Yama, the lord of death). It consists of a simple structure with an open passage running through. There is a bell suspended from the roof. One is supposed to pass through this passage to overcome the fear of death before he embarks on a trek to Mt. Kailash. On either side of this structure, there are cylindrical stone heaps, with boulder sized stones, some carved with Tibetan letters and others carved with various geometric motifs. I could not find anyone in the vicinity who would be able to explain the meaning of these carved stone mounds to me. All vehicles that come to this spot circumambulate the Yamadwara once before proceeding ahead to Shershong from where the Mt. Kailash Parikrama starts.

One of the two stone mounds.

Right: Mr. Yama in a red down jacket seated at Yamadwara








Later we drove from Yamadwara to Shershong which we reached at 12:20 p.m. At Shershong we were allotted porters or ponies as per our earlier spelt-out needs. As I found the cost of a pony rather stiff at 1200 Yuans, I settled for a porter at 600 Yuans. A local chief organises the allotment of porters and ponies and I was allotted a young girl by the name of Paso.

On the valley-wall to the left, as one looks upstream, one notices a Tibetan settlement at some height above the valley-floor level. This structure looks like a monastery and has some smaller structures beside it. It seems to have been built right into the valley wall.


(Left: Structures at Shershong)



We commenced the trek to Dirapuk at 12:45 p.m. armed with a cane stick and many chocolate bars and flasks of water. A Nepalese Sherpa with us called Dilli had an altimeter watch that gave an altitude reading of 4535 m at Shershong. (almost 15000 feet)