Tag Archives: yunnan
Our “The Tea Explorer” Documentary is – finally – up on Youtube (with heaps of ads).
Almost ten years ago Andrew Gregg, sound magician Mike Josselyn, 90th Parallel, and I, made ’The Tea Explorer’ documentary. Many over the years have asked when it will be available for a more general viewing. Finally, the piece which (still) … Continue reading
Time with Tseten – Tea Horse Road Trader
We sat in the dark gloom of his home, with a bit of lukewarm butter tea roaming around our hands. Another of the remaining legends of the days of trade and odyssey journey-making along the Tea Horse Road, Tseten was … Continue reading
A Tea Comes Around
The joy of a bit of time-hit leaf beauty. Age hasn’t always been something I’ve ever been convinced matters in any tea. Age of bushes, of trees, or even of the producer maybe, but age of the cake or how … Continue reading
Tea Horse Road Chronicles – The Tea That Never Came
A simple tea room in Weishan, Yunnan, and one of the only tea rooms in my life that I failed to actually have tea in. Weishan was another of the understated hubs along the Tea Horse Road, and it marks … Continue reading
Tea Horse Road Chronicles – Part Human and a Little Part Goat
Over the course of years since meeting Dorjè I’ve written and pondered much about him. “Part goat and a little part human” was how he was described to me. Perhaps sounds unfair but the goats’ abilities in the Himalayas are … Continue reading
Tea Horse Road Chronicles – The Great Bend of the Yangtze
It was here at the ‘first bend of the Yangtze’ in Yunnan province that the Mongolian armies of the Yuan Dynasty crossed the great waterway and would ‘take’ the previously independent region into the greater fold of the Middle Kingdom … Continue reading
Tea Horse Road Chronicles – Other Tales and Sight
Not all stories of the Tea Horse Road were ones of grand expanses, snow caps, or buzzing tea sessions. A friend from the Yi minority invited me to visit his grandmother who had tales of her own to tell. She … Continue reading
Tea Horse Road Chronicles – Fields vs Forests
Blankets and ridges of green stimulant leaf lie in rows near Puerh. Here the leaf is entirely industry. Gorgeous industry, but still industry. Local Hani, Han, Yi, Lahu, and Dai pluckers shimmy through the humid air to pluck, pluck, and … Continue reading