Between these various publications - always in the company of Aphur Yongden, her loyal companion in these adventures, now her legally adopted son - she undertook lecture tours in France and Europe.

Ten years went by. In 1937, Alexandra was only 69 and her persistent nostalgia for these faraway lands made her decide to return there to pursue her studies...

She once again obtained assistance from various ministries and received royalties. Philippe Néel - with whom she was perfectly reconciled and who had provided financial support for her first voyage during World War I when her subsidy had not been renewed - brought her his help once more. Indeed, Alexandra found herself in similar unpleasant conditions; this time, it was war between China and Japan and civil war in China. She remained one of Philippe Néel's main concerns until his death in 1941 and when she learned of it, she remarked : "I have lost the best of husbands and my only friend..." Indeed, he had become her friend, after those very difficult first years of their marriage.

But, back in 1937, Alexandra and Yongden set off again for China. Considering her age, Alexandra assumed the journey would be short... so she had to take advantage of it. She took the tiniest country road to return to Brussels, and visited all the capitals of Europe, to Moscow on the Nord Express. Finally, it was the lengthy trip on the Trans-Siberian railroad that took them to China. There, they both took up the studious and somewhat fashionable wandering life they had known in the past.

All this happened during the violent bombardments of the war between China and Japan. Alexandra experienced the worst difficulties : no money from Europe, harsh cold, dramatic famine and epidemics. A spectacle of horror unfolded before her eyes and, in 1941, she learned of the death of her husband, her best friend.

Fleeing the atrocities in a cart or on foot, but continuing to write and study, Alexandra and Yongden reached India in 1946. Nearly ten years had gone by, she was 78.

Regretfully, she returned to France to settle her husband's estate and settled once again in Digne, where she took up her pen to recount her latest adventures. She published many books, translated into several languages, gave lectures in France and Europe. Upon her return, at the age of 82, for a rest after all these trials, she went camping in early winter at the Alpine lake of Allos, 2240 metres above sea level.

But this was to be Alexandra's last escapade. Her rheumatism was worsening. Far more tragic for her, in 1955, she lost her travelling companion, who had loyally followed her for 40 years and should logically have survived her - he was 30 years her junior. He had the impudence, she said, of leaving before her. At the age of 87, to forget her solitude and persistent nostalgia for Tibet, Alexandra went back to work, obstinately. Until the 18th day before her departure for her last great voyage - she was almost 101 - she studied, wrote and continued expressing her desire to return there, probably to pursue her studies...

Thus, Alexandra David-Néel, over 100 years old, went to have her passport renewed, to the great surprise of the Prefect of the Basses-Alpes departement.

On October 15, 1982, then from May 21 to 26, 1986, His Holiness the 14th Dalaï Lama came to Digne to visit her house, "Samten-Dzong", thereby paying tribute to the courage of Alexandra David-Néel, whose life's work had revealed the snow-covered highlands to the West. In Benares, on February 28, 1973, the ashes of the first Western woman ever to explore Tibet and of her adopted son, Lama Yongden, were scattered on the waters of the Ganges.