[The following post is from the archives of my In Search Of Incredible blog, originally published on 17 January 2016]

6 August 2015, Wednesday

Last night, I did not sleep well at all. The room was pitch dark except for the light coming through the gap of the door. The blanket was heavy and it weighed down on me. My nose was blocked and I had difficulty breathing. I woke up at about 1am, feeling like I was trapped inside a coffin, feeling stifled. I kept thinking about the scene in Kill Bill 2, where The Bride (Uma Thurman) was buried alive inside a coffin and had to punch her way out. It was the worst night ever and I didn’t manage to sleep much till the morning.

We woke up at about 6:30am and climbed out of bed groggily. We headed to the water’s edge hoping to see a glorious sunrise. However, the heavy clouds from yesterday continued to loom over Namtso Lake and by 7am, the sky gradually brightened up but there was no beautiful sunrise to be seen. Dejected, we headed back for breakfast at the restaurant, before checking out and hitting the road back to Lhasa.

During the past few days on the road, we kept ourselves occupied by playing Bridge and Uno in the van, using XY’s bag as a makeshift table for the cards. We had much fun and laughter doing so, and it was a great way to kill time during the long journeys. It was definitely one of the highlights of the trip.

Back in Lhasa, we stayed back at the same hotel and it felt good to be back in a familiar place, with a proper bed and toilet once again. We spent the rest of the day free and easy, catching up on shopping and feasting on our favourite fast food, Dico’s, again.

In the evening, we had dinner at a restaurant called Jin Hui Dou Hua Fan and we ordered a hot pot that cost RMB 98 (about S$22). It contained tofu, sausages, internal organs, meatballs and other ingredients, and it was yummy. However, it was really massive and it could well feed 10 people, so the six of us were struggling and couldn’t finish it, because we had ordered other dishes as well. But we tried our best.

At night, KL, XY, ZJ and I went to a live pub to check out the music scene. We sipped beer and munched on nuts while a local rock band performed and did their best to entertain us. They only performed one cover song – a Mandarin version of Coldplay’s Yellow – and the rest were originals. Well, they were so-so, but it was a good effort.

With that, it was the end of Day 13. Almost the end of our Tibetan pilgrimage adventure!