Shigatse Area: (Tashilhunpo, Sakya, Mt Everest BC and Rongbuk) :-
Shigatse is the second largest city in Tibet and the capital of the Tsang province. It is 354 kilometers west of Lhasa at an altitude of 3180 meters.

1. Tashilhunpo Monastery
Tashilhunpo Monastery has long been Panchen Lama's seat. It is Shigatse's foremost attraction. This gorgeous monastery can be detected miles away with its gold tops reflecting the sunshine. Tashilhunpo holds the giant Future Buddha statue- biggest Buddha statue in the world. The statue is 26.2m high, 11.5m shoulder width, with numerous jewelry inlaid in the body, unbelievably imposing. Founded in AD 1447 by Genden Drup, the First Dalai lama and it is the seat of the Panchen Lama who is second to the Dalai Lama in Tibetan Buddhist hierarchy. The 5th Dalai Lama declared that his teacher, then the Abbot of Tashilhunpo, was a manifestation of the Buddha Amitabha and the fourth in line of incarnate Lamas who would henceforth be referred to by the title of Panchen Rinpoche.

2. Sakya Monastery
Sakya lies 143 kilometers to the southwest of Shigatse; Konchok Gyalpo founded Sakya Monastery the center of the Sakya order of Tibetan Buddhism, in 1073. Sakya rules reigned over Tibet for nearly a hundred years from the 13th to the 14th century and many of its priceless images, statues, Holy Scriptures remaining today back to the time to its founding. Sakya reached its heyday in the second half of the 13th century, when it was showered with gifts and privileges and given control over all Tibet by Kublai Khan, the Mongolia emperor of China. A separate sect of Tibetan Buddhism, named Sakyapa, also took from here. Sakye is reputed as the "Tibetan Dunhuang", for its great amount of Mongolian fineries, porcelain, statues, fresco, precious Tangkas and original Buddhism Scriptures.

3. Mt. Everest Base Camp
The Tibetan name for Mt. Everest is "Mt. Quomolangma" which literally means "The Third Goddess". Towering 8848 meters in the middle section of the Himalayas in Tingri County, Shigatse, and Mt. Quomolangma teems with snow-capped peaks and glaciers. It has four peaks above 8000 meters and 38 peaks above 7000 meter, thus is reputed as the Third Pole on the Earth. Glaciers of modern era are located at the foot of the mountains, deep caves and snaking ice rivers present a magnificent view around the Quomolangma.

4. Rongbuk Monastery
The Rongbuk Monastery was founded in 1902 in an area of meditation huts that had been in use by nuns and hermits for over 400 years. Hermitage meditation caves dot the cliff walls all around the monastery complex and up and down the valley. Mani walls and stones, carved with sacred syllables and prayers, line the paths. The founding Rongbuk Lama, also known as the Zatul Rinpoche, had a reputation of being a remarkable individual, very wise and intelligent and much respected by the Tibetans. Even though the Rongbuk Lama viewed the early climbers as "heretics," he gave them his protection and supplied them with meat and tea while also praying for their conversion.

At Rongbuk, there is a beautiful, large, round chorten, a reliquary with religious significance embedded in its terraced structure and crown of emblems of the sun and moon, symbolizing the light of Buddha's teaching and the chorten dramatically.