Tibet Tours

TIBET –  Shangri-La on Earth

Tibet at a Glance                

Land Area: Aprox 2.5 million sq km
Geography: Tibet is located with borders with Sichuan and Yunnan to the east; Qinghai and Xinjiang provinces to west and north; to the south with India, Nepal, Bhutan and Burma.

Capital: Lhasa
Population: 6 million.
Language: Tibetan and Chinese (Mandarin). 
Currency: Yuan
Main Religions: Buddhism & Bon Po.  
People: The Tibet’s native people are Tibetan, Bodpa, Chinese and Pinyin. 

Tibet tour starts with their unique hospitality. Upon your arrival at the airport, you are greeted with the khada, a soft ceremonial cotton/silk made scarf of about a meter and half length. It is their traditional form of garland used to worship their gods and goddesses in the temples and monasteries as a result of scarcity of flowers due to poor vegetation in Tibet. So, it is wonderful to experience yourself being greeted as gods and goddesses in their homeland.

Next, if you happen to visit private home, you are offered a bowl with a special salty tea brewed with yak butter and tea. It has a very special nostalgic taste. Their homes are decorated as a miniature monastery with the images of gods and goddesses with khada, water and other food items like tsampa. This is the reason why their whole houses and monasteries including the individuals are pleasantly smell like yak butter and incense of juniper leaves.

The Tibetan life style is unique. Their women dressed up with a dark-colored wrap dresses over a bright colorful blouse.  They also dress up with a colorfully striped woven woolen apron on the front side of the body below their waist. It is called pangden. It is the symbol their married status plus the pattern of stripes tells which area of Tibet the ladies belong to.  Generally, men wear a dark grey colored gown like dress covering whole body with long sleeves. Although everywhere western dresses are over taking the traditional dresses, still Tibetan hamlets and cities abound with men and women in the traditional Tibetan attire. It is really interesting to watch them as if it is an ethnic fashion show during your visit in Tibet. If you wish, you can also try and wear the Tibetan costumes and enjoy photo session with them, particularly on the roof top of the Potala Palace where this facility is available at a nominal cost.   

Unique is their food habit as well. As barley is the major crop in Tibet, the staple food of Tibet is the flour milled from the roasted barley called tsampa.  Mostly, it is enjoyed by mixing with their national beverage called yak butter tea. Momos, Thukpa  and Balep Breads are some of the major food items popularly enjoyed by the Tibetans with much interest and festivity.  

The most unique is its wonderful landscape. Even amidst the highly arid and dry environment, the charm of the Tibetan landscape has no comparison in the world. Its ever changing color and light over its varied landscape with the snowcapped mountains around is so wonderfully photogenic that it is beyond our imagination. It is a land of innumerable beautiful fresh water and salt lakes. It is, in fact, a paradise for the photographers. Do visit Tibet. You will certainly agree with us.

Tibet is worth visiting once in you lifetime. It is because this is where many unique and unbelievable practices are being undertaken even in this present day modern world. Have you heard of sky burial (offering of chopped dead human bodies to the birds)? Have you heard of polyandry (one wife with more than one husband)? Have you heard of taking bath once in a year? Such an interesting lifestyle is still in practice. That is in Tibet.  

It is unbelievable for us to believe that the formation of the Tibetan plateau dates back to the period prior to 60 million years. The geologists from Geological Society of London  describe that the Himalayan mountain range and Tibetan plateau got formed as a result of the collision between the Indian and Eurasian Plates and it is continuing even today and continues for the days to come. The recent earthquakes in and around this area are the result of this continuous pressure building up through the years.

After learning the amazing geological information about the formation of the Tibetan plateau, anybody would be fascinated to visit Tibet. What about you? Do not delay. Tibet is fast changing under the Chinese influence. Early bird catches the worm. You know it better.

Actually, you can enter Tibet from either the mainland China by the highest train journey or flight; or by overland or flight from Nepal. The shortest way to visit Tibet is Nepal where we (LALIMA TRAVELS PVT. LTD.) are based to provide you all the needful travel related services. You can fly in to Lhasa (just 1 hour) and drive out overland to Nepal or first drive in to Tibet overland and fly back to Nepal or to the mainland China. You have the options. Just join any one of our carefully designed tours, you will be fascinated!