It's been a long time since I updated my blog - mainly because I've been living in tents in the middle of the countryside for the past few days and whilst all the gers have satellite television the internet doesn't seem to have caught on yet.

I last updated just before I got on the train from Irkutsk to Ulan Bator I think. Just after that we went to try and find food and could only find expensive restaurants with no free tables. Luckily we were rescued by a Russian couple who took us for food and then drove us to the train station. The Russians definately got more friendly the further east we went!

Having met no English or English speaking people all the way through Russia we suddenly met with an influx. We shared our train cabin thingy with an English lady who was doing the round the world trip after retirement (see, everyone who said "I wish I could have done what you're doing while I had the chance", it really is never too late) and an Irish bloke who we kept bumping into around Listvyanka turned out to be in the next compartment. So that was all very nice. Plus after the grumpiness of the Russian train people we were now on a Chinese train, and the guy who was looking after us was very friendly and helpful if a little mad. The rest of our carriage was full of Chinese and Mongolian people who assumed we were Russian but were very entertained by our bumbling along. Border crossing took about 6 hours in total, 4 hours in the Russian station and 2 hours in the Mongolian one. Lots of very official looking people in a variety of hats strode up and down the corridors barking orders at us and looking suitably unimpressed at any attempts at humour. on our part

When we got to our hostel we were ready to experience some Mongolian culture after our our time in Russia. However, when we arrived we found the hostel was overrun by Americans. Turns out the Peace Corp has 100 volunteers across Mongolia, all of whom are in Ulan Bator for their yearly conference. I feel as if I'm in a sitcom! There was a power cut for the whole day when we arrived, but apparently this is quite normal and most towns and cities in Mongolia only have electricity for part of the day anyway.

On the second day Laura, Ciaran (Irish bloke) and myself went out on a trip to a ger camp. We seemed to be staying in a family's ger as we could see childrens' shoes and things but there was just the one guy looking after us who could speak two words in English, "horseride" and "check" (we got annihilated at Chess by him). We were also surprised to see a huge satellite tv in the ger! But it was very warm and cosy and homely. The Mongolians are very houseproud, they don't have a lot but they seem to follow the mantra "a place for everything and everything has its place", I suppose we're getting close to China as well now. Everytime we went outside he came round and swept the floor. We went horseriding. Mongolians seem to assume that everybody knows how to ride a horse and light a fire as I guess these things are so essential to their way of life. Luckily I know how to ride a horse (but not how to light a fire, to follow) but we just got thrown on the horses and expected to ride off, and poor Ciaran ended up in the middle of a forest because his horse was hungry. Luckily the horses weren't exactly what you'd call "spirited" though, after a lot of encouragement they would trot for a couple of minutes but apart from that they'd just plod along wearily so there was no danger of them galloping off. Mongolian horses are also more like donkeys. We went for a few walks in the forest and ate a lot of food. It was clear by this point that the Mongolian menu consisted of mutton, vegetables (potato and carrot) and either rice or noodles. When it was time for us to go the whole family turned up, it seemed as though they'd all been kicked out so we could stay there! They had a very cute baby (which I almost dropped - maybe this caring for children in Cambodia thing isn't the best idea!)

Invigorated by our ger experience we had the option of staying in Ulan Bator for another 4 nights (and there really isn't a lot here, the highlight being the State Department Store, which is an experience not least because if you ask for directions for anywhere in Mongolia you get sent to the State Department Store) with a hundred Americans or going on another trip. As we'd had such a good experience with the first one we went for the trip, this time with Pat, the English lady from the train. We had an 8 hour car journey the first day which was mainly off road and lots of fun, though bouncy. Arriving at the ger which we had all to ourselves, the fire was roasting hot and we spent the evening feeling as though we were in a sauna. It eventually cooled off enough to go to sleep. We knew the fire would go out but were assured it would last a few hours and then the people in the next ger would come in and light it for us at 6am. I woke up at 3am and the fire had been out for some time and it was starting to get cold. I attempted to get the fire going again but nothing seemed to happen (turned out we needed matches for this part which we didn't have). Oh, I then became convinced I'd set myself on fire because when I moved my sleeping bag it kept sparking (I'd never seen static electricity in the dark before!) When I had rationalised that a) it would have been a superb display of incompetence had I managed to put out the fire and set myself alight at the same time and b) the fact I felt the need to put the light on to check to see if I was on fire was fairly inconclusive proof I wasn't, I went back to sleep. I woke up about 6am and it was freezing cold. I think Pat was awake too and we said "well, at least they'll be coming to light the fire soon". We all kept waking up and falling back asleep and it was getting colder and colder. Eventually they came in to light the fire, at 9am, so we'd been without a fire probably for 7 hours and I'm not sure how cold it was but it was -20C outside. Oh and there was a cat which kept jumping on the roof and trying to tear a hole in it so it could crawl inside, so there was slightly smaller than cat shaped hole in the roof.

Needless to say we weren't very happy about that but the rest of the trip went fairly smoothly (until we broke down on the way home) though it wasn't until we got back to the hostel last night I warmed up again! The second night we stayed in a different ger which belonged to a nomadic herder family. They were completely different to the other family who just left us and kept giving us food and stoking the fire. The parents were 70 and 64 and were still grappling with herds of goats and various other animals in very harsh conditions and seemed to be a lot healthier than many English people of that age. They were very friendly as well and asked lots of questions (through our English speaking Mongolian guide). The funniest thing happened when the old man came in to sort out our fire and told us he'd hurt his shoulder. Pat is a trained masseur so she offered to give him a massage, at which point he eagerly started to take off his clothes. We were a bit worried about what would happen if his wife came in!

My favourite part of this camp was the "bathroom" (the English speaking Mongolians always optomistically call them "bathrooms"). I have a picture which I'll try and upload later (along with lots of other pictures, mainly of animals - see, the budgies set me off) but it was a hole in the ground in a two sided tin shack halfway up a mountain, a couple of hundred metres walk from the ger through a field occupied by two camels, two horses, about 300 sheep and goats, several cows and a few dogs. The view was nice though.

I am quite envious of the Mongolian way of life. They seem to be very free and kind of at one with the land they live in. It's almost like going back in time to before technology and materialism (apart from the tvs and moblie phones, which is a little surreal. Especially when you see a Buddhist monk break off from chanting to read a text message). They don't use anything on the farms which isn't natural and they're entirely self-sufficient. It's obviously still a developing country though and mainly very poor, but people seem happy. They're also very friendly and welcoming (unlike Russia) and many are amazed by blonde hair. Mongolia is the most sparsely populated country in the world (according to one of the Americans) and you really see that driving through the countryside, as you can go for miles without seeing anybody. It's a very beautiful country as well and very variable. I imagined there would be lots of snow but it's been sunny every day and all my pictures look as though it's hot!

Apart from the Americans there is an English bloke staying in our hostel. Apparently he is of the "old money" clan and seems to be very very posh and monied. He's also quite mad and I'm not quite sure how much truth is in a lot of what he says (and he's said some pretty outrageous things). Talking to him is like being in a nineteenth century novel - a Victorian Sensation novel to be exact. He has asked me to be his girlfriend when we're back in England and has said he will put me up in a two thousand pound a month flat. Charming!

I have written loads but I'm sure I've left out a lot of stuff! Off to Beijing in the morning.

I'm glad you liked the budgies. I have more pictures to upload and they all seem to be of animals or gers this time :)