Getting from Lhasa Gonggar Airport to the city

Before you fly

• Foreign nationals need a Tibet Travel Permit to enter Tibet, arranged in advance through a registered agency, and are generally required to be on an organised itinerary with a guide.
• The permit is checked at the departure airport when you board. Turning up at Chengdu or Xining without one means not flying.
• This is the single most important fact about Lhasa Gonggar and it has nothing to do with the airport itself.

The journey in

• The airport is about 62 km south of Lhasa. The road crosses the Yarlung Tsangpo and runs through the Gala Mountain tunnel, which cut a long detour out of the trip.
• The airport coach costs 30 yuan and takes an hour to an hour and a half.
• It ends at the Civil Aviation building, about a kilometre east of the Potala Palace, which is central enough to walk or take a short taxi from.
• Departure times from the airport are reported inconsistently. One source says every 30 minutes from 05:40 to 14:30; another says buses go as flights land, from around 08:30. In practice a bus meets arrivals; do not plan around a published time.
• From Lhasa to the airport the service is more regular, roughly 04:30 to 19:30.

Further afield

• Coaches run from the airport to Shannan for 50 yuan and to Shigatse for 100 yuan.
• Both save a night in Lhasa if that is not where you are going, though for anyone arriving from sea level, going straight to higher ground is a poor idea.

Altitude

• The airport is at about 3,570 m and Lhasa at about 3,650 m.
• You will feel it within the hour. Headache and breathlessness on the first evening are normal; worsening symptoms are not.
• Do nothing strenuous on the first day, drink more water than you want to, and treat the coach ride as part of the acclimatisation rather than the start of sightseeing.

Taxis

• About 130 to 150 yuan to the Potala Palace, roughly 45 minutes.
• Agree the fare before setting off. Meters are not the norm on this run.