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Four marches from Shekar found us at Rongbuk, the final march from Chodzong to the Rongbuk Monastery being extremely interesting. There is only one word for it: the valleys of Tibet leading up to the Rongbuk Monastery are hideous. The hills are formless humps, dull in colour; of vegetation there is next to none. At our camp at Chodzong, however, on the hillside opposite our camp, there was quite a large grove of thorn-trees. We had visions of a wood fire very quickly damped when we were told that this grove was inhabited by the most active and most malicious of demons, and that he would promptly get to work if we interfered and carried away any sticks from his grove.

The Upper Rongbuk Valley is an extremely sacred valley; no animals are allowed to be killed in it. In fact, the great Mani at the mouth of the valley opposite the village of Chobu marks the limit beyond which animals are not allowed to be killed. We were told that if we wanted any fresh meat it was all to be killed lower down the valley and carried up to us. The Tibetans themselves live very largely on dried meats, both yak meat and mutton. I have never tried it myself, and its appearance was enough to put off anyone but a hungry dog, but I am told that when cooked it is by no means bad. Most Tibetans, however, eat it raw in its dried state. I bought quantities of both sorts for the porters. They cooked it as they would cook fresh meat, and it seemed to suit them very well. For the sake of their health, however, I gave them, whenever possible, fresh meat, and with the very finest results.