Tokchen

Tokchen lies near the eastern shore of Lake Manasarovar in western Tibet, on a route linking Ngari with Lhasa. The country around the lake is cold and dry, with wetlands set between Mount Kailash to the north and the Himalayan range to the south. Communities here provided animals for the transport obligations of the Tibetan postal system. In 1728 a local pastoral leader sponsored the Drikung Kagyu monastery of Sewalung on the lake's eastern shore.