Namtso Lake
After breakfast we were off to Namtso Lake. It was a short drive from our hotel in Damxung town. The drive was 45 minutes for about 40km.
We arrived at the entrance of the Lake Scenic Area at about 9am and our guide went down to get our tickets. The ticket costed ¥210 per person, which were entry and tourist shuttle.
Our van stopped at a car park near the entrance, there were several stores selling “tourist stuffs”, all the stores were not operating (low tourist season). We saw a stone sign indicating that we were at altitude was at 5950m and the name of this place was called NagenLa.
At Nagenla we could hardly see the lake. From there we boarded tourist shuttle bus that took us nearer to the lake. The ride was about 15 minutes. Near the lake side we alighted and saw a couple of white hairy yaks. These were not wild, they were brought here by their owners for tourists interested in a “photoshoot” with the white yaks.
The scenic area was a “triangular shape” peninsula. This peninsula was name Tashi Dor Peninsula. Near the lake there was a huge stone sign indicating that Namtso lake was the world highest altitude Salt Lake. Wow, we thought it was a fresh water lake! Where did all the salt came from?
Namtso lake was also official known as Namcuo Lake (纳木错) or Namco. It was one of Tibet Heavenly Lakes. The lake had a surface area of 1,900 km2 . There were two very tall gigantic rocks by the edge of the lake adorned with lots of white prayer flags. This two iconic rocks were the Yingbin Stone (Welcomng Stone) also known as the Husband and Wife Stones.
Namtso Lake was a sacred lake in Tibet Buddhism and pilgrims would make kora *ritual circumambulation” around the lake.
We saw a stone seller, she had many stones with Tibetan words (Om Mani Padme Hum) carved on it. Traditionally after buying the stone, one could add it to a Mani Piles near the lakes as an offering for peace, protection and good fortune.
On the peninsular was a temple, Tashi Temple. It was built under the cliff . There were a row of stupas right in front of it. We heard some chanting coming from the temple and went up to investigate.
There were some praying ritual going on. A group of lamas were chanting They were fine with us watching them chanting and taking photos too.
Namtso lake was very beautiful and very blue. The backdrop of snow alps on the opposite side of the lake enhanced the beauty of the lake. The primary source of water of the lake came from melting snow and glacier of the Nyenchen Tanglha mountain along its southern border and natural precipitation. This inflow into the lake was balanced by intense evaporation of the lake which was a close basin. Though the centuries salt accummulated resulting in a salted lake.
We had a great time at the lake as this lake was very beautiful and not crowded with visitors. We got opportunity to explore it leisurely at our own pace. Near to noon, the weather got pretty hot and the sunray was very strong. We supposed the ultra violet intensity around the lake was very intense.
We had to take the tourist shuttle bus back to the entrance of Namtso Lake Scenic Area. Just after the entrance we found a “coffee van” and was so happy to had our coffee break!
Last Evening in Lhasa
From Namtso Lake back to Lhasa was a three hour drive over a distance if 210 km. We reached our hotel in Lhasa central by about 5.30pm. We stayed in the same hotel as we had done so on our three two night in Lhasa, it was Lhasa Snow Paradise International Hotel (Potala Palace).
We liked the hotel because of it proximity to the center and the its SMART ROOM. The hotel was newly renovated and theincorporated these smart rooms. Many tasks in the room were controlled by voice. So when we wanted to call it a night, we just said “XiowDu XiowDu (小度 小度) ” to initiated the smart controller then said “good nite” in Mandarin, XiowDu the smart system would switched off the TV, closed the curtain and off all the lights!! It was really fun!!
Dinner with a view
We found this restaurant that had a great view of Potala Palace. The name of the hotel was “星月菩提观景餐厅·藏餐·川菜·咖啡(布达拉宫店)”. It had a viewing deck that was only accessible by restaurant customers. The internal of the restaurant was partitions into cubicles and we had a nice cubicle to ourselves (5 of us). We ordered our food and when they arrived they looked delicious. The cost of the meals for 5 including drinks was ¥150 per person.
When the sunset we went up to the view deck for some nice photoshoots.
Bye Bye Tibet
The next day we flew out of Lhasa on an afternoon flight. Our guide and driver brought us to the airport on time. There we gave them their tips and bated good bye. The standard rates for tips (as told to us by our agency) was ¥100/day to the driver and ¥150/day to the guide.
We found our guide very lacking in many “comfort” knowledge like where was a nice restaurant, where was a nice cafe, where were the cleaner toilet/restrooms, how warmly should we dressed up the next day. These information were very essential to make us comfortable but our guide were only good with “technical/historical information of Tibet”.