Thinking about times past, lessons, and inspired moments and a little sun burned cheeks, few words, and a fearless countenance comes to mind. Thinking too about the importance of communities that still transfer their knowledge as a point of pride and pragmatism. Little Lubden with the abilities to read and feel what his ancestors long were able to. Knowledge kept!! Often (so very often) I’ve been treated to moments – or a series of moments – when the senses are engaged, the b

Sonam moves up singing, chatting, all the while moving through his Tibetan Mala beads. Mingmar dances from stone outcroppings to thatches of stems and back. Always he is looking for medicine, herbs, or simply that which matters to him – and when outdoors, there is much that matters to our energetic Mingmar. He carries an extra back pack for juniper that he will collect, which will in turn be dried and used as incense. Above all of us is the land where ice, stone, winds, and t

Langtang, the land called “Ox’s land” is grassland valley and ‘was’ a village…one that has been destroyed, reset eastward and rebuilt (if such a thing is possible). It lives again not far from a swath of rubble, stone, and line strokes that descend from the north. An avalanche obliterated the village with inhabitants, travellers, and animals alike being wiped out. The ‘new’ Langtang sits just east and higher than the swath of stone that covers what once was. Crossing the rubb

Abu is chatty. Not prone to overly long sessions of speaking, Abu, when he is talking, usually has something to expel and it is always a treat watching it begin to emerge. Weeks in and heading west out of old Samzong to Lo Manthang, with our caravan of two and four-legged ones spread along a weaving line, Abu is going on how “the valleys need to talk to one another and they need to share”. His energy is ‘up’ and his eyes glow with some sort of inner force of conviction, which

The Tibetan term ‘gtum mo’, pronounced “Tummo” refers to the tantric tradition of meditation that summons or produces heat and a kind of blissful warmth within the body. It is a kind of yogic heat, which is attained through a practice that involves hyperventilation and visualization and it is one of the many practices of these mountains. One of the many gifts that they eyes can feast on in Mustang. Perception and perspective are everything. Living with elements that aren’t si

‘The Rice Eater’. A particularly strategic rice coveting monkey in Kathmandu who provided a spectacle lasting for 20 minutes. A new year comes and some looking back at moments and a summoning back of experiences and people seems required to pay homage to time having passed. This contemplation isn’t something noble but rather something of appreciation, and it very much more than Tea and Mountains…though they will always tinker with time and moments. Even the darker moments can

Gongotri Glacier – Great Feeder of the River Ganges One of the great moving river bodies of the planet, the mother Ganges, is fed by the Himalayan Water Towers; glaciers that ebb slowly at greater speeds. We know the river itself but not necessarily the epic bodies that feed it. They are revered and worshiped…and they do ebb. The Gangotri is one of those feeders, lying in India’s stunning Uttarakhand State. The article in September/October, 2017’s edition is based on a month

Berinder is impatient and staring in his mournful way at Saurabh and I to hurry. He wants to move and it is our day to make another incursion into the Chaturangi Glacier valley and then head south up a smaller feed valley. The three of us for much of this journey have been a party of wanderers while others wait in base camp. Berinder has had his tea and stands like a shy gunslinger with hands at the side, ready. Some of the multi-hues of Chaturangi Glacier We chug tea down in

Berinder, with pink wooly marvellously intact. Berinder is his name. Tiny, unsmiling, and topped off with a vibrant pink woolen cap I’ve locked onto him and his intense energy. These porters can take the breath with their abilities to pirouette on little more than rubber soles, while hauling crippling loads. There is a not-so-secret adoration I have for them and I’ve long been fascinated with their balance of sinuous power and clairvoyance on ‘all things mountain’. Our porter

First steps towards Gangotri Glacier involve words from an impeccable source. For six decades Swami Sunderland has climbed, wandered, and worshipped the great bodies of ice and stone from his simple home in Gangotri. He arrived here and was held by the silences, and the divine mountain gifts. Whatever the reasons for the great bodies of ice to recede, they do recede and Swami is as wise and observant as a family member. Swami Sunderanand – A man who’s soul belongs to the moun

Preparation Notes…and Tea Stirring through some cakes and balls of tea deciding on the leaves to take on this upcoming venture to the Himalayan Headwaters of the great Ganga, the sacred life giving Ganges River. A 2,527 km river of water that sluices through the Indo-Gangetic Plain and discharges close to 40 thousand cubic metres of water per second (third in the world). Tea = Fuel. Even in the realm of the glaciers This journey, beyond all of the stuff needed, beyond fabrics

The long ridgeline of sediment and stone from a glacier has made a wall beside our trail. Known as an esker it is a thing of power and sculpted magnificence. Accelerating – and then retreating glaciers – have left stone and deposits of sand and grey as some of the only evidence of their wanderings. It is such lakes (calm as they might appear) that often develop into danger lakes that have the ability to burst sending a vertical tsunami downwards. We are leaving Bara Shigri af

Glacier water sluices down near the Changtang region of the Himalayas Preparing to head back into the precious Himalayas of Ladakh for a month of living atop two glaciers to see what the great bodies of ice are up to. Moraine and stone on the Bara Shigri glacier in Himachal Pradesh. It is part of an initiative not simply to ‘explore’ and discover but rather observe, document and bring back a tangible view of a glacier’s life – day and night. ‘Impact Exploration’ with a goal t

Returning to northwestern Yunnan’s snow-clad mountains and their precious waterways. We’ll wander up the Salween River (pronounced Gyalmo Gyul Chu and written རྒྱལ་མོ་རྔུལ་ཆུ། in Tibetan) to the eastern extension of the Himalayas and a slow route south along portions of both the Mekong (pronounced Dza Chu in Tibetan and written རྫ་ཆུ) and Yangtze (Ma Chu at the source and written རྨ་ཆུ) Rivers. All of these waterways find their way off of the Tibetan Plateau and collectively