CHINA’S OPEN DOOR TO TIBET

A medley of Chinese and foreign songs--including a syrupy version of “Swanee River” in English and Chinese--played on the sound system of our sleek Japanese-made bus as we rolled through the barren semi-desert of western China toward Tibet.

With the fabled Kunlun Mountains of Taoist legend looming before us, our driver stopped to give rides to three burgundy-robed Tibetan monks hitchhiking our way. A pilgrim seated behind us softly chanted a prayer. Chinese passengers traveling to the “Roof of the World” on work assignments munched sunflower seeds or settled in to sleep away the hours.

Only a few weeks before, Peking had dropped the last of its restrictions on travel to Lhasa. Now anyone with a Chinese visa could hop onto a bus or plane to this ancient Tibetan city, which for centuries was one of the world’s most inaccessible cultural centers.

The opening of Tibet, a historic event in itself, also dramatizes the transformation in recent years of all of China to a place where anyone with endurance and patience can travel independently, rubbing elbows literally and figuratively with ordinary Chinese citizens.

On a month-long journey from Hong Kong through China and across the Himalayas to Nepal, my wife and I traveled 3,600 miles by plane, train, bus, truck, van and foot. We usually stopped at hotels whose quality ranged from good to Spartan, but we also passed several nights in Chinese or Tibetan homes.

Hitchhiking through the countryside east of Lhasa, we stayed with road maintenance workers, with fishermen camped by the turquoise waters of the Yarlung Zangbo River and with the Communist Party leader of a small Tibetan village. We were dinner guests of a Tibetan truck driver and his wife, and of army officers whose men had given us a ride.

Our ability to speak Chinese enriched such encounters and helped make them frequent. But we met dozens of people unable to speak Chinese who were traveling on their own and enjoying similar experiences.

Peking’s move dropping all barriers against travel to Lhasa was part of a decision implemented Feb. 1 that raised to 244 the number of “open” cities and areas in China. That is more than double the 107 places that foreigners already could visit without special travel permits.

Although permits are still required for some remote areas, almost everywhere a foreign tourist might want to go is either in the general vicinity of an open city or on a route between one open city and another.

In practice, it is up to police to tell foreigners if they have entered a restricted area. But as long as travelers don’t linger too long, authorities rarely raise objections. Although most foreign travelers to Tibet fly to Lhasa, usually from Chengdu in neighboring Sichuan Province, we wanted to enter the region by land.

Our route took us by train from Hong Kong (where visas for independent travel in China are easily obtained) to Canton, then by air to the Silk Road city of Lanzhou, the real kickoff point for our Tibetan adventure. From Lanzhou we traveled by train to Xining and Golmud, where we caught one of the buses that depart daily for the 720-mile, two-day trip to Lhasa.

A half-day’s journey southwest from Golmud took the bus over 15,869-foot Kunlun Pass onto the barren highlands of the Tibetan plateau, although this area is part of Qinghai Province rather than what the Chinese call the Tibet Autonomous Region.

As we rode along, a sharp early April wind sometimes blew light snow, and sometimes small dust storms, across the two lanes of asphalt that broke the high desert. At one point, storm-gray clouds sat on the ground off to one side. But much of the time we traveled under blue sky and a fierce sun that burned into all it struck, despite the chill in the air.

After passing the night with other passengers in a barracks-style hotel in a small town about 15,500 feet above sea level, we left before dawn for 17,388-foot Tanggula Pass.

Crossing Tanggula can be dangerous, because it is the highest pass on any of the overland routes to Lhasa. We intentionally traveled slowly from Lanzhou, giving our bodies a week to adjust to the rising altitude, and as an added precaution were taking Diomox, a medicine for prevention of altitude sickness.

We made it over with nothing worse than moderate headaches. But travelers in poor health or those who come up too quickly from the lowlands face grave risks.

Altitude Problems

Any tourist considering overland travel to Tibet should talk seriously with a physician about altitude sickness and its prevention. An elderly Tibetan woman on our bus, who apparently had been at low elevations and also suffered from heart trouble, was stricken with altitude sickness. After we reached Lhasa we were told that she had died.

Lhasa’s 11,830-foot altitude constantly challenges the energy of travelers. But the best hotel in town, the Lhasa Fandian, provides guests with a welcome pick-me-up in the form of oxygen, available as standard equipment in rooms running about $38 for a double. A hotel clerk said that most guests, upon arrival from the airport, use the oxygen.

Cheaper places such as the Banak Shol--a popular hotel on Xingfu Lu (Happiness Road) where double rooms cost $3--offer no oxygen supplies, and guests who have flown into Lhasa usually just take things easy for a day or two.

Dalai Lama’s Palace

By their second or third day in town, however, most travelers are ready to appreciate the wonders that drew them in the first place.

The Potala Palace--former residence of the Dalai Lama, the exiled priestly king of Tibet who is revered as a reincarnation of the Bodhisattva (Buddha-to-be) of Compassion--dominates sightseeing lists as dramatically as it looms above the city. The artistic beauty of its residential and religious quarters impresses all who enter its fortress-like walls.

Visitors can wander through the Jokhang Temple, the holiest site of Tibetan Buddhism, as pilgrims prostrate themselves in prayer.

We joined a crowd of more than 1,000 Tibetans at the Jokhang one morning when the inner sanctuary housing a 1,350-year-old jewel-incrusted golden image of the Buddha was open for prayer.

The scent from hundreds of yak-butter lamps was almost overpowering as the line of worshipers--mostly peasants and herders, men in sheepskin coats and women in black robes with brightly colored aprons--wound past the paintings on the inner walls and into the side shrines that surround the main worship hall.

End of the Line

From Lhasa we made a 10-day excursion east that started with an all-day bus trip along the Chengdu road to the town of Bayi, where the bus line ended. In recent years many foreigners hitchhiking between Chengdu and Lhasa have passed this way. We met one of them--a middle-aged Danish man who spoke no Chinese, and who had reached here from Chengdu in 10 days, slightly faster than average. We heard later that a Lhasa-based bus company was planning to begin thrice-weekly service between Chengdu and Lhasa.

From Bayi we crossed the glacier-fed Yarlung Zangbo River--which becomes the more famous Bramaputra after slicing its way through the Himalayas to India--and slowly hitched back toward Lhasa. Little traffic plies this road, made treacherous by dunes of wind-blown sand from the river.

Sometimes we walked half a day without seeing a vehicle. We passed pine-forested mountainsides and villages made idyllic by thousands of peach trees bursting with blooms, then the land rose gradually to the more barren countryside of the high plateau.

Tibet to Nepal

Travelers who wish to exit Tibet over the Nepal border--which requires permits easily obtained from public security offices--often join to hire Jeeps for the 520-mile trip, which typically takes two to five days, depending on how much sightseeing is done along the way.

But we covered the first half of this route by bus, stopping overnight in Gyangze and Xigaze, two towns with beautiful monasteries. At the Xigaze Hotel we found a van driver willing to let us ride along to the border for about $15 each.

The last high pass on this route, crossed before reaching the Himalayas, offers a panorama of Mt. Everest and other peaks rising abruptly from the plateau.

Tourists are also entering Tibet from Nepal by this road in growing numbers, but they face an extreme one-day rise in altitude, leaving 7,500-foot-high Zhangmu in the morning and crossing two passes of slightly more than 17,000 feet the same day.

Total Expenses

We crossed into Nepal 34 days after entering China from Hong Kong. Our total expense for two people--all transportation in China, food, lodging and a few souvenirs--was $692. Adding the cost of round-trip tickets to Hong Kong and one-way air fare from Katmandu to Hong Kong, such a journey can be made from Los Angeles for about $1,500 per person.

It appears that Lhasa, a city of 60,000, will soon be crowded with tourists. On the day we left Katmandu its English-language paper, the Rising Nepal, reported that a visiting Tibetan official said Tibet plans to receive between 15,000 and 20,000 tourists this year, and expects to increase that figure to 100,000 by 1990.

The official, Vice Chairman Puqung of the Tibet Autonomous Region, also told local journalists that Tibet plans to set up its own aviation company; the date for opening a direct flight linking Lhasa with Katmandu is under discussion between the Chinese and Nepalese governments.