Fromeward Bound

My musings on Mongolia continued….

#11 The Mongolian steppe is very curvaceous. The soft rounded hills look like they have been draped with a plush green velvet.

#12 The men are rather handsome….. especially when they are riding their horses!

#13 Milky tea is popular here.

#14 There is a South Korean influence here so some of the supermarkets are stocked with Korean food. Great, if like me, you’re a fan of Kimchi.

#15 People are often packed into cars. Sometimes it looks like there are 6 or more people in any one car. In the cabs of minivans and lorries the children are often pressed right up against the windscreen.

#16 Mongolia is at high altitude. We’ve spent much of the time at 1500 – 2000 metres above sea level (highest we’ve been is 2500m). Because of this you really feel like you’re living in a thin sliver between the land and the clouds.

#17 Animals that have been accidentally killed, most likely by cars or lightning, are left  where they died to be slowly devoured by nature. We passed a dead dog in a village covered in flies and two horses on one side of the road, stiff as wood, with a burnt out car on the other side. We also saw a dead calf on the road that had at least 8 vultures patiently waiting – while a dog tried to chase them off defending a member of his herd as best he could.

#19 We are caked in dust and sand. I understand it’s been the hottest July in the world ever and that’s no exception here. It’s hot and hasn’t rained in weeks; with many river beds dried up and lakes low. As you can imagine cars leave a trail of dust in their wake and, as we like to have the windows open, the inside of Totty is covered. It’s playing havoc with my curtains as the curtain tracks are full of dust so it’s increasingly difficult to open and close them! A soft-furnishing headache 😉

#20 It is very windy in Mongolia especially in the evening and night.

After my Ruminations on Russia here are my Musings on Mongolia:

#1 I’m not the biggest fan of cows but the cows here are cute and fluffy especially the baby ones.

#2 Mongolia is one of my favourite countries ever!

#3 People still stare at us……maybe it’s our drop-dead good looks?

#4 Mongolians are very friendly. If you are stopped for lunch or camping they will come over and say hello. Obviously with language being a barrier, and because Mongolians are nomadic, the ‘conversation’ always reverts to where you have come from and where you are going. They will stay for a few minutes and then potter off.

#5 There are hardly any tarmac roads in Mongolia (apart from the major routes.) There are mostly rough tracks through the steppe. Unfortunately, what happens along the well trodden routes is that as a track gets too rough new tracks are formed. This means that over time a single route can turn into a 10 or more lane ‘motorway’ that snakes through the countryside.

#6 Mongolia is vast – 1.566 million square km but has less than 3 million people!

#7 As a result wild camping is incredibly easy. Just drive off the main route and find a quiet spot – we have camped in the most beautiful scenery imaginable.

#8 Horses, cows, goats, sheep and eagles abound (as well as camels in the deserts and yaks in the north).

#9 There are lots of tour companies, in Russian minivans and 4WDs, ferrying tourist groups from A to B.

#10 The houses and towns look very similar to their Russian counterparts apart from one very obvious thing. Mongolia is so much more colourful – where roofs in Russia would be brown and grey here they are a multitude of colours: dusty pink, yellow, turquoise, orange, blue and green corrugated iron roofs sit on top equally colourful buildings.