Getting to the heart of things (continued)

Baker attributes his success (and the failure of a competing Chinese expedition) to the simple fact that the local people "felt we were in sympathy with them. They knew us" after eight trips to the gorge, and in the end, Baker thinks, "even they caught the fever of what we were doing."

The fever hasn’t gone away. "I’m still totally entranced by that area," Baker says. "Whatever the mythology about it, it’s one of the most extraordinarily biologically diverse places on the planet. I’ll be going back this coming fall to the Indian side, an area that’s just now opening," down where the Tsangpo has transformed into the Brahmaputra. As in his expeditions from the Tibetan side, Baker will be following in the footsteps of failed British expeditions which, beginning in the mid-19th century, spent decades trying to find the waterfall before discrediting the whole idea as a "romance of geography."

More important to him — although he admits that being the guy who finally found the great waterfall in the heart of Pemako is, "on an outer level, very gratifying" — is the centuries-old tradition of lamas "who went through enormous obstacles to open up this area," including being killed by local tribesmen, swept away by avalanches, or stalled by the king of the long-gone land of Powo.

The lamas, Baker says, are more in touch with what the waterfall means to him. They sought Pemako as "a place of passage" into "a more sympathetic way of seeing the world and the possibilities that arise from it." The waterfall "was a great symbol of what’s possible, and remains so for me, as well as a reminder that things are not static. A waterfall is a perfect symbol of that."

Also in the spirit of the lamas, who didn’t always take no for an answer, Baker resorted to sneaking around when he couldn’t get the Chinese authorities to issue him permits. He even formed a paper company called Red Panda, whose unofficial motto was "confuse and elude."

"You have your intention very clear," he says now, "and then as obstacles arise you work with them creatively. Also, when openings occur, you work with them creatively," he adds, putting Red Panda in the context of the Tibetan "paradoxical approach to existence where when an obstacle arises you look at it as a challenge rather than something that’s there to thwart you or that indicates that you shouldn’t move forward in that direction." This constant dynamic of challenge, Baker goes on, is an important part of his "sense of what pilgrimage means."

For Baker, Pemako is "like a trace of the original world, a vestige of what the world was like," one of the few places in the world that’s still "off the map."

Or was, until the National Geographic movie came out. Is Baker worried that he’s put Pemako a little too much on the map?

"Yes and no," he says. "It was going on the map one way or another," either from his group or the competing Chinese expedition. "A certain time comes when there’s really no choice."

The National Geographic movie, which Baker says "brought attention to [Pemako] at a really critical time," debuted at the Telluride film festival, and perhaps Baker’s choice to bring a movie camera along did some good. There’s been no further talk of hydroelectric projects in Pemako, he says, at least not that he’s heard of — although the Chinese are still relocating the locals out of the gorge to locations where they can be monitored more closely. There’s also a move afoot, led by Chinese scientists, to make the gorge a biosphere reserve.

But Baker is already turning elsewhere. Mongolia, he says, is "another area where there’s been a real crossing over between myths and legends and landscape," including the legendary realm of Shambhala. "That’s an area that has a lot of magic for me."

He’s also working on a project to get a spa/retreat/conference center — "an Esalen of the East," he says humorously, referring to the famous Big Sur retreat — off the ground in Thailand, and will be moving there for a year or so. After that, who knows? There’s always another pilgrimage.

"It would be actually tragic to ever finally get somewhere and feel like you didn’t want to go anywhere," he says. The experience of Yangsang is "not something that just happens at once. You get glimpses of it, you get tastes of it. The more you have glimpses and experiential moments," the more you want to keep journeying after it.

"The ultimate beyul," he says, "the ultimate hidden land, is something in the heart that shifts when we begin to see the world in a sacred way."

Or, put another way: It’s like the Zen masters used to say. When you get to the top of the pole, keep on climbing.

Alex Irvine can be reached at airvine@phx.com

Ian Baker reads at Longfellow Books, in Portland, on Friday, Feb. 18. Call (207) 772-4045.