Blogs from Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, Asia - page 18

A country with beautiful landscape and real traditional mongolian natives living in yurts, simple but good food,sometimes maybe too much for foreigners, the capital city Ulaanbaatar (Ulan Bator) (Улаанбаатар) has got 1.000.000 citizens,most of them crazy driver without any sense of guilt after hitting pedestrians,coldest capital city in the world. In 1924, after the death of the religious leader and king Bogd Khan, a Mongolian People's Republic was proclaimed with support from the Soviets. So the capital ulan baatar looks like. 50% of Mongolia's population follow the Tibetan Buddhism, 40% are listed as having no religion, 6% are Shamanist and Christian, and 4% are Muslim. So the Buddism is still such a main part in their life. ... read more

After the positive experience in the Buriat country we were very much looking forward to Mongolia and we were not going to be disappointed with the days that followed. When boarding the train for Ulaanbaatar in Ulan-Uday, we were joined by a team of young Mongolian sportsmen in their Adidas tracksuits with 'Mongolia' written on their back. It was the Mongolian boxing team coming back loaded with trophies from some competition in Russia. One of them was the Olympic silver medal for his category. As we shared our four berth compartment with two charming young swiss girls, the Mongolian sportsmen passed by our place a bit more than 'normal'... They started joking with the girls when waiting at the Mongolian border, we took a few pictures. Robson had his picture taken with the Olympic champion as ... read more

Like a moon landing, Ulaan Baatar rises from the barren nothingness of the Mongolian steppe - a city occupied by more than one million people and almost half the minuscule population of Mongolia; the most sparsely populated independent country in the world. Venture some five kilometres from downtown and the city ends abruptly as you fall from the proverbial cliff of civilisation, and into the bleak beauty of an undulating landscape devoid of barriers or boundaries, evidently untouched by its millennia of human habitation. Save a few barren outposts with inflated prices due to their inaccessibility, buying anything in Mongolia outside of Ulaan Baatar is difficult, hence we were required to buy some journey essentials prior to leaving, namely food, drink, clothing and cooking equipment. Gathering all the necessities for our long trip took longer than ... read more

Moscow - Irkutsk The afternoon in Moscow was perhaps the closest we've come to arguing thus far, after walking round the Kremlin (I only just managed to get the camera in and had to leave most of the lenses outside) - we were all tired and irritable, and somewhat lacking in the ability to make any real decisions....fortunately after some aimless meandering we found a restaurant, which had a great view over Pl Revolyutsii Square & the statue of Karl Marx, and good quality food (they stopped doing beer at 7...but we stayed anywyay!) We got the train dead on time at 23:25, and were greeted by our non-too smiley provodnitsa, who whilst not smiling at us, was still very helpful, and also quite irritable once we made her repeat herself a number of times, but ... read more

Righto, jumped on the fairly packed train in Irkutsk at 21:50 Wednesday night, but by the time I woke the next morning there was me and only 2 others on the entire wagon. All the Russians jumped off at Ulan Ude which I think is the last main stop before you hit Mongolia. Thursday will not go down in the books as a day to remember.....5 hours at the Russian border control, 1 hour crossing the actual border then 2 hours at the Mongolian border control......Travelled about 1 mile in 8 hours, which is now included in the "Shane's book o' stuff" as the new definition of boredom. Rolled into the capital of Mongolia (Ulaan Baatar) at 6:10 the next morning. Think I may have made a bit of a mistake in that I'm only staying ... read more