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Published: June 24th 2010
Day 55 - Leaving UB.
Another pretty miserable day and still pretty cold. We were going on tour with 2 Dutch people which was good but our vehicle was not quite a jeep! A 4x4 minibus which looked like it was in need of a bit of TLC. Joining us we had our driver and a 20 year old translater who were both Mongolian. The roads in Mongolia also leave a lot to be desired but for the first 2 hours we had paved roads, unfortunately we still managed to hit a guy crossing the road! There was a lot of yelling and screaming as to who's fault it was but we were back on our way within a few minutes.
Stopped at a local restaurant for lunch surrounded by open spaces and green hills. Now Mongolian food while hearty is fairly bland. So basically the food mainly consists of rice, mutton, bread but not much in the way of vegetables.
Also we were served hot milk which is traditional drink they have with lunch. It's definitely an aquired taste as the milk is also quite sweet and does not smell great. I'm sure it must be good
for your teeth and stomach as they kept telling us. From that point on the road was no longer paved, in fact the driver did not seem to have any particular route in mind as was either driving on the mud roads or simply cutting across the fields in a general direction. Also bearing in mind there are no roadsigns whatsoever he seemed to know exactly where he was going. From here the scenery was distant hills and plenty of open space, no cars on the roads either.
We stopped off at Karakorum, which is the ancient capital of Monglia. It is mainly ruins now and was once where Ghengis Khan's son Ogedai had his capital. It was built after the death of Genghis when the Mongols finally defeated the Jin. We also visited the Erdene Zuu monastery now inside the walls of the city. When a guide took us around we learnt of the 'Sky Burial' technique that the mongols use to bury their dead. If you didn't know they pretty much take the remains to a high peak or hill and leave them there for the hawks, eagles to eat. If there are no remains left it
means you were good in life, otherwise you are going to hell (or perhaps just not tasty enough?). Afterwards walking around we saw quite a number of bare bones and wondered if there had been a Sky Burial last week! Funny at the time, you had to be there.
We eventually arrived in our Yurt camp around 6pm in the wilderness it seemed. We were then informed that actually there are no showers at any of the camps we are staying in for the next 5 days, do not remember that on the itinery!! So we had to make do also none of the places were would be staying in had electicity either so was like going back in time several hundred years. There are so many families living like this and is a normal part of life, hard for us to understand and looks like a very hard life.
So there was not much else to do but drink a few beers and get to know our Dutch travellers before heading to bed. Nice sunset tonight though and scenery was still amazing.
Day 56
What a freezing night, we had winter sleeping bags and before going
Walls of Karakorum
Ancient Capital of Mongolia.to bed and we had a plan where we would do shifts to keep the fire going. Did not happen of course, once the fire was out it was really chilly and the morning we begged for more wood and got it going again.
Today was another long day driving to Orkhon waterwall some 200 kms away on very bumpy and non-existent roads. It would take a good 5 hours or so. The weather was cold and rainy once again so things were not looking good.
Sometime in the afternoon we caught up to one of the other vans on a trip who had got stuck in the mud attempting to cross a river, naturally we got out and helped push which was in vain before our driving managed to haul him out with a rope. All fun and games.
We crossed quite a few rivers etc and our driver was top notch having no problems and choosing his crossings carefully (it seemed). Mongolians do not believe in building bridges and this seems more convenient for them!
Arrived in Orkhon Waterfall after 6pm, it truly was a stunning setting. It was surrounded by mountains, Monglian horses
and Yaks were just feet away from us and we could hear the thunder of the waterfall nearby. This was in really bad weather so as we were staying a few days here hoped tomorrow would be better.
Day 57
Late yesterday evening the weather cleared and got some stunning pictures around sunset, then my camera died! So there I was still 3 days of our tour left and battery dead and no hope of electicity within a hundred miles. The dinner also last night left a lot to be desired, it was pasta with potatoes and dried meat. We reckon we had about 1 gram of meat each it was ridiculous. Ania and I had a word with Inush our translater as it was our second meal without meat, pretty ironic as Mongolia is supposed to be the land of meat!
He said we do not give our tourists much meat as it is expensive? Hello we were surrounded by cattle and little else. Anyway along with the fact we were not told about the electricity part all 4 of us rebuked and said it was simply not good enough. After a few arguments a generator or
2 was found and they were working through the night to fix it.
We also expected to spend time with the nomadic familes which just was not happening either. When speaking to the Dutch guy with us who had done a tour previously like 5 years ago said it was completely different so perhaps we just got a bad tour or company.
Magically in the morning they had more activities for us to do and managed to charge our gear with the generator. The weather was beautiful so we headed to the waterfall and followed the rocky slope down to the bottom. This is a pretty big waterwall, not quite compareable to one we saw in Iceland (which is still my number 1!) but pretty impressive. It had been raining a lot so hence there was a lot of water coming through here and people have also been known to jump off the top to the river below 😊
In the afternoon we had a go riding the Mongol horses. They are actually quite small in size so all 4 of us mounted up and we were off. Not all of our horses obeyed us, not sure
Stuck in the mud...time to push.
As you can see not much of a road..! if they did not understand 'Choo Choo' which was pretty much the only command we were told!! Anyway mine seemed to behave nicely and after a while managed to work out how to make him run though he seemed not to want to turn right most of the time!!! Pretty awesome experience though we just rode anywhere in the hills and was good fun until we tried to get off 😊 When I dismounted unfortunately I happened to get off the wrong side which is a big NO NO with these horses (we were not told of this in my defence) and he went mad and I did the cowboy thing and was eventually thrown off the horse. No injures just a gentle reminder what not to do next time. Ania also got a kick from hers for walking behind the horse so she was limping. Yes it was a good experience!!!
Bit of a surprise in the evening as the Nomadic family put on a Goat for us for dinner! Traditionally cooked in a stove covered by stones to keep the heat really had a feast tonight. Following this we went out and made a fire under the
Around the gorge
Near Orkhon waterfall. stars and grilled more of it and drank vodka so was really good night. Inush had done a top job here. One word of note Goat is very very tough meat, my teeth were sore for days afterwards!
Day 58 - Mini Gobi
They call it Mini Gobi as it is a much smaller desert than the actual Gobi, but that is all we had time for unfortunately. If you want to go to the Gobi on a tour it takes something like 3-4 days just to drive there. Pretty impressive I'm sure as they found dinasour fossils there and there are ice caves which sound amazing as well. Anyway we were off to the Mini gobi, sure it would be impressive as well 😊
Another bumpy ride and we had just about had enough of the roads in Mongolia, not good for the back that's for sure. Weather was much better and after another stop in a dodgy back alley restaurant in a village in no mans land for lunch we arrived in Mini Gobi late afternoon. It is worth mentioning that pretty much nowhere outside of UB (that we found, I could be wrong) seems
Orkhon Waterwall
From above in the rain! to have running water. Having said that they still do a pretty good job with the food and everything was pretty clean in these restauarants. Also the main thing was nobody was sick yet!
Also on our way to Mini gobi we stopped and saw a mass of Eagles (pictured). Pretty amazing sight and so close to us. Apparently this is normal when there are animal remains about, got some great photos.
The Yert camp in Mini gobi was in a pretty amazing setting as well, surrounded this time by sand dunes but unfortunately still no electricity or showers so we were all starting to stink a bit I reckon on day 4 without a shower..Did not help that we then played some beach volleyball in the desert before dinner which was good fun and met some more Dutch people.
We were then to do the camel riding after dinner flagged it until tomorrow.
Day 59 - Last day and back to UB!
So final day and Fleur (Dutch girl) and I were the only contenders for the camel riding with the others giving it a miss. These camels had 2 humps and as I had
only previously had experience with 1 hump camels thought I would try. Well after an hour of riding through the desert and in a lot of pain (they use almost 0 padding) we were back. We climbed a sand dune which was nice and gave us great views but other than that it was OK.
Back in the minibus and 5 hours later we were back in the crazy city of UB. It really has a lot going on here compared to the rest of the country. We were pretty happy to try some alternative food (thai) tonight as reckon we had our fill of Mongolian fare.
Back in the hostel we organised ourselves as we had a long haul tomorrow to Beijing would take us a good 30+ hours.
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Mike T
non-member comment
Great Photos Daz, looks like you're seeing alot of awesome places. Hope the camera stays alive for the rest of the trip, keep it up.