Beyond Ulan-Bator (Cameron)

1) There are some obvious things to prepare for on a seven day trip to the Gobi (dehydration, camel attack, etc.), but torrential rainfall did not make our list. We hiked across a swamp to climb the sand dunes, but on the way back the water level had risen substantially resulting in a challenging crossing. When we went to the dunes again the next morning on camels, they struggled not to slip in the mud.

2) Throughout our Gobi trip, we would periodically stop at general stores in small towns. These stores were all pretty much identical in terms of the products they sold (and the plastic "I <3 NY" bags they provided). We would buy water, gum, candies, peanuts, and bland pieces of dense bread which tasted vaguely of glazed donuts. We would always offer some to Oggy and Moosh, and they never refused. But we suspect that this was culturally mandated; Oggy once took only two peanuts, one for her and one for Moosh.

3) We visited a family and were given a wide variety of dairy products. Our best guesses as to what we consumed are: mares milk, goat curd, goat/sheep cream, and fermented mares milk. The mares milk was incredibly sour (and a powerful laxative according to the internet). We had trouble getting it down, yet our bowl was continuously refilled so we ended up drinking quite a lot of it. The curd was similarly strong and sour. I found the cream and fermented milk quite inoffensive, other than the odour.

3) We were lucky to come across a horse race that some rich families had organized. The race was 20km, and the jockeys were all young children, mostly boys, but some girls. The youngest jockey was three. They started from a congregation of cars and horses in an unpopulated area in the steppes, and we waited until they returned some time later. Some of the horses returned with no riders. Chaperones rode alongside on dirt bikes.

4) We stayed for one night in a ger in Dalanzadgad, a town of 17,000 people, 540km south of Ulan-Bator. There were a few permanent buildings, but most people lived in gers. In urban areas, gers are in rectangular, fenced lots (fencing is made of almost anything: wood, corrugated metal, bricks, unrolled barrel sides). A standard lot is about 7 by 20 meters.

We heeded Oggy's warnings, but nonetheless decided to venture outside the safety of our lot (the "green zone"). There were numerous playgrounds (basketball hoops and strange exercise devices were the main features), and all of them were packed with children. We stopped at one and I juggled a bit (a universal language), and the kids seemed happy with this. I had to turn down requests to juggle tiny, unperturbed puppies.

On our way back, a couple of guys were up to no good, and started making trouble in the neighborhood. After an suspicious suggestion to take out a camera for a picture was rejected, one of them raised a fist only to be held back by his compatriot. They followed us as we walked home. My concern that Gordon Ramsey and Julia Child would have to get involved (my right and left fists) was dissolved when we neared the green zone and Moosh saw what was going on and chased them down the street. One of them lost his sandals. This lent further to Moosh's superhuman image, not the least of which because Andrew's sub 100 pound estimate of Moosh's weight (based on a drunken piggyback ride).

5) Mongolian horses are very small, prompting Andrew to wonder who would be riding whom. The saddles are small and the stirrups are high, so there is plenty of groin, thigh, knee, calf, and ankle pain. This was not helped by our guide's great fondness of convincing our horses to canter.

Our second equestrian excursion was in Terelj National Park. The horses did not seem happy and proved difficult to control for our 11 year old guide, despite the whippings he generously provided. Not far from camp, a Korean girl was tossed over the front of her horse, and though uninjured, she decided she was now afraid of horses. In the commotion, the other two girls couldn't prevent their horses from trotting back home; both decided this was for the best. Our young guide sorted this out while Andrew and I sat on our calmly grazing animals. He returned at a gallop, and communicated his impatience by whipping my horse square in the face.

6) The Gobi trip was awesome, and the rain actually made it better: we saw lightning and rainbows (and double rainbows), and drove through rivers and mud. We saw thousands and thousands of cows, camels, sheep, goats, and horses (it is very satisfying to see a big herd of horses freely galloping across the steppes). We saw hawks, vultures, Jerboa, and lots of interesting insects. The sand dunes were magnificent, as were the rocky hills we climbed. We got to crawl through a 70 meter cave, which felt somewhat unsafe because it was through a clay hill and there were large chunks of the ceiling which had fallen off, leaving only small places to squirm through (Oggy joined us, yet remained improbably put together, as she was for the whole trip). The sky was huge and in some places it was very flat so the horizon was wavy in the heat in all directions.