My Gobi Journal

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Sunday

We left the Golden Gobi in high spirits. We have a guy from Israel, a guy from Slovenia, a woman from German, a woman from Australia, and two women (including me) from the US. Beautiful landscapes stretch out all around us. The vast distances between blips of civilization are astounding. We saw lakes and lots of grazing animals: sheep, goats, cows, and herds of horses. The horses are half wild, grazing for most of the year and brought in on occasion when needed. Our driver Baira is very outgoing and loves to sing along to his music. He plays traditional Mongolian tunes as well as Abba. He also knows “Barbie Girl” by Aqua. Watching a 40+ year old man croon along to Aqua is quite a sight! Overall it was an excellent day. We settled down between two large rock formations and entertained ourselves with an “American Idol: Mongolia” performance. Helped along with a little vodka of course! The sunset was beautiful. My sleeping bag is way tooooooo small! We had lots of wind that night.


Monday

We went to sleep in heaven and woke up in HELL! A sandstorm was roaring full force when we woke up and though you might expect such weather to be hot, it was instead freezing cold! It was a definite low point as we tried to bundle all our supplies into the van. Barb (US) and Miriam's (Germany) tent had 3 inches of sand inside because of a small air flap in their tent. Moved on to a Ger where we settled down with a Mongolian family for some breakfast. Ran into two other people on a tour but they had spent the night in a tourist Ger. They looked well rested. It was sandy and windy for quite some time but when we got to our next campsite it was beautiful! In the distance were tourist camps and a large Turtle Restaurant. We camped at the base of a sand dune and all around us were distant mountains and steppe grass. We made our first camp fire and I was quite proud of my ability to start one in next to no time. Not only have I become the designated Cook (everyone loves my food), I am also the fire starter. Note: add to resume :-)


Tuesday

This morning we got a SHOWER! We walked over to the tourist camp, paid a minimal fee, and enjoyed a wonderful shower. After three days of sweat, sand, and wind, it was a glorious experience. Feeling refreshed, we moved on to the “Flaming Cliffs” which had formations quite reminiscent of the Grand Canyon. Everyone loafed around and took loads of pictures of themselves and each other. Then we continued to the Gobi National Park and paid 3,000 tugrik for entrance. Then we went through one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. It made me think of Jurassic Park scenery and pictures I have seen of South America. And tucked into the middle of a beautiful green valley was a big glacier! In the Gobi! It was amazing and with cows grazing in the lush grass in the surrounding area it was quite picturesque if not surreal. After we took many pictures of all of us amongst the ice and hills, we went on to our next campsite. Along the way we almost flipped the van on a particularly tilted road. Baira told all of us to get out and had three people hang off the side of the highest part to balance out the van while he drove on. At this time we made a very unpleasant discovery... TICKS! Miriam found five crawling on her leg and we quickly did a tick check. I began to count off all the vaccinations I had passed up. Just my luck if I get bit by one. Our campsite, though beautiful and conviently located next to a glacier stream was crawling with ticks. We had to do a gender strip down and investigate each other head to toe. Then it was long pants, long sleeves, and tucking everything into socks and gloves. Barb brought DEET but it proved completely ineffective against the little buggers. I ended up nauseous and with a headache so I went to bed early.

Wednesday

I froze my ass off again last night. Meg, the woman who rented us our equipment, is clearly an idiot. All of our stuff is completely substandard and besides the sleeping bags being way too small, they are also thin and completely unsuited for cold Gobi nights. The wind was blowing quite fiercely this morning. It is beautiful and clear outside though. So nice to see green grass everywhere. Quite a change from the brown landscape and dirt of Ulaanbaatar. The ticks had us all itching to get out of there and even once we were in the van and far away we found several crawling around. They obviously hitched a ride in our bags and in our clothes. Once we reached the sand dunes we also found two more ticks and two BIG spiders!

The sand dunes are GORGEOUS! Each location we continue on to gets more and more stunning. It's almost too much to take in at one go. The dunes are immense and every bit as beautiful as pictures make them see. It is no exaggeration and no stretch of the imagination. We decided to stay in the tourist gers because 1) they were cheap, 2) we were exhausted and fearful of ticks, and 3) we were tired of freezing. When we arrived we piled into the host's ger and they served us fried bread and sheep's cheese. Having already experienced the cheese and biscuits I passed and encouraged the girls to try it. THEIR FACES WERE PRICELESS! Let me explain... the biscuits are stale and taste of faint mutton grease and the cheese tastes like vomit. Goat vomit. It is no exaggeration. It is so sour and I almost died laughing watching Barb and Miriam struggle not to spit it out all over the ger. Barb's eyes began to water and she ended up stashing the left over bits under the van. Talk about cultural experiences! We have all agreed that sheep cheese is by far the most disgusting thing we've ever tasted.

So that night we had a wonderful sleep on real beds.


Thursday

SHEEP MILK!! Baira brought us straight-from-the-baa milk which the girls poured over Museli. I can't really tolerate sheep's milk without enduring bad stomach cramps so I passed. Overall it was not very popular amongst any of us. It was a lovely thought anyhow. We got up and prepared to go on a 2-hour camel ride to the sand dunes. We were all quite excited and when the camels arrived we were nothing short of delighted. They were smelly, fuzzy, and AWESOME! Camel expressions are very entertaining! The ride itself was a bit dull as camels move rather slowly compared to horses but with such lovely scenery it was still very enjoyable. Our guide was also a delight and we had fun watching the camels slurp up massive amounts of water from the rivers surrounding the dunes. We stopped at the base of a dune and the girls trekked to the top of one of the big ones and I stayed behind with the boys, snapping pictures of the camels. The guide made me a camel wool twist which I attached to my backpack. Then we rode back to the camp and spent the rest of the day completely loafing and lying in the sun drinking vodka and beer. It was excellent fun! We also attempted to make baked apples in a pot on our cooking stove. When I say “we” I mean Barb. They were pretty disgusting and when we added honey, it ended up smelling like cat urine! Strangest thing. We tried apricot jam next but overall it was quite the hilarious food flop.


Friday

We got up early and packed up the van. We had a long drive to our next campsite. Along the way we stopped at some stores and resupplied ourselves on bread and various perishable goods. So far we’ve eaten VERY well. Lots of noodles, rice, and vegetables! Also apples and oranges. Supposedly we were supposed to “camp in a beautiful valley” but ended up amongst some hills where there were tons of rocks and not great camping sites. The cloud began to accumulate some huge thunderheads and as we were setting up camp, thunder and lightening began to strike. It was quite exhilarating and we all felt like we were running a marathon, trying to get everything set up before the torrential downpour. We all huddled in the van getting ready for the rain when I realized I left the vodka and cups in our tent. I had sent Ashley to get it but she had her hands full with baggage so I booked it outside to the tent. As I’m rooting through our stuff I feel a drop of water on my back. OH NOOOOO! I grab the cups and vodka and start running back to the van just as I start getting PELTED by gigantic hail! Hail the size of golf balls were coming down on my head! I dive into the extremely squished van and we all huddle together while the storm rages outside. Then we get into some serious conversations. Oren decides that I’m an interesting person and we launch into discussions about my ex-girlfriend, my current boyfriend, my life. I continue to drink, since most of the conversation was a bit… uncomfortable and by the time the storm lets up and we all go to bed, I’m quite buzzed.


Saturday

I wake up to grumpy Oren. Ashley and I both sleep in the van since the wind blew our tent over. Ashley wakes up in a furious mood and informs me that I dropped a box on her head in the middle of the night and said some pretty nasty stuff. I apparently had my first episode of sleep walking. I had trouble getting out of the van and then I disappeared for a while. They found my jacket lying on the ground this morning and I have not the foggiest what the hell I was doing. It was a pretty scary thing not to be able to remember anything about anything. Also, in the middle of Mongolia. It creeped me out quite a bit and I felt really terrible for being so awful toward Ashley. She forgave me after she realized that I really DIDN’T remember anything but she teased me about it for a while after.

For the rest of the day I was a bit subdued and we had another day of long driving. We finally arrived at a beautiful hilly region with lots of tourist camps and horses! We loafed about all day waiting for the guide to come back with the horses so we could ride them. There was supposed to be a waterfall but it’s all dried up right now so we were a bit bored. Everybody went for a walk and I chatted with some tourists we ran into on the way. Then I headed back toward our tents and the horses were back! I immediately got on one but it was sluggish and pissed. Miriam came charging up (she rides horses at home and riding Mongolian horses has been a major goal for her on this trip) and we switched out my horse and got two lively, gallop-happy horses. We charged out across the plains and I did quite well considering I haven’t ridden a horse since I was 9 years old, and certainly never galloped on one. The guide led us over to his own ger and the family there presented us with a big bowl of Yak yoghurt. I tried two bites and though it wasn’t bad, I let Miriam eat the rest. Miriam was quite nauseous by the time we got back to the horses. Then we returned to the tourist ger where our tents were set up nearby. The family who owns it is good friends with Baira so they let us use one of the gers to store our backpacks, etc. Then we all got together and made DUMPLINGS! It was a lot of fun since we got to make them from scratch and Baira showed us all how to make them traditional Mongolian style. We made a bunch of potato ones since 3 of the girls are vegetarian/not big meat eaters and the rest were mutton/garlic/onion ones. They were SO good. Especially with hot mustard and ketchup!


Sunday

Got up to a beautiful warm day and Ashley and I went for early morning horseback riding. Afterwards we got ready to go and drove by Kharokum (the ancient city and Monastery.) A bunch of us wanted to head back to Ulaanbaatar today but time constraints were not permitting so we ended up at another camp where they had a shower. Miriam and I then endured the worst drip-drip cold ass shower we’ve ever had. It really wasn’t worth it but at least we were kinda clean. Then it started to rain so we made lunch in a ger and hung out for a bit. Then we went to the Monestary which was nice enough but nothing really spectacular. Plus there were a lot of people peddling wares and it was a little annoying. So we moved on and ended up at one of the best campsites we’ve been at yet! It was surrounded on all sides by beautiful mountains and interesting rock formations.

The neighboring ger brought us two huge Mongolian deels (made from sheep and smelling of sheep) to keep us warm since a bunch of us were freezing our asses off at night. It was very nice and Baira made us dinner which was also excellent. He is quite the chef! Then most of us drifted off and wrote in our journals and I played with the dogs. Everyone’s been joking that I’m the “Dog Whisperer” just because everyone else is afraid of contracting rabies from the dogs. *rolls eyes* But whatever, the dogs were awesome and made for great company. Then we all settled down for the night.


Monday

Miriam and Barb had a wolf attack their tent in the night. No one else heard it and they were too afraid to scream. Luckily the dog drove it off but not before it was scratching on the side of their tent. Scary.  Miriam swears it was a werewolf!

So we packed up and prepared to go to Ulaanbaatar. The scenery was beautiful and along the way we stopped at a restaurant where I got to eat Yak! It was by far the most delicious meat I’ve eaten so far in Mongolia! It tasted like meatloaf and the best parts of sex.

Then on we went to the hostel!!

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Photos

Sitting Around Dinner
Rice, vegetables, and ketchup!

Desert Dunes
Lots of baby camels around.

More beautiful landscapes
It really never ends.

Mongolian Horses
Yes, these horses are as small as they look. Mere ponies! But very strong!

Comments

[Rupert]

*chuckles*
So that's why you were silent for so long... I look forward to hearing more after you settle down late next week! ;)