Middle of nowhere

Trip Start Aug 24, 2008
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7
129
Trip End Jul 07, 2009


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Flag of Mongolia  ,
Monday, September 22, 2008

We arrived in Ulanbator, the capital of Mongolia, and did a quick tour of the city before heading out into the Gobi desert. We stayed for 3 nights with some nomadic people in their tent, known as a ger, and went on little trips out to places such as Karakorum, where we saw a monastery and a turtle rock. Sleeping in the ger was very cold, and I slept in slept in 3 sleeping bags. The only warmth we had was from the stove, which burnt out during the night. In Karakorum also saw the hilarious sight of a motorbike with two men and a sheep on it. The sheep just did not seem bothered to be speeding through the desert, even though they were probably taking it to be slaughtered. We posed for photos on the sand dunes in the desert. David and I also went horse riding, and we rounded up a herd of goats and sheep, which was fun. David later rounded up some horses, but Angela's horse was lazy and so just ran off in the opposite direction, so the herdsman had to rescue me! We saw some horses being milked, and we tasted the milk, which was just like normal milk. We later tasted arag, which is fermented mare's milk, and is alcoholic. It tasted interesting.. We also saw a bull being slaughtered and dissected for sale in UB. We then moved to a different ger camp, more tourist-orientated this time, and went out to see a massive statue of Genghis Khan and did some archery. Mongolia does not have many towns and cities, so we felt very detached from civilisation. Also the roads are not all paved, so we had quite few bumpy rides in the jeep! Back in Ulanbator we sampled the local cuisine (burger and chips!) and looked around the state department store.
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