Garfield around the world

Last night we stayed in a ger camp nest to a hot spring at Thenther. After we left camp we had a long drive to Therkhun Taagaan lake via Tsertserleg city. In this city the locals came from all around with their goods to sell their wood, wool, eggs mares milk etc.
Hereafter we left the city and crossed a large wooden bridge, which according to the road sign could carry a 5-ton payload. But it looked so crooked that even our drivers in our light Gaz busses where not planning to cross at the same time.

But we made across safely and had an very early lunch near Chuluud canyon, which is an impressive piece of natures work.
The plan was to have lunch at one but since in the morning we had a short stop and our drivers had purchased a big marmot they got very excited and instead we stopped for lunch just after eleven. Apparently Mongolian men are just crazy for this meat and can’t resist it.
I got offered to taste it and I must say it tastes very nice; it’s a cross between rabbit and hare. The way it is prepared is noticeable when you eat it. The neck of the animal is cut and they place a lot of very hot stones inside and thus cooking the meat from inside. The way you notice this is that they don’t clean the stones so after your meal you keep eating sand.

Today we left camp to head for the ancient city of Kharakhorum.
Once there we first drove up a hill, next to the city, to hear a story about an enormous penis and vagina.
These were made on the order of the head of the local monastery, because his young monks where only interested in the local women and not in their prayers. Once the priest had performed many mantras and sutras at these reproductive symbols the young monks returned to their prayers again and no longer looked at the local women. At least that is what the legend says.
But as the story goes up to this day women who want to get pregnant, but have problems getting, come in the early morning to these symbols and ride the big penis, because they believe it will bless them.

We then visited the monastery in the former capital, founded by Chinggis Khan. The monastery was largely destroyed during the communist purge under the Soviet influence of Mongolia. A large part of the monastery has been restored since 1996 and since then there are again Buddhist monks living and studying in the monastery.
On the earlier mentioned hill and outside the monastery there are two huge statues of turtles, which make no sense what so ever because Mongolia has no seas.
The ruins of the former Chinggis Khan capital surround the statue near the monastery. As a big contrast in the back of these ruins and the statue stands a very ugly polluting asphalt factory. Which is a shame off course but can deliver a nice photograph if you stand on the other side of the monastery. From that side it looks like the monastery is on fire because of the black smoke from the factory.
After our visit we headed off north through a UNESCO protected nature reserve and saw our first Yaks. Little did we know that in the coming days we would see more and more of them, together with Yak and cow cross breads, named Hannocks.
It became obvious we where heading north because the surrounding plains and mountain ranges became greener and greener and the nights got colder.
Mongolia, what a beautiful country.

We headed off in southern direction to another 5 star ger camp, this time in the south Gobi, near the Chinese border.
Near this new ger camp we finally saw, for the first time this trip, the enormous sand dunes for which the Gobi is famous. After settling in and close to sunset we drove to these sand dunes to climb them. We made a really exhausting climb up a 200-meter high sand dune and admired the sunset from the top. We had a bit of luck on our climb, because of the recent rain, the sand had hardened a bit so instead of going down two steps with every three steps up, we only went down one step with every three steps up.

Back in our ger camp it started raining again and once in our gers to turn in for the night it started poring.
The next morning, Monday the 16th, the rain had cleared and we headed out of the Gobi on a northerly course.

During the day it started raining again and when we reached our next ger camp it seemed like a tropical rainstorm was upon us. But according to our local Mongolian guide we were one of the lucky groups, through our oneness and therefore able to reach this central camp between the south Gobi and the central Gobi.
As it turned out this camp is situated in a mountain range that separates the north from the south Gobi and is one of the rare crossing points to go north out of the Gobi. Several groups started the climb up to this camp to late and had to turn back because mud floods blocked their way up.

This morning we left for the flaming cliffs in the central Gobi. These all kinds of colours cliffs, but mainly red, hence the name where made famous in 1921. When an expedition finally resolved the question whether Dinosaurs are egg laying or life bearing animals.
Around these cliffs the expedition uncovered many dinosaur skeletons, but more importantly lots of eggs. Both of flesh eating dinosaurs, small eggs, and of plant eating dinosaurs, big eggs.
Next to these Grand Canyon like cliffs is a very tiny dinosaur museum in a typical Mongolian ger tent.

In the afternoon, after we settled ourselves in our 5 star luxury ger tent resort, we drove to vulture canyon. Going up in the mountains the temperature dropped from about 30 °C to a refreshing 18 °C and the surroundings started to get very green.
During our horseback ride in the canyon we saw a lot of wildlife, but as luck would have it no vultures. We did however saw ice! Yes really mid July in the middle of the Gobi ice.
Hereafter we turned back to our ger camp and had a luscious warm shower a meal in an air-conditioned ger and electric sockets in our private ger tents to recharge our camera batteries.
Yes we’re really roughing it out here.

Yesterday we had a long day drive, 300 km, to reach our first ger camp. These 300 kilometres take about 9 hours going south from Ulaanbataar.
Today we had another long drive to our primitive campsite in the middle off the Gobi, but we made a lovely stop at a now almost dry lake. The lake had shrunk by a lack of rain and of a nearby mining site.
We had a big rain shower on the way to our campsite and were lucky enough to be just a few metres ahead of a mud flood up in a mountain range we crossed. The flood was building up and if we had reached the crossing 5 minutes later we would not have been able to cross the range and would be forced to turn back. We drove through the first waves of the flood and got the hell out of there because there was lots more coming down the mountain.
Other reasons why you should not travel on Friday the 13th: In the morning our car wouldn’t start and in the afternoon we had a blow out of a rear tire.
Almost enough to make you start believe all this nonsense about Friday the 13th.