Delighted to make the cover-feature (top-less no less) of Canada’s award-winning Outpost Magazine in the current edition. Our journey last year along the Route of Wind and Wool, tracing the ancient Himalayan pathways by foot is the focus.
Expedition Ladakh, Jeff Fuchs
Another of the great mountain’s unheralded routes gets a little light shone on it with some emphasis on the glaciers, which continue to ‘bleed’ and disappear. Our ‘expedition Ladakh’, known more accurately as the Route of Wind and Wool (both of which thrive up in the mountains) was an odyssey as much into the suffering mountains as they were along a timeless route of commodities.
Indeed, it was the glaciers (and the elusive snow leopard) that were occupying the mind during much of this journey. A few years ago, according to a local, glaciers like the one above were “covered in white“. Now, “The mountains I knew as white, my son has only known as black and snowless“.
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.
Every man, once in his lifetime, has to take the road from Srinagar to Leh. Jeff, i did that in 1986.
Now I’m interested in a journey/trek from Kashgar to Lhasa. Been to both places but not from one to the other. Any interest in a personal guiding trip?
Thank you.
Brendan,
I’ve send on a response to your email address – let me know if you do in face receive it.
Jeff