Random Black and Whites

We are in Ulanbataar till Sunday if we can get on a train to Beijing.

How YOU doing?

Mongolia is High!

Next thing you know we are in a lush pine forest! We hiked 3km up a hill and on the top was a restored monastery. It was a bit of a battle as we were over 2000M above sea level and even though we were all sick from chest infections, hangovers, food poisoning and periods, at least 4 of us made it to the top and bathed in the peace, quiet and sunshine.

Ice Valley, Red Rocks and Dinosaurs!

We hiked down a frozen valley and saw a frozen water fall then we saw some big red rocks! The next day we went back into the rocks by Camel and the nice chap that we stayed with shopwed us some fossilised dinosuar bones in the rocks! I even have a small piece though after visiting the Natural History Museum here in Ulanbataar (where they have a major exhibit of dinosaurs excavated from the very same spot we were) I suspect that my bone is actually from a mammal dating back only 30million years and not an actual dinosaur. It sticks to your tongue. Look it up!

Bodies.

One of the camps we stayed at had an alarming number of animal carcasses around it. I even found a tidy pile of hooves! We were also greeted with a a big pot cooking in our Ger and we were shocked to find that it was a sheeps head and feet. After a lot of people taking the piss out of us and telling us how nice the eyes are, the girl that lived there told us that it was for her dog! You can imagine the relief. The next day i awoke to 2 inches of snow everywhere. There was no toilet and i did my first poo in the snow.

Sweeeeeet.

Red Rocks

Quite amazing....not sure if the photo does it justice but just another example of the ever changing landscapes of the Gobi.

Hmmm...maybe this will be a day by day account after all...

We stopped for lunch in a local school. Everyone had fun with paper aeroplanes.

Monasteries

The second day we saw two Monasteries. The first one was just ruins in the rock formations and the second and abandoned one. In the Stalinist period in the 1930s these places were destroyed and the monks killed.

First Ger Camp

These guys had a whole load of goats which meant that you ate goat, you drank warm goat milk tea with salt(!) and you smelt like goat!

The Dream Wagon!

This is the Russian 4x4 that hauled us around the Gobi for 3000km without missing a beat. A tough old thing! We did have to change a petrol filter and fix a hole in teh fuel tank but apart from that it tackled sand, mountains, rocks and rivers!

Mongolia!

Wow!

So we were out in the Gobi Desert for nine days driving around in a Russian 4x4 and staying with nomadic Mongolian families, staying in Gers and eating mutton! I took a toni of pictures so will just briefly describe eachg one rather than a day by day account...

Though I will link to Reto's Blog who will definately have day by day and google maps to look at! (Geek)

Road to mongolia.

We finally arrived in Mongolia at 6am this morning. Not a bad trip as the slow train we were on had a few people from our hostel that we have made friends with. there also a group of english people obviously on a tour. I'm so glad that we didn't end up with them. They are like a bunch of pricks from Clapham. It's quite weird as you can tell that they have no clue because they have a guide who does everything for them. Its great - I was speaking mock russian just to confuse them. The hostel we are staying at is pretty good. They seem very organised ....just nice! Ania and I are tomorrow going on a 9 day day trip out into the Gobi with our Swiss friend and a nice english couple that we met this morning. Should be cool. Its only about US$175 each including our van and driver. Its gonna be one of those Russian 4x4 things that i love so much so we are really looking forward to the trip. Mongolia is great. You can tell the difference straight away compared to russia.

People smile and laugh for a start.

See you in 10 days!

Then the sun came out...

more ice....

Lake Baikal - Listvyanka

Siberian House In Irkutsk

Happy Socialist Workers Day!

Yes May 1st was a glorious day in Irkutsk. Check out the Goose Step! Perfect....

Siberian Sunrise.

Siberian Train

You get the idea. This is about 6am on our way to Irkutsk.

ice ice baby!

alright stop!

we just spent 2 nights out at lake baikal which was absolutely beautiful. We stayed in a big wooden chalet ovelooking the lake. Its still off season there so we didn't get to do everything we wanted to as there was still a huge block of ice stopping any boats from docking there! We walked on the ice which was a little scary as this morning we came out to see that same block of ice floating out to the middle of the lake. It has been beautiful and sunny and we spent yesterday afternoon drinking beers and looking out over the ice to the snow capped mountains on the other side of the lake. We are catching our train tonight and leaving Russia for Mongolia. It will be a shame to leave but its quite expensive here so it will be good to get out and look forward to easy budget travelling from here on in. I should be able to upload some pics in a couple of days.

Have fun out there!