Quest for the Four Fountains of Tibet

Mount Kailas, in the southwestern corner of Tibet, is regarded as the centre of the universe by millions of people. It is identified as the physical manifestation of the mythical Mount Meru, the axis mundi of the Indic religions. From Mount Kailas, or Kang Rimpoche as it is called in Tibetan, spring four great rivers, the Brahmaputra, Sutlej, Karnali and Indus. Like Mount Kailas, each of the rivers is heavily steeped in legend. In the Indo-Tibetan Chakravala cosmology, the universe is divided into four quarters or continents. Each quarter is fed by a lifeline or river which links it with Mount Kailas, the primordial fountainhead of creation. Through long mythological association, the quartet of lifelines has been identified as these four great river systems.

Having travelled and researched in the Himalaya for many years, I felt that a trek to the sources of the four rivers would be a prefect recapitulation of my peregrinations. It was an extremely rewarding journey, but the logistics, distances and paucity of detailed maps made it a challenging one. Since I could afford only the expenses of transporting myself across the wilds of Tibet, I could not rely on hired motor vehicles, guides, staff or support facilities of any kind. I had to be fully self-reliant and be prepared to travel a couple of thousand kilometres on foot over the course of many months. There was also a lack of detailed information on the sources of the rivers. The annals of Sven Hedin and Swami Pranavananda's landmark book Kailas Mansarovar helped but are incomplete and ambiguous in terms of precisely how to reach the sources. Moreover, the best topographical maps I could procure in the United States were the 1:560,000 technical aeronautical charts and the 1:1,000,000 Operational Navigational Charts of the relevant areas which are rife with erroneous and inconsistent data.