Outer Mongolia: The Vast Emptiness

During our stay in Mongolia, we’ve taken two trips out into the Mongol countryside.  The first one was a five day trip organised by the hostel that we spent most of our time staying in.  A brief rundown of the trip was:

Day 1 – driving to the semi-Gobi (a place that is getting close to being a desert).  On the way we stopped at the Hustai National Park, where there are the last remaining Przewalski horses, the only untamed horses on the planet.  There were six of us; we were joined by a 19 year old posh English kid of Peter Crouch proportions (Jamie), an Indian, Sandeep, who’s been living in American for more than decade and two Swedes, who proved to be stingy, silent, sour and stubborn.

Swedes not included, as they annoyed me, I was taking the picture

Day 2 –  Driving to the Ulaan Tsutgalan waterfall, set in a large plateau surrounded by mountains.  On the way there, the underside of Russian van we were travelling in wacked a rock in the ground as we were going through particularly rough muddy terrain.  After an hour of trying, and surrounding the tyres with stones to help grips, the van eventually came loose.  It was only then that we could see the full extent of the damage, as one end of the drive shaft lay on the ground.  Top Gear wouldn’t be in it for drama (plus, we didn’t have a huge supply van to keep us and the camera crew living in a worst case scenario).  Our driver simply took it off and put it in the van, and on we continued.

Day 3 – Woke up to a magnificent, snow covered landscape, thought it melted quickly (that didn't stop that wretched Swedish Orlov from remarking "I fucking hate snow!").  No driving today, we simply stayed in the area and did some walking in the hills with a couple of random dogs leading Audrey, Jamie, Sandeep and I.  We also got the chance to help with goat herding and sawing wood.  The Swedes did not take part in anything, and simply sat in the tent, apart from the horse-riding, which was part of the organised tour.  We both had sore arses after a couple of hours of that.  The driver spent the day getting the van back in working order (Russian machines are not so complicated, so it seems you can do this type of stuff yourself).

Dinner time, doggie!

We also had a “Mongolian Barbeque”, when our tour guide helped us buy half a goat.  I didn’t expect anything like what we have in the West, but it was also nothing like a BBQ.  It involved heating up a load of large round stones in the fire, taking a large cauldron of hot water and putting in spuds, carrots, onions and then the meat, and dropping in the stones, and letting it all stew for an hour or more.  Was quite interesting, not the best meal ever though.

(Left: Tuul our tour guide, very friendly, and cooked well with the limited resources. Just to be clear, with "limited resources" I don't mean the size of the lamb. In fact it had nothing to do with the BBQ)

The Mongolian "BBQ"!

Day 4 – On the road again, we headed to Kharakhorum, which was the ancient capital of Mongolia and where good old Genghis called home.  Seen an impressive monastery that is basically the only thing standing from ancient times (but reliable Joe Stalin did his best by getting over 70% of it destroyed in the 30s).  Then we headed back to the semi-Gobi, but a different part of it.  Rode camels, even more uncomfortable, never again.  Where we stayed that night, they used dried dung in place of firewood, which wasn’t that surprising, as there wasn’t a tree in sight.  Seemed to work quite well, with no smell.

Day 5 – Headed back to UB, got my first beer in 5 days.

The second trip we took with a friend of a friend that Audrey knew, so it wasn’t really a tourist trip, but rather someone going back to his family to help with a few things before going back to UB.  This way, we avoided the slightly more sanitised tours and got to see how people live day-to-day.

Day 1 – Headed out of UB, took about 3 hours to get out by the time the driver, Mönkhbat (henceforth known as Monk) stopped off a few times to get things and pick up other people.  There were two vans, and seven of us.  His newly wedded son (Naran) and daughter-in-law (Bolor) were moving to the South Gobi, where he came from originally, to live in a Ger that used to belong to Monk.  His mate (name unknown) and son (Chegi) joined us, which helped us somewhat as Chegi had some English (the rest had none, but some did have a little Russian).  We stopped regularly to fix one of the vans, which wasn’t coping well with the terrain.  We camped in the middle of nowhere late that night.

Naran, Bolor, Audrey and Chegi

Day 2 – Driving the whole day except for breakdowns, a short lunch break (awful food at a “restaurant” about 100km from anything else) and Bayanzag, which was quite impressive.  Eventually we reached a village Bulgan, where we would stay for the next two days.

Day 3 – Spent the day doing not much in Bulgan.  Monk got stuck into doing the regular things he was there to do, such as fixing the door of his bro's squat toilet (as we had specifically said we didn’t want to interrupt his plans as we were only paying for his petrol, and he wasn’t a tour guide).  Bolor and Naran showed us around the village.

(Left: Monk's brother and other random family)

Monk fixing the toilet door

Day 4 – Headed up into the hills to drop Monk's mate off in the mountains for a two week Buddhist retreat with a famous local Lama.  We found out later that Monk’s mate was also quite famous, having been the governor of one of the districts in UB.  We helped them set up camp at the top of a mountain, and then left them.  Audrey had great difficulty getting down, a mountain goat she is not.  Audrey, Chegi and I headed off to Yolin Am, an ice valley set in beautiful landscape, while the others headed off to Monk’s hometown.  We met up with them later there, and stayed in the Ger that Monk was giving to the newly-weds.

Day 5 – We took the Ger apart, put it on the back of a lorry, and drove it to Bolor’s family and rebuilt it there.  The whole process took about 4 hours to dismantle, move and rebuild, and by the end of the day, they had the interior 100% completed.  I’d like to see that happen in the west.  In the evening, copious amounts of Vodka were consumed with a few beers.

Day 6 – The start of the day was quite slow due to the evening before.  Eventually we set off at 3pm on the “road” back to UB.  It would be 570km before we saw any proper roads (again to add a bit of perspective, it’s only 466 km from the northern most point to the southern most point in Ireland).  After 7 hours on the road, we set up camp in a hill, had a bit of food, and then three of us slept in the back of the mini-bus.

Day 7 – After setting off at 8, UB appeared on the horizon at 1:30pm.  Traffic was horrendous, and it would be 3pm before we would reach Monk’s apartment.  He invited us up for some food, but we declined politely, saying that we needed to get some sleep as we were knackered.  Really we wanted to avoid another helping on mutton or goat and milk tea (as the name suggests, very milky tea, but also with salt).

We found out when we met him later with a friend who spoke English and Mongolian that he had phoned ahead to his wife to get her to prepare something a bit more western with beef, as he sensed our exhaustion with the Mongol diet.

We got back to our hostel at 4pm.

Mongolia: The Arrival

I’m not sure where to start with Mongolia, as we’ve been here for three weeks, and have seen and done so much.  Firstly, a few facts.  Mongolia is huge, 17 times the size of the island of Ireland, and less than half the population.  It is the least densely populated country in the world.  More than a third of its population lives in the capital, Ulaanbaatar (UB), which makes the rest of the country seem even more remote.

There are practically no roads in the country, only 2600km of paved roads, which would be just about enough to create one straight road across the country, everything else in the official roads maps (up to 40,000 km) are simply bumpy dirt tracks.

Ghengis Khan (know to the Mongols as Chinggis Khaan) and his offspring are the only world famous people that the country has produced (although he is as famous as nearly anyone in any civilization ever).  Without a google search, or having previously visited, it would be difficult to name anyone else who is famous (some Japanese people might be able to name a Yokozuna or two, as Mongols are known for wrestling, and some crossover into Sumo, the only current Yokozuna is a Mongol).

Getting here involved a one day train trip from Ulan Ude.  Nothing major happened on the train trip.  It was the best carriage we had been on yet, as all international trains are minimum 2^nd class, and they are from China, who normally provide better trains than the Russians.  One of the travellers in our compartment was a Russian nuclear physicist.

It took us 9 hours to get through the border, 7 on the Russian side, and two on the Mongol side.  For a few minutes, it looked like we were going to get fined by the local Russian gendarmes, as we had not registered anywhere while we were in Russia.  Actually, it looked like Audrey was going to get fined, for some reason, he didn’t ask me any questions, even though Audrey and I had had the same itinerary and visas.

In Russia you are meant to register anywhere that you stay for more than 3 working days, but we had been moving on from places quite often, as well as hitting weekends, so we didn’t register anywhere.  He started talking about how much of a “fine” we would have to pay (him).  We stood our ground, told him our situation (Audrey’s Russian was proving very useful at this point) and started showing him all our train tickets to prove that we’d been moving around quite often.  Eventually our persistence paid off, and he slunk off to the next carriage.

Eventually the train got moving across the border, and we were saluted into Mongolia by a number of military personnel.  Everything was much quicker on this side, the train got moving, we fell asleep and work up the next morning in Ulaanbaatar.

We got off the train a 6:20am

Ulan Ude, the end of our Russian adventure

We’re a couple of weeks behind in our blog writing, since we’ve spent most of our time in Mongolia hitting the hinterlands where the internet is a rarity, and when we’ve been back in Ulan Bator, we’ve either been recovering or meeting up with people.  And to top it all off, my domain expired, so I've had to spend a few days getting it all back together.

Ulan Ude would be the last place that we would regularly encounter people who determined themselves as Russians.  Initially, I had mixed feelings about them.  When you first get to Russia, and go through St. Petersburg and Moscow, the main thought you have about the Russians is how unfriendly they seem.  Bump into someone, walk on.  Stand on their heel, ignore them.  Go through a door, let it slam in the face of the next person.  Smile at someone, get a puzzled look.

Once you get over this aspect of Russian behaviour, and realise it is not personal, it’s just the way they are, you become more comfortable wandering around, doing similar things (except if you’ve knocked into an old lady, people will still apologise for something like that, they’ve been through a lot for the motherland).

The people that you actually meet though are a different kettle of fish.  Once a Russian spends 10 minutes getting to know you, and if they like you, then they are very helpful and hospitable.  I can’t think of anyone that we met on our way for the briefest period of time that wouldn’t help us when lost, offer us some drink or a bit of food.

Anyway, back to Ulan Ude. On the train journey, we went around Lake Baikal, which looked amazing.  The train snaked its way through mountains above the lake giving us great views over the vast frozen expanse (as usual, a camera find it much more difficult to pick up what the eye can see; and that's a crack in the ice).  I also got accosted by a 12 year old kid, who was interested in speaking English with us.  His English wasn’t great, but I was amazed by his persistence, as he spent 3 hours talking to us about different things.

I tried to explain to him I was from Ireland, the northern part, but he got confused, and continually called it the Republic of Northern Ireland (which is perhaps the best solution for the place).  He also wanted to know what types of guns we used there!  I couldn’t remember the name Armalite.  He told us that in Russia, they loved their AK-47.  By the end of the journey, he'd given me his address and e-mail (and vice versa, seems I’ve now got a 12-year old penpal), and he told me I had to stay with him the next time I’m in Russia, which I will, in case he gets his Kalashnikov out after me.

We arrived in Ulan Ude on a scorching hot day, at 5 in the evening, the heat of day having accumulated to make it humid and stuffy.  We had a 30 minute walk to the hostel, and by the end I was sweating like David Cameron in a working man’s club.

The hostel was pretty shit, they moved us between rooms the two nights we stayed there, and also somehow managed to move the kitchen to another room in the hostel as well (sink and everything). The hot shower didn’t work on the second night, and Audrey had to make do with the kettle for washing her hair.

We went to the big Lenin head (pic), the biggest in the world, and a monastery, but apart from that, the place didn’t offer too much.  Except for unusual encounters with strangers again.  We were on the tram in wondering (aloud, in English) where to go for dinner, when a young man approached us and offered help. It turned out that he (Shawn, I tried to explain to him it should be Sean) is studying English at the uni and wanted some practice, and we are the fist "real" foreigners he has ever spoken to.

After recommending us two good local restaurants, he suggested driving us there.  Audrey was interested, but a bit skeptical (he was a stranger, after all), but I was up for it, so we got off the tram and got in his car.  The windscreen had a spiders web of cracks all the way across it (like my brother Karl’s Skoda used to have), but no one worries about that type of thing over here.

We headed to the restaurant, but it was closed, so he suggested we try another one that was his friends.  He drove us out of Ulan Ude (I could sense alarm bells ringing in Audrey’s head, later she told me she was making mental calculations as to whether it would be safe to pile out of the car as we sped out of town) to a village, where he claimed the best baozis were to be had.  The food was good in the restaurant (right), and we got to hear the Russian take on Walk Like An Egyptian over the radio.

Shawn was Buryatin, but was fiercely proud of being Russian, and even though he studied Chinese and English, he had no interest in using them as a ticket to a “better” life in the west, but rather wanted to stay in Ulan Ude and help make it a better place instead of it continually suffering a brain drain.

During his English courses at Uni, he also studied the culture around the language, and had recently done a module on Northern Ireland, so he had a chance to ask me a few questions about it, and we discussed the situation.  He did admit to barely passing that one, but I can understand, as it’s a pretty complicated situation even now.

At the end of the night, far from being robbed, poisoned or abducted, we had 6 delicious baozis, a new friend, and valuable insights about Buryatin life in Ulan Ude.


A couple of final things, I had the best chocolate cake ever while I was there, for the grand sum of £1.4, and cheapest tastiest dinner, costing about £4 for both of us.  I would show links on google maps, but that part of Russia isn't mapped too well.

We left the next day at 6:55am.

Website down

This is a test post.  Lost my domain, so the website has been down for over a week now.  Trying to get things back up and running.  Currently I can't see the website where it should be, so sticking this up in the hope it will republish the blog.