Returning to northwestern Yunnan’s snow-clad mountains and their precious waterways. We’ll wander up the Salween River (pronounced Gyalmo Gyul Chu and written རྒྱལ་མོ་རྔུལ་ཆུ། in Tibetan) to the eastern extension of the Himalayas and a slow route south along portions of both the Mekong (pronounced Dza Chu in Tibetan and written རྫ་ཆུ) and Yangtze (Ma Chu at the source and written རྨ་ཆུ) Rivers.
All of these waterways find their way off of the Tibetan Plateau and collectively they chart almost 20,000 km’s striating and convening as they journey to distant seas. Long coveted by the people within the mountains as living beings, the waterways are fast becoming the most coveted items to many beyond the ‘hills’.
Tortured and utterly precious, the rivers are the arteries of the mountains, fed by glaciers and deep springs. Journeys that begin as begin as numbingly cold and clean descend to become barely recognizable. For centuries the rivers acted as not simply sources but as guides for the traders, pilgrims, and wildlife of the mountains.
Winter’s snows are still atop the mountains that hang and feed the rivers – a perfect time to be there.
As the nomadic Yi often say of the rivers, “As long as the water makes a sound, all is well”.
About JeffFuchs
Having lived for a decade in Yunnan, Fuchs’ work has centred on indigenous mountain cultures, oral histories along with an obsessive interest in tea.
Fuchs is the author of 'The Ancient Tea Horse Road' (Viking-Penguin) and he was the subject of 'The Tea Explorer' documentary based on his exploration of the Tea Horse Road.
His photos and stories have appeared on three continents in publications such as Kyoto Journal, TRVL, and Outpost Magazine, as well as The Spanish Expedition Society, The Earth, Silkroad Foundation, The China Post Newspaper, The Toronto Star, The South China Morning Post, and UNESCO amongst others. Various pieces of his work are part of private collections in Europe, North America, and Asia. Fuchs served as Asian Editor at Large for five years at award-winning Outpost magazine.
Jeff has worked with schools and universities, giving talks on both the importance of oral traditions, tea and mountain cultures.
His recently released book ‘The Ancient Tea Horse Road’ (Penguin-Viking Publishers) details his 8-month groundbreaking journey traveling and chronicling one of the world’s great trade routes, The Tea Horse Road. Fuchs is the first westerner to have completed the entire route stretching almost six thousand kilometers through the Himalayas a dozen cultures.
Fuchs partnered with Wild China to create a journey along the Tea Horse Road which National Geographic Traveler called one of the "50 Trips of a Lifetime".
He is co-founder of Akahiao Nature Institute on the island of Hawai'i along with his wife, Julie Rogers.
