From Gyantse

we're 4 days into the ride, have done 250km, climbed 3 passes  of 4790m (Khamba), Karo (5039) and Simi (4330), and camped in the middle of nowhere for 3 nights. Tonight we're in a hotel in Gyantsa. 100km tomorrow to Shigatze (2nd biggest city in Tibet). All good so far. No altitude issues or other health or mechanical issues.  The road is great and the traffic not too bad. Worst on the steep 1100m climb up Khamba pass on Day 2 but the view from the top and teh descent made it worthwhile.  The top of Karo Pass was cold and bleak, with some sleet, and huge ice walls only 100m or so above us. The scenery today on the valley leading into Gyantse was spectacular - a mixture of desert, farmland, ancient ruins and modern infrastructure. The engineering on roads, power, dams and particularly water control (aquaducts, causeways etc) to prevent the snow melt from washing everythig away has to be seen to be believed, yet the people still live a primitive and isolated live. We're told the scenery tomorrow oput of Gyantse is even better than today. Photos do not do justice to this part of the world.  I will be able to add photos very couple of days but not sure how often I can get to this blog (only a very circuitous route gets around the Chinese block on blogspot). Flickr is nt blocked so uploading photos is easy. After tomorrow night we have 9 nights camping, so will probably runout of computer power, so won't be able to post anything