Mongolia - Part 2!

The last 2 full days in Mongolia, we took a trip organised by the sustainable tour group, Ger to Ger, out to Terelj National Park where we met 3 very different nomadic families. Although Ger to Ger had given us a useful orientation, some of the other information they gave was a bit lacking. After getting off at the wrong bus stop in the main town, we just made it (with the assistance of some friendly locals) back in time to get the minibus out to the Park. Then, we got off at the wrong stop (again!) so had to walk further on but we soon met our first host who took us by ox cart to his home where we had a really nice lunch with the rest of the family.

The park is a mixture of forested hillsides and green river valleys with some crazy rock formations thrown in. After lunch, we got to enjoy more of the scenery when we travelled by horse to the next family, where we were to spend the night in their second ger. In many respects, this family seemed the most authentic and we definitely had the best time here. We had a really nice evening meal and played a game with knucklebones until it was too dark to see. The next morning, we got up really early and had a chance to milk a cow, try our hand at archery, have a yum breakfast, and climb the nearby hill to get an amazing view across the valley. Then, it was back on an ox cart for a long trip to our 3rd and final family's ger for lunch before heading back to UB. The weather was stunning until about 20 minutes before we got to the last ger and then it rained. Hard. We spent a lot of the afternoon, sitting in the ger (being somewhat ignored as our hosts had their neighbours visiting as well) trying to keep dry. Fortunately the weather cleared enough for us to get back to the village in time for the bus.

We were pretty tired when we made it back to our hostel but we managed to have just enough energy to pack our bags for our early morning train departure the next day to Beijing....