Expedition Update - Departures
The concept of a ‘departure' has all changed since Sebastian’s arrival into our little orbit. Now a departure isn’t simply an exciting...
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Jeff Fuchs
Apr 27, 20211 min
A Pass, The 'Feel', and Karma's Chai
The mind wanders back to a pass, a blizzard, and that wonderful thing that exists still: instinct. On a day of few words along a portion...
Jeff Fuchs
Apr 2, 20211 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Departure and the Cherub
The final destination along the Tea Horse Road, both for our own expedition and for the great journeys of the past, was Kalimpong, in...
Jeff Fuchs
Mar 9, 20212 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Part Goat and a Little Part Human
Over the course of years since meeting Dorjè I’ve written and pondered much about him. “Part goat and a little part human” was how he was...
Jeff Fuchs
Mar 7, 20212 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Choices, No Choices, and some Courage
Ascending up to the Sho La Pass in northwestern Yunnan in May there would always be a chance of weather issues, but it would still be a...
Jeff Fuchs
Feb 27, 20211 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Tea and Bloodlines
On foot our team of four puttered and wandered west (often faintly lost) through the Nyanqen Tanghla mountains in Tibet towards Lhasa....
Jeff Fuchs
Feb 19, 20211 min
The Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Remnants
Within the tidy remnants of a former ‘Tea and Horse Trade Office’ in Mingshan County, near Ya’an in Sichuan, Jamyan and I wandered for 25...
Jeff Fuchs
Feb 11, 20211 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Other Tales and Sight
Not all stories of the Tea Horse Road were ones of grand expanses, snow caps, or buzzing tea sessions. A friend from the Yi minority...
Jeff Fuchs
Feb 9, 20211 min
Tea Horse Chronicles - Fields vs Forests
Blankets and ridges of green stimulant leaf lie in rows near Puerh. Here the leaf is entirely industry. Gorgeous industry, but still...
Jeff Fuchs
Feb 3, 20211 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Empress of Cloth
Ponzera, or Benzilan as it is now known, is a small valley town in northwestern Yunnan that lies alongside a headwater stream of the...
Jeff Fuchs
Jan 28, 20211 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Way Out, and Out Again
Yeshi and I shared tea with this old memory palace of time. Goat milk and butter were used instead of yak variations. The tea was deadly...
Jeff Fuchs
Jan 26, 20211 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - There Are No Straight Lines Through the Mountains
Not heeding the warnings of Sonam Gelek; I should have known better at this stage of our journey than to plunge onwards without his...
Jeff Fuchs
Jan 14, 20211 min
Tea Horse Chronicles - Tea's Value
“Tea is our everything. I don’t know where it comes from but we take it every day in the morning, afternoon, and night. Our children...
Jeff Fuchs
Jan 7, 20211 min
Tea Horse Chronicles - The Hostess, The Keeper
A nomadic hostess (nemo) offers up a smile to our sun and grime battered crew near Ala Jagung, Tibet. The smile that comes from living so...
Jeff Fuchs
Jan 5, 20211 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Jokhang Boys
After 52 days of trekking from my then home in Zhongdian (aka: Shangrila/Jiantang/Gyalthang) in northwestern Yunnan, a small celebration...
Jeff Fuchs
Dec 28, 20201 min
Tea Horse Chronicles - 'The Dorjè'
Immersed in a hotspring that is tucked within a mountain cave, sitting beside the venerable and irrepressible Dorjè Kandro. Just days...
Jeff Fuchs
Dec 27, 20201 min
Tea Horse Chronicles - The Fry
Dakpa and I had been rolling around tea forests, tea houses, and tea characters for months at this point along portions and strands of...
Jeff Fuchs
Dec 11, 20201 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles, Part 5 - The Load (Gyap'kè)
A continuation of some of the embedded moments - both large and small - of our 7.5 month expedition to chart and document the Tea Horse...
Jeff Fuchs
Dec 8, 20202 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles, Part 4, The Ebb
Tea Horse Road Chronicles Part 4. Continuing with an homage and tribute to spaces, moments, and sparks in the memory palace of time spent...
Jeff Fuchs
Dec 1, 20202 min
Tea Horse Road Chronicles - Part 1
The coming weeks' posts will delve back into the memory palace of moments from our 7.5 month expedition along the Tea Horse Road, to...
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