Lo Manthang: a splendid isolation

In Lo Manthang we stayed at the Mona Lisa guest house (how they arrived at the name, I don't know), where a wonderful family took care of our needs. The wife of the family, Karsang, was a smart and strong woman who prepared our meals and cared for her two-year-old, sometimes simultaneously. The husband helped with the meals, looked after the family's livestock, and in the summer was part of a team that is restoring murals in the local monasteries.





Four generations lived together, the husband and wife, the husband's 62-year-old mother, a 92-year-old blind grandmother,

and an incredibly cute and impish 2-year-old, Nawang.










Since we were the only guests, we ate in the warmth of the kitchen, and it felt for the few days we were here like we were part of the family. Cooking is done on a a very efficient dung-fired stove from China and a 2-burner propane stove. Dried horse and cow dung are used; goat droppings burn the hottest. Though there is no shortage outdoors, the family buys bags of the goat dung.

Tibetan tea was our favorite

The staple food was dal bhat, rice with lentil soup and a little vegetable curry. Because the road had been closed for months, vegetables were in short supply, but the potatoes, cabbage, and cauliflower were very tasty. I was surprised that I was able to get by in the cold weather on a vegetarian diet.

In our humble unheated room, I was happy that I'd brought a sleeping bag.

On our first day out on the streets of Lo Manthang,

we visited a temple and two monasteries. A 35-member team of locals trained by an Italian conservator has been restoring ancient Buddhist murals in a monastery and temple. A young monk showed us around. Like many people in Upper Mustang, all but two monks went south for the winter to Pokhara or Kathmandu.

Thubchen monastery contains giant mandalas with pinhead-size detail. This is said to be the finest Buddhist art in the world, and Thubchen is one of only two examples left in the world, the other being in Tibet. Karsang's husband is on the restoration team, and it took him four years to learn the technique.

He also has his own gallery.

Near the big monastery of Chhyode Gompa, what appeared to be just a pile of stones around an old chorten was in fact hundreds of inscribed tablets.

Buildings are constructed from what we call adobe bricks, but with dung instead of straw in the mud. Chhyode Gompa's walls, however, are solid tamped mud. There is little rain in Mustang, just snow, so the walls last a long time.

Upper Mustang had its own king until 2008, when Nepal changed from a monarchy to a republic. The king's main palace is here in Lo Manthang, though he winters in Kathmandu.

The locals made us feel welcome, offering a greeting of "namaste." Life is not easy here, and the culture is changing rapidly due to Chinese and other outsider influence since completion of the road. Lo Manthang is only about 10 miles from the China/Tibet border.

These people are cleaning the animal enclosures that adjoin most houses. When the snow melts, they'll take the manure out to the fields. The late snows have delayed the start of farming.

Carrying hay to feed the livestock

Most of the livestock consists of horses, cows, and the occasional donkey. I expected to see yaks, but these few that had been brought down from the mountains for the winter were the only ones I noticed.

Yard yaks

I don't think anyone has ever said "The horses are ready" to me, yet on the second day after breakfast we saddled up for a two-hour ride to the Jhong caves, a 2500-year-old village cliff residence.

The adjacent contemporary village appears to have been inhabited by the Maoist rebels during Nepal's civil war.

The old monasteries were built on hilltops, and ruins are everywhere.

Our return to the modern world retraced our steps to Jomson, first by horses through 4 inches of new snow. A group of villagers passed us with pack horses to bring goods back from the Tsarang riverbed waystation. I could not help but feel a kinship to those adventurers in the times of Marco Polo who spent months on horseback in these barren mountain expanses.

Looking back at Lo Manthang's farmland under snow, I admired these enduring people and could hardly comprehend the reality of this exceptional experience.

So farewell to the Kingdom of Lo, its stark beauty, ancient traditions, and hardy people.