Me and Chris arrived in the Mongolian capital of Ulaan Bataar on the 26th of August after spending what seemed more than 2 nights on the train from Irkutsk with 2 crazy Irish girls. Tell a lie one crazy Irish girl and one fairly sensiable Irish girl. After checking into our hostel and finally managing to get some money from those con merchants Western Union we spent a good 4 hours queuing for and buying train and sleeper bus tickets for Beijing. We had to catch a bus from just across the Chinese border as all the trans-Mongolian trains were sold out for the dates we needed so we had to book a train from Ulaan Bataar to Earlain on the 31st which only left us with 5 nights in Mongolia. Once we sorted everything out and had our first showers for about a week we walked around town and went to the Museum of Natural History were we saw the bones of some of the Dinosaurs that had been dug up in the Gobi. In the evening we went out for food and drinks with people we met on the train. Monday we went to the National Muesum of Mongolian History and to the Monastery. We also ate A LOT for food as we had been living on pot noodles for ages and the food was dirt cheap so we treated ourselves. Tuesday we spent 8 of the most uncomfortable hours of my life on a rammed mini bus to Kharkorin the ancient capital. On route to Kharkorin we stopped at a real ger and drank some fermented horses milk, which is rank and ate some some horses cheese and cream. Never again!! Once in Kharkorin we got ourselves a ger, met a few other travellers and surprise, surprise, got drunk on Mongolian Vodka. On Wednesday we visited Erdene Zuu Khiid, the first monastery in Mongolia, took a few pictures as it seemed like the thing to do and sat and admired the amazing countryside for a fair bit. We spent the rest of the day not doing much as there wasn't actually anything esle to do!! Thursday we got anther rammed minibus back to Ulaan Bataar to catch our train at 2030. We only just made the train as the mini bus driver decided it would be a good idea to arse about with his mates at the bus station until I had a go at him. It was looking pretty certian we was going to miss our train but I think the driver realised I was not too happy with him and decided to put his foot down and got us to the station with 20 minutes to spare!!