Antonio de Andrade and Manuel de Marques were 2 Portuguese Jesuit priests that became the first Europeans to cross the Himalayas and visit Tibet

De Andrade was ordained a priest in the Portuguese colony of Goa and was a Jesuit attached to the court of Mughal emperor Jahangir. In Agra he met Manuel de Marques and there both of them started their trek towards the Tibetan plateau.

They disguised themselves as Hindu and followed a throng of pilgrims to Badrinath, in what is the modern day state of Uttarakhand. In the middle of the way they were discovered and held as prisoners by the Raj of Garwhal.

Both were interrogated and allowed to leave after one week, whence they moved towards Mana pass, but found the way impassable due to snow.

It also seems that the Raj of Garwhal changed his mind about liberating the Jesuits, because he decided to send agents to pursue the men.

With a group of Tibetans, the Portuguese tried to cross the snow-covered pass one.more time and were successful. Soon they found themselves at the Kingdom of Guge, where they were received by the king and Queen and became the first documented Europeans to reach Tibet.

Both only stayed there for a month, but returned later in 1624 to establish a Catholic mission in Guge with the support of the monarchs.

From then on, other Portuguese missions followed, with missionaries reaching Shigatse in 1627.

None of them reached Lhasa - this honour would be bestowed to Austrian and Belgium Jesuits Johannes Grueber and Albert D'Orville in 1661, who went from Delhi to Peking by way of Lhasa

Eventually, both missions were abandoned in 1630 due to civil wars amongst Buddhist sects.

However, in the 18th century a Portuguese jesuit - Manoel Freyre - and an Italian priest - Ippolito Desideri - returned the explorations in the plateau, visiting Kashmir, Leh and eventually Lhasa. Desideri learned a lot about Buddhism, but that's another story.

In 1627, in another side of the Himalayas, another Portuguese would get one more "first to". Estevão Cacella became the first European to visit the hermit kingdom of Bhutan, eventually dying in Tibet a few years later.