Our cheerful guide Mando met us outside the hostel at 8am and introduced us to our driver and the ex-Russian army van that would transport us around Central Mongolia for the next week. We climbed in and headed for Terelj National Park, just east of Ulaanbaatar.

After battling through rush hour traffic (and our driver apparently reducing a learner driver to tears), our first stop was the huge Ghengis Khan statue in the middle of the Mongolian wilderness. We took a look around the museum in the base of the statue before taking a shaky lift to the horse's head, with some awesome views of the surroundings. Mando led us back to the van, we trundeled along to our lunch stop- a dingy cafe on the side of the road. The waitress served us up some 'milk tea', which seemed to be brewed by briefly introducing a teabag to some hot water for a few milliseconds, and then blitzing the water with milk and salt. Diabolical stuff. This was served up with some mutton soup with oily meat-filled pancakes. This kind of food was to become quite a feature of the week. After eating as much food as possible, we drove to a buddist monastary in Terelj. The temple was set back into the hill of a valley, which we climbed while reading the uplifting buddist phrases dotted along the path ("The Lord of Death never sits still. Have you, an ignorant man, prepared for it?"). Our campsite for the night was only a short drive away. We arrived and settled in to the ger, where a fire was already burning in the stove. After a mountain of meat dumplings, we went to bed. Judith became the first victim of the Mongolian cuisine during the night, spending most of her night between the tent and the long drop toilet.

The next day we all piled into the van, not before eating a particularly greasy breakfast (Judith mostly abstained on this occasion). Most of the day was spent driving deeper into Central Mongolia, stopping only to contend with mountain of fried noodles and meat which was called 'lunch'. As we reached the Semi-Gobi (a long stretch of sand dunes running through the middle of Mongolia) a snow storm hit suddenly, and by the time we reached the ger for the night there was a thick covering of snow. Fortunately, the stove was lit again turning the tent in to an uncomfortably warm sauna.

The campsite was situated right next to the museum dedicated to Kharkorum (the ancient Mongol capital), so the next day we took a look around. We also visited a huge monastary that was nearby, but had had many buildings destroyed in the Communist purges. In the afternoon, we pressed on and reached Orkhon Valley- this was our first real impression of the Mongolian wilderness. We drove off road for over an hour, past huge rivers and herds of yak and cattle to reach the nomad family who we were staying with. As we were greeting our hosts, one of our companions Clara rather inopportunely became the second victim of the sickness sweeping our camp. Was there to be a third?

Our hosts presented us with milk tea ("At least try some" begged Mando) and we took a short walk around the hills nearby before going to bed. The next day was my personal favourite of the trip so far. We took some of the horses and rode around the valley for most of the day, visiting the Orkhon Waterfall and many other parts of the valley. Our horses were well behaved for the most part, although throughout the day we often turned around to see Judith as a speck on the horizon desperarately trying to hurry her horse along. We said goodbye to our hosts the next day and headed back to the SemI Gobi Desert in the direction of Ulaanbaatar. On the bumpy off-road journey I felt slightly uncomfortable in my seat, something I brushed off as motion sickness. How wrong I was.

We stopped at the Semi Gobi for some camel riding, a nice, laidback experience compared to the horses the day before. After spending an hour or so riding around the dunes, we drove to another monastary, before reaching the nomad family who would host us for our final night. They offered us milk cookies when we arrived, and naturally I greedily dug in. However, after attempting to take a bite I realised that these were no ordinary cookies. Rock hard, they are essentially solidified sour yoghurt Mando told us; "Everyone in Monglia loves these" he nodded solemnly. I pocketed mine and threw it in the already lit stove of out ger when we got out of sight of our hosts. Almost immediately the husband of the woman who made the cookies came in to tent to tend our fire. His silence made it clear that he had seen the offending object somewhere in the ashes.

As the snow turned into a blizzard outside, we were assured by Mando that the dinner that night would be particularly special- a Mongolian Hot Pot. I was looking forward to trying the meal, but I soon realised that I could no longer attribute the feeling in my stomach to car sickness. Throughout the tour I had been overly confident about the strength of my stomach, finishing the greasy leftovers of others as well as my own, and sending whithering looks at those who turned down the milk tea. Now was my comeuppance. I took a few bites of the delicious meal before pushing past our host and running out of the tent into the snow. I was the third victim.

I immediately felt better after returning to the tent, and (like a fool) began eating again. Predictably, I was running back to the same bank of snow minutes later. The rest of the evening I miserably spent in bed while everyone else enjoyed the meal and chatted with our host.

Some time later in the pitch black of night I woke up again knowing that my meal was returning for a third time with a vengance. In my pajamas I kicked the ger door open and ran to the long drop toilet only to find that I couldnt see it. The snow was so thick that I had to feel my way to the toilet only 10 meters away, where I gratefully collapsed with the door open. The snow blew in on me as I lay slumped in the toilet, but I looked up and saw an awesome view across the valley, lit by moonlight and the reflection of the snow.