Inner Mongolia - Contrast. Day 2

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Geo: 36.8945, 104.166

October 1st.Hailar - Golden Horde Mongolian Tribe - EnheThe city in the morning was just like any other city. Big, dirty but it had lots of odd roves with yurts on them all painted up in white blue and gold.We grabbed breakfast on the side of the road. Baozi which cost almost nothing. We passed many people just sitting out in the sun on the side of the road. There didn't seem to be any sort of rush in this town. Everything seemed to move very slow.We drove for a while with fields and field of nothing but grasslands.We arrived at the Mongolian Tribe.<br style="color: rgb(33, 33, 33); font-family: wf_segoe-ui_normal, 'Segoe UI', 'Segoe WP', Tahoma, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: normal;">We thought it would have been just a little bit real?It was 100% fake and empty. Once again we have just missed the masses of tourist that come to this area but the down side it that of the Museum was closing for the winter.It is set up like a village with permanent concrete Yurts in one area which is like a caravan park and then in another area where the real Yurts make of wood and fabric that where being pulled down for the winter. These yurts all had amazingly painted doors and they where all different colors with different designs. The walls are made of a wooden Lattice work that was then covered with fabric and the roof was lengths of wood that all came together in a wheel like center piece.The burial sites are really beautiful with all of the colored flags and bits of fabric flowing in the wind against the blue sky. This was beautiful.In the distance we could see tepees. Wooden posts wrapped in white fabric with blue designs on them. Which was really funny as a young fashion designer my label was tepee. It was great. From here we headed off to into town and lunch.We found a great little place that sold a bit of everything and of corse lamb. One of the ladies was a vegetarian and her Chinese was good so she would explain that she doesn't eat meat and she wanted only vegetables and plain rice. Well..... When the food arrived it wasn't just vegetables. She asked if that was for her. Just vegetables? "Oh. It's ok,"they explained. "There is only a little bit of meat in it."This happened for the whole trip. Luckily she bought muesli bars with her because that's all she ate for breakfast, lunch and dinner.The thought of just vegetables just didn't seem to make sense to them.In the city we saw a donkey pulling a cart down the Main Street and lots of vendors selling fruit and vegetables from the side of the road.As we headed out of town into the wilderness there where small villages along the way and most of them where Muslim. We stopped on the side of the road just before a bridge that crossed a river. In the distance we could see a heard of cows walking down the middle of the road and they then crossed the bridge and stopping all of the traffic. This was quite funny to see but I suppose they had to cross the river some how.We arrived in Erguna. We went for a quick walk around the town. We asked our guide where we could eat dinner. He replied, "There is nothing here to eat." And then told us that he was going to meet with his friends for dinner. Ok? Great? Thanks and enjoy your meal. It was very small and we managed to find the only restaurant that seemed to serve food. We just sat down all 12 of us and we ate whatever they gave us. We really had no choice. It was pretty good if you weren't a vegetarian.It became very dark very quickly and the small streets didn't have many street lights. It was a very quite town and we headed back to the hotel.

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