Thursday 30 July 2009

We have just had 3 days out in the Gobi - not Gobi desert but Gobi-steppe country.It is all referred to as Gobi.It is still really arid but with interesting land forms, vegetation and wild life.

We caught the slow train to china (Trans Mongolian railway) from UB on Monday morning and got off at Shivee Gobi in the middle of a sand storm after travelling through a rain, hail lightening storm.Shivee Gobi is about 45kms (but 1 - 2 hours drive) from Red Rock Ger Camp - where we stayed.It is on the edge of Ikh Nart Nature Reserve.

Everyone was expecting challenging food and turned up with various bottles of sauce and extra bits of food - a wasted effort.All meals were delicious and consisted of either 4 or 3 courses with excellent bottles of wine available for purchase.

After a hearty breakfast on day one we set off with picnic lunces in search of Argali Sheep.Our guide was a local 18 year old lad who could run with the speed of a gazelle and climb the rocks with the agility of a mountain goat.The evening before, at the restaurant Ger, we had bumped into Susan a wild life artist from US and Ghani, a biologist who were involved with the nearby research station.They invited us to visit and meet the local nomad women who had been there on a residential for four days doing craft work and planning how to get a local handcraft enterprise off the ground.Ghani explained that the main research is on Argali sheep - and has been going for about 12 years .There was also another researcher there who is working on the two types of hedgehogs in the region.Everyone was keen to see the Argali sheep and there was a sighting on a rocky ridge top.There were closer sightings of horses and birds.Our best sighting of the sheep turned out to be on the way into the camp on the bus.

Next day we set off in search of Ibex and again sighting on rocky ridge tops ( best sighting of 4 or 5 Ibex running away as we left camp in the bus today).A quiet afternoon (what else do you do after a four course meal on a hot day in the Gobi).Later in the afternoonZoe and Iwent for a camel ride in the Gobi.In Mongolia camels have 2 humps and a boney spine between where you sit on a carpet.It was a lot of fun.The pre-dinner activity was a 5 km walk to the ger of local herdsman's family.We were shownnomad hospitality complete with dried goats milk cheese and goats mild tea (salty).There was an interesting discussion about the ger/herding lifestyle.We also inspected the goats and sheep.They have 400 goats and 200 sheep and sell the cashmere wool to keep their 3 children at university.

Today was a 7.30 start for the bus trip back to UB (about 350kms).We went via the site of a destroyed Buddhist monastery.Lots of monasteries were destroyed in 1937.Still remaining were mantras carved into the rock and rock paintings.There is also a little temple there that has probably been built since 1990.

We did not get back to UB until after 5pm - there were several stops where the driver leapt out of the bus with various tools.Some of the road was only track but some was bitumen.On the relatively good road the bus was only travelling at a little over 60km/hr.When we got back to UB the hot shower and opportunity to do our washing was most welcome.

Tomorrow (Friday) we head off to Khan Khentii for a week.Three nights will again be spent in a ger camp but the other four will be walking and camping.