Our head is in the clouds. Not real, virtual. The satellite image shows nothing but a large, white surface. Zooming in, the page reloads, now the clouds are gone. Brown contours, and barely visible, somewhere between the shades a thin brighter band - our track. It winds along the hills to a lake. Then up to a pass. That looks tough. Will we get through? The track ends, loses itself in small pools. A swamp? Zooming out, gaining overview. Zack, and there it is again. The big white cloud. Route planning is like walking in the fog. First you see nothing, have no idea where it goes, tap in the clouds. Then paths and possible trail connections show up. Slowly, a track is formed. The continuation of our Yak Track to the north. From vague ideas a picture, a new adventure grows. The clouds are thinning.

Our head is in the clouds. 4000 meters - and that is not the pass. No, actually it is the lowest point between two passes. To the right, the next rain wall approaches in time-lapse. A gray curtain of rain cords. Frayed at the edges, with a narrow gap in the middle, through which we can catch a last glimpse of a piece of blue sky. Then the colors mix together like watercolor on a paper. The black spreads, devours - and wins. A few seconds later, the wind blows us the first needle-sharp ice drops in the face. The clouds are close, it feels as if we could almost touch the sky.

The former Tibetan province of Amdo is the homeland of the Golok nomads. Formerly feared robbers of the Silk Road, they have rebelled successfully against China's occupation for a long time. Anyone who has to hold its ground against such harsh environmental conditions cannot be pushed into a system so quickly. But their unruliness came for a high price. There is no room for freedom and independence in China. When we reach a small village, we often ride through desolate, miserable barracks. Forced resettlement projects of the government. Nomadism does not fit into a political system that builds upon control. But often the houses are empty, the windows are broken, the small forecourt is overgrown with weeds. A hint of resistance blows through the empty alleyways, despite a massive police presence. They still stand on the high plateau, the black yak hair tents. The Golok cannot be locked or lured with cheap living space. They look proud and wild with their black hair, their heavy sheep skin cloaks with the long sleeves and their dark eyes. They need the sky as a roof, no rattling corrugated steel. They live with their heads in the clouds.

After Bayju we reach the granit massif of Nyempo Jurtse. On satellite images and old sovjetic maps we have found a trace, which should lead us right through the centre of this mountain range. The weather forecast reports a three-day good weather window, and after the hilly plateau landscape of the last few weeks we are longing for some more dramatic mountains. A narrow concrete road becomes gravel and then a perfect singletrail along a mountain lake. Rugged peaks tear the fast passing clouds into pieces. In the evening we set up camp at the bottom of the valley. A short snowstorm, then sparkling stars.

After the singletrail follows the hiking path. 300 meters of altitude gain from our base camp up to 4500 meters. We remove the backpack from our front harness and load all luggage on the back. Even with an unloaded bike, the hike-a-bike section up to the pass is exhausting. But we do not want to be anywhere else. The mountain lake below us shrinks, the rock faces and peaks move closer. Exactly for such stretches our heart beats. We love to have our heads in the clouds. Even though we sometimes get a blue nose. We know that it is almost always worthwhile to keep going when the path ends.

In Aba, we are forced to take another long break. We enjoy to have a heated room and to watch the inhospitable weather for once out of the warm bed. Wind, snow, rain, cold - the weather forecast shows gray clouds for the next eight days. Then two days of sunshine. We decide to take a bus close to Amnye Machen, Eastern Tibet's most sacred mountain. We want to be ready to catch up on what we left out seven years ago. We want to be ready to circumnavigate this mountain with our bikes as soon as the first sunray shows up. But the mountain deity Machen Pomra, who lives there, makes his reputation for unpredictability all honor. Perhaps he is annoyed by the newly built four-lane highway, which sneaks like a Chinese dragon around his mountain. Maybe he just makes fun of weather forecasts. In any case he sends snow, rain and cold instead of sun. He wraps his crystal palace into gray clouds and with drives us off of Eastern Tibet eventually. The weather forecast shows rain for another ten days.

Our head feels heavy. Gray and packed with all the clouds. Gray and heavy from waiting, pondering and planning. Two months long, the Yak Track has shown us the best of Eastern Tibet. Now it is coming to an end. We need some tailwind, some warmth, some sun. At some point we will return to Eastern Tibet. To the high passes, the warm people, the wildness of the plateau. Is it not best to bid farwell from a place when you do not want to leave it yet? Keep living with the head in the clouds?

It is time to go. We board the train to the land of the blue skies.