Jaunted - Tag: Tibet Travel

China Building World's Tallest Airport In Tibet

Omri — 2010-01-13T17:20:00-05:00

Tibet already has the world's highest airport, the Bamda Airport in Qamdo. Now China is planning to build an even higher structure, the 14,553-foot Nagqu Dagring Airport. The record-setting airport will be built in Nagqu Prefecture and is set to go live some time around 2014. Construction won't even begin until 2011, and the project is just one of 97 airports that the Chinese hope to build by 2020.

Of course since it's China there's no news that doesn't have some political upshot (just ask Google). The catch here is that Nagqu Dagring is part and parcel of a broader Chinese project to integrate Tibet into the rest of the country. They want to bring Chinese Han into Tibet and wouldn't mind seeing more Tibetans moving into the rest of China, and so they're developing the region's travel infrastructure accordingly. That's happening whether native Tibetans want it or not.

Shangri-La: Southwest China Field Trip: Life's Good In Shangri-La, But Not For Yaks

ced138 — 2009-10-16T10:43:38-05:00

All this week, Jaunted special embed Claire Duffett will be relaying the joys and jumbles of her travels through Southwest China including Tibet. Finally, she reaches Shangri-La:

Oh, Shangri-La. In a cynical attempt to drum up tourism, the Chinese government renamed the town of Zhongdian, which is a pleasant city with a lovely old town, after the fictional Utopia in Lost Horizon. Copies of the book are sold in every shop, so we read it, and no, there’s really no similarity between the fictional land and the town in northwestern Yunnan. But it is TIbetan, and that's cool.

Tibet: China Bans Tourists From Tibet To Lower Riot Risk...Again

amandak — 2009-09-29T14:53:51-05:00

If you're not already in Tibet today, it's going to be a little while before you're allowed to enter the region. The Chinese government has stopped issuing the special permits that foreigners require to enter Tibet and won't let any tourists in again until October 8.

This kind of behavior is, of course, nothing new. China spent decades banning tourists from Tibet until it was opened up a bit in the 1980s, and banned foreigners again in March 2008 in response to rioting.