Monday, Sept 1 - UlaanBaatar - Report from the countryside

Lydon Mongoli-Siberia Adventure Update – August 31, 2014

UlaanBaator – Sept 1 Day 11 - 4:00 PM - Best Western Premium Tuushin Hotel -- best hotel in town.

We are staying in this fancy hotel for one night before heading to Siberia.

The view from the Best WesternTuushin hotel - that's Genghis Khan Square - the heart of Mongolia.

  This is being posted after our three-night stay at Lake Khovsgol where we were off the Internet.  I will provide a brief summary of where we’ve been and what we’ve done – but, let me begin by saying that the weather has been wonderful, the group’s health has been good, and the adventures keep coming one right after the other.  I’ll do this in reverse chronology to get us all caught up.

Our window to the heart of Mongolia – Chimgee, our guide, has arranged so many wonderful things for us, it’s hard to list them all. Some of the most touching moments have occurred on our van as she told us of her childhood, living about 12 hours drive from UB to the east.  She is uniquely qualified to explain Mongolia to a group of Americans as her English is wonderful (and idiomatic from spending a year in the US) and she also has a long and treasured early life growing up in the nomadic Mongolian culture and then in urban UB.   One of our favorite stories – and hers – revolved around her childhood chores of gathering dung for the family.

 

 Taking Other People’s Dung –

Our van driver, Khurlee, Chimgeee and Annie Lydon, on the
trail at the Uvgun Temple near Bayangobi.  Khurlee has been
so special to us that we insisted - INSISTED - that he take care
of us these last two days in UB.  He is.  Amazing man, big heart,
but can be a tough driver on the streets of UB.

She and her sister had the daily chore of gathering dried dung off the countryside for fueling the family stove in the ger.  She said that one day she and her sister found a pile of already-gathered dung that they added to their own pile, and then spent the free time available goofing off and playing in the grass.  When they arrived back at the ger, her grandfather approached them asking why they had been playing around when they should have been working.  He then told them that he had seen them take the dung that did not belong to them and told them to take it back out where they had found it.  He had been watching them through binoculars.  His lesson for that day was that you should not take from the work of others.  A lesson that Chimgee now appreciates, though found at the time embarrassing.

 Lake Khovsgol – Aug. 29-31 Toilogt Ger Camp

 We timed this itinerary to take advantage of the short weather window before winter slams it shut, and also avoiding the mid-summer crowds.  School starts Monday, September 2, and we seen a steady flow of trucks carrying the ger gear, headed toward the towns and UB.  Not everyone will move off the land yet, but many of those with kids will move closer to schools.  It also means that the tourist season is nearing a close, and we’ve reaped the benefits of that at the Toilogt Ger Camp on the shore of Lake Khovsgol – we’re just about the only residents at this sprawling camp.  And the weather has been sublime – I’m writing this in our tepee ger, the sun streaming through the open doorway, the lake sparkling about 50 yards away and the sky that famed Mongolian blue.

We stayed in tepees, the style of gers used by the reindeer people
of Mongolia.  Yes, there's a connection with American tepees.

Toilogt Ger Camp, Lake Khovsgol

 

 

This is ranked as the best ger camp here at Lake Khovsgol, and has several levels of accommodations, ranging from tepees, rounded gers, to log cabin-like fancy cabins around the edge.  It rests on a hillside overlooking the lake, and there are communal showers and toilets, and a huge dining room and even a game ger.  They also have their own boat that took us on a lovely tour of the central part of the lake.  Horses, and there’s a resident herd of yaks and cattle that continually come through the gate and a shushed out. 

All of the gers at Toilogt ger camp have a view of Lake Khovsgol.

The lake temperature is a balmy 56 degrees, while the air temperature ranges from 70 daytime to 30s at night.  It can get chilly up here – we’re over 5,000 feet in elevation and almost to Siberia in latitude.  The lakes waters are crystal clear – drinkable they say, though I’m resisting it.

At this moment most of the group is out taking a horseback tour – I stayed behind to get our journals caught up.

  Khovsgol Highlights include the place itself, the meals, the boat ride, a visit to a family that keeps yaks and makes yak stuff. 

The charging station at Toilogt Ger Camp - powered by a
sophisticated solar system with plenty of power strips to go
around.

 

 

The meals at Toilogt ger camp were well
beyond your traditional fare - this is beef
with vegetables, mashed potatoes and stuff.

The Flight from UB to Moron – August 29 -Look Ma! Propellers!

Distances and roads being what they are in Mongolia, sometimes it’s just easier to fly – we flew the short 90minutes from UB to Moron (pronounced “Moo Roan”)  in a Huunu Airlines Fokker 50 – two jet powered propeller engines – two rows of seats with an aisle – and mostly locals – there was the 10 of us and  group of 6 Russian fishermen with a mountain of gear. 

The Takhi Horses – August 28  - Hustai National Park

We flipped the itinerary so that we would be passing Hustai in the evening, in hopes that we might see the famous Mongolian wild horses that were once extinct in Mongolia.  With stock from European zoos, the animals have been brought back and turned loose in this huge national park.  In mornings and evenings they come down out of the mountains for water, and we got our takhi fix that evening – beautiful animals, and a feel-good story where, not unlike what has been done with the condors in California, members of a species only living in zoos were put back.  And are thriving.

Viewing the Takhi - left to right, Mary Lynne Donnelly, Pat Loughlin
and Janet Jones.  It was a wonderful moment being able to see these
magnificent horses.



Annie photographing the Takhi

 

Karakorum – August 26 – 27

The iconic centerpiece of this once-capital of Mongolia is the Buddhist temple complex at Erdene Zhuu.  We visited late in the afternoon, and saw the place against a dark, broody sky.  Very photogenic.  This was also the location where we had our own personal mini-naadam – demonstrations of archery, wrestling, and horse racing.  Barbara McCrary had won the archery contest at our naadam in 2007, but this time they gave her a very strong re-curve bow, and thought she did skid an arrow into the target, she was disappointed that she didn’t do better.  She needn’t have been as it took great courage to even attempt it.  She’s still the champion as far as we’concerned.

Barbara McCrary following the flight
of her arrows.

 

Our post-naadam conversation with the neighbors -- they were
very interested in what we had to say.

Bayangobi – Khurlee's Family

Some tours in Mongolia promise some up-close-and-personal time and even a visit to a ger.  In our case, our van driver noted that we would be passing close to his family ger camp, and suggested that we might stop and meet his mother and some of the family members still living there.  This was not a staged visit – it was as natural as perhaps most ger visits are in Mongolia.  We met Khurlee’s mother, several of his brothers, and nieces and nephews.  But it was his 88 year old mother, Sandag, who was the star of the visit – she had born 11 children (10 still living), and her fecundity recognized by the \Mongolian government.  It was  magical morning with the family swirling around as we sat in the gear sampling hard cheeses, soft cheeses, yogurt, salt milk tea, and the Mongolian staple – airing – fermented mare’s milk. Sandag was a bit hard of hearing, but she never stopped working the entire time we were there – stirring the milk, feeding the stove horse turds and keeping the fire going.  She even made – from scratch – a marvelous noodle soup. 

Kurhlee's mother, Sandag, mixing all kinds
of milk-based goodies.  We were invited to sample
them all.

Otganbayar, Kurlhee's brother with child. He
is a famous Mongolian horse breeder and
trainer.