King Cypress

Bon tradition makes this cypress the life tree of Tonpa Shenrab Miwoche, the man who founded the religion. Locally it is called the God of Tree, and pilgrims leave prayer flags and mani stones in the grove around it. It is also the largest known specimen of Cupressus gigantea, a cypress that grows wild only in a few Tibetan river valleys. It stands about 50 metres tall on a trunk close to six metres through, which works out at roughly eighteen metres around, though that circumference is calculated from the diameter rather than taped. Its age depends on who you ask. The English-language record gives a calculated 2,600 years; the Chinese encyclopaedia entry says over 3,200. Both numbers put it here long before Buddhism reached Tibet in the seventh century, and before the Yarlung kings who brought it in. The grove around it is old too, a tenth of a square kilometre of ancient cypress averaging 44 metres tall, which makes the King the tallest tree in a stand of giants. It has been fenced, named and ticketed for years as the World Cypress King Garden, six or seven kilometres out of Bayi town, with minibuses from the centre for about five yuan. The local advice is April to October, which also catches Nyingchi's peach blossom at the start of it.