Serta — the name itself sounds far away and a little forbidden. Before I left, all I knew was that it hid in the mountains of western Sichuan, a Tibetan Buddhist pure land holding the world's largest monastery academy and the solemn sky burial rite.
Serta was the third stop on my Tibetan loop. I drove 730 kilometers west out of Jiuzhaigou, and the road served up four seasons in one day: spring morning light leaving Jiuzhaigou, summer heat at noon, autumn wind on the passes by afternoon, and snowflakes drifting by evening.
The road coiled through range after range. Every bend opened a new palette — green valleys giving way to bare plateau, turquoise rivers to grasslands gone gold. Tibet deals in extremes, and it shows them all at once.
I came with two wishes: to walk the Larung Gar Buddhist Academy, the world's largest Tibetan Buddhist academy, where thousands of small red wooden houses climb the hillsides in a sea of crimson; and to witness a sky burial, the sacred Tibetan funerary rite.
Pandemic rules shut both doors that year. I could only stand at the foot of the sky burial platform, looking up at prayer flags snapping in the wind, picturing the solemn rite carried out just beyond the fence.
At the academy gate I pressed my eyes to the gaps in the fence, taking in the endless red houses spilling down the valley. Even barred out, the scale stole the breath. Somewhere a low chant seemed to drift over the hills on the highland wind.
Travel is like this sometimes — you don't always get what you came for. Serta's closed doors became part of the trip in the end. Maybe that was the lesson: not everything is meant to be seen or explained.
I left Serta with loose ends still trailing, but the road pulled me on. Next: Daocheng Yading, the last pure land on the blue planet.
Travel Tips
Location: Serta County, Garze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan Province
Transportation: Self-drive from Jiuzhaigou is approximately 730km. The road conditions are generally good but include high-altitude mountain passes. Drive carefully and watch for altitude sickness.
Best Time to Visit: May to October. The land sits high, around 3,800m to 4,000m, so expect cold even when the calendar says summer.
Note: Check in advance whether the Larung Gar Buddhist Academy and sky burial site are open to visitors. Respect local religious customs and photography restrictions.
