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Note from Jonah: This is the continuation of a photo series from the Great Himalayan Mountain Range. The photos document a journey by car, foot, boat, plane and elephant from Tibet to Nepal. If you’re just joining now, here’s what you’ve missed:

1. Road trip on the Himalayan Shelf
2. Lhasa: City of Sunlight, City in the Sky
3. In Tibet, People’s Liberation Army (mostly) out of site, but not out of mind
4. Attn: Crayola — a new color for you — Tibetan Blue
5. Tibetan Cloudscapes
6. Tibetan Prayer Flags Littering Roof of the World
7. Should you pay for photos? The ethics of travel photography
8. 29 Minutes and 15 Seconds on Mount Everest
9. Desertification stretching from Inner Mongolia to Tibet
10. ‘The journey not the arrival matters’
11. Namaste and welcome to Nepal
12. Kathmandu: The greatest place on earth to get lost
13. Kathmandu: Full of mystery, culture, history — and trash
14. ‘A journey is best measured in friends, rather than miles’
15. Who has the strongest necks in the world?
16. Hey hey, they’re some monkeys
17. After the Himalayan: The Terai
18. Watch where you step: Chitwan National Park
19. At the end of the road: Pokhara
20. Final Destination 8 (in 3D): The luckiest travelers in the world
21. Tibet to Nepal: ‘The Journey Not the Arrival Matters’

Regardless of where you are from in the world, most people have seen a Tibetan prayer flag. But until I actually went to Tibet I had no idea how they were actually used.

Tibetan Prayer Flags can be seen in hutongs in Beijing, on skyscrapers in Shanghai, in college dorms across the United States or in Buddhist temples around the globe. Normally, you see a single line of about a half dozen to a dozen colored flags.

However, the reality in Tibet: You’ll never see just six or twelve. The biker above may have learned this on this mountain pass on the Friendship Highway. Many signs and overpasses look like this.

Not only are many used, but they actually very rarely come down (according to my guide, they never come down — however, I’m a little skeptical of that statement). They are hung on Tibetan new years on houses, signs, hills, mountains, across rivers — literally anywhere and everywhere it seems possible — or impossible to hang a flag. They are actually hung in such mass, at times its a bit comical.

Enormous groups of them litter the Tibetan landscape — and I do mean litter. As they become worn and shredded they fall and blow off somewhere to most likely never be picked up again.

I talked about this with United Nations Ambassador of Peace Dr. Jane Goodall this weekend, and she agreed in the Tibetan usage of the flags, it could be considered littering (more on the three day shoot with Doctor Goodall in an upcoming post). Although prayer flags are seen all over the world, their origin does come from the Himalayan.

A prayer flag is a colorful panel or rectangular cloth often found strung along mountain ridges and peaks high in the Himalayas to bless the surrounding countryside or for other purposes. Unknown in other branches of Buddhism, prayer flags are believed to have originated with Bön, which predated Buddhism in Tibet. Traditionally they are woodblock-printed with texts and images.

Another strange habit I saw was a confetti style prayer flag that people throw out of car windows as they drive down long highways surrounded by amazing landscapes.

While its hard to argue with someone’s religious belief system, it seems weird to me a population that is so connected to the earth, thinks that throwing paper and cloth into the street is a good idea. However, people’s perception of trash around the glove is so different, I’m sure the Tibetans don’t think they are littering.

The prayer flags have different meanings. According to my guide they are:

• Blue (symbolizing sky/space)
• White (symbolizing air/wind)
• Red (symbolizing fire)
• Green (symbolizing water)
• Yellow (symbolizing earth

I’m curious how much these things cost in the Western world. In Tibet right now, I believe the “going price” is about 5 RMB (60 cents) for a dozen or so.

The prayer flags can play an element photographically speaking for landscape photography. There is always a flag to shoot in front of some landscape, rather than — just the landscape like the example above where we get a little bit of Tibetan Blue and a Tibetan Cloudscape. They make landscape photography globally unique in Tibet.

Drigung Monastery

This amazing place is the Drigung Monestary. Tucked away in the Himalayan, 150 km east of Lhasa, this place is truly amazing — and truly covered with prayer flags. A hot spring runs through the middle of the village with nice pools (separate female and male pools) that can be used for a nominal cost. The monastery continues up the mountain until a final area of prayer is built into the rock at the top of the mountain (about a one hour hike up from the hot springs — be wary of some shady dogs). As you walk up the hill prayer flags cross enormous ridge tops and valleys on both sides of you — in mass quantities.

Nuns walk around barefoot praying and chatting. There is a certain zen like feeling to the place. Although its only 150 km east of Lhasa, it does take all day to get there with the roads. I feel — its definitely worth the drive from Lhasa. Unlike some places in Tibet, everyone seemed very open to photography and people even encouraged me to explore the area. The nun above was walking around a Stupa when she stopped to give me directions to the top of the mountain.

This nun even let me photograph her in the small temple on top of the mountain. She didn’t ask for money, didn’t expect money and seemed pretty happy I made the effort to get to the monastery and then climbed the mountain.

Other villagers, were even asking for portraits, including this Paniolo type Tibetan cowboy below and the younger woman above. A lot of Tibetan men seemed to have a cowboy type image or style to them.

Check back Wednesday China time, Tuesday USA time for a new post with a note to all travelers — a small discussion of travel ethics.