Gyantse:
Although it ranks as Tibet's third largest "city," Gyantse is still a small agricultural center about 50 miles west of Lhasa. To the visitor, Gyantse is primarily known for its nine-tiered stupa (a monument to house Buddhist relics). This particular stupa is known as a "Kumbum" (literally, "100,000 thousand images of Buddha").
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The Kumbum at Gyantse houses the traditional 108 separate Buddhist chapels and over 10,000 murals (count 'em!). Visitors can walk the clockwise circuit up the tiers, snooping into each chapel as they climb to the top. The reward, besides the often dazzling display of relics, Buddha statues and murals along the way, are the panoramic vistas from the Kumbum's summit.
Gyantse's other main attraction, the reddish-brown Pelkor Chode Monastery, stands in stark contrast to the whitewashed Kumbum next door. Similarly, the monastery's plain exterior contrasts with its ornately decorated interior, lined wall-to-wall with sparkling golden Buddhas. As your eyes adjust to the candlelight darkness, the space comes alive with intricately-carved wooden ceilings and mandalas, or geometric designs symbolic of the universe.
Above Gyantse, high atop a mountain, looms the town's Fort ("Dzong"). Now in ruin, the fort is the site where, in 1903, Tibetan forces were overpowered by the British during a pivotal territorial dispute.
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Viewable from the road linking Gyantse and Lhasa is the turquoise blue, scorpion-shaped Yamdrok Lake. The lake, considered sacred by local Buddhists, has no perennial water source, save for a trickle of mountain run-off. But it now has an outlet - a hydroelectric power plant that is syphoning off water to a nearby river. Locals are understandably concerned; they contend the lake will be drained by the year 2020.
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Gyantse
is featured
on the following tour: |
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