It’s time to start exploring the rest of Mongolia. I decided to start by heading east into Khentii province. But first just a bit outside of Ulaanbaatar is Mongolias easiest national park to access, Gorkhi Terelj. The main draw here it seems is to stay in a resort type camp and go on extended horse back riding trips. Which would probably be amazing, but it also seemed like a bit of a tourist trap to me. There were a couple of sites just off the road worth a quick stop though. First up, Turtle rock. No explanation needed really. It’s been an important landmark to the people here for hundreds of years.

And as a bonus, there were some camels nearby.

Just a short ways back towards the main highway is 1000 monks cave. There’s no way a thousand monks fit in that small cave, but it’s true that a bunch of them did hide here from Stalin’s troops during the purges of 1937, so it’s an important historical landmark. It’s not much to look at really, but down at the road near where I parked they had a couple of golden eagles perched. I’ve never seen one so close before!

A bit further east past Gorkhi Terelj is a giant Chinggis Khan monument. I’m not sure why they put it way out here, but it seems to be a popular spot.

Inside is a small museum dedicated to the soyombo (the symbol on the Mongolian flag) and honoring the horse riding culture here. You can also climb some stairs to a platform on top of the horses head to get really up close and personal with Chinggis himself.

After the Chinggis Khan monument, civilization pretty much disappears. I drove on the paved highway until I reached my turnoff headed north. After several hours of bumpy terrain I finally reached Khukh Nuur (N 48.017469, E 108.949943) where Chinggis Khan declared himself Khan and took power.

There’s a small monument to him and wooden busts of every Khan that came after him. I never realized there were so many.

The lake itself is reason enough to come here, though. It took a lot longer to get here than I anticipated, so I just decided to camp here for my first night.

It was a really pleasant night, but I woke up to quite a bit of rain. I took down camp quickly, threw everything into the back of my LandCruiser and started driving on some very muddy terrain! Luckily, I didn’t get stuck in the mud. I did happen upon a local couple that did, though. We hooked up the towing cable, I pulled them out, and then continued on my way.

Thank God for the GPS, because there’s almost nothing in the way of signage and when there is it’s only moderately useful. Just mud tracks zigging this way and zagging that way. I’m really glad I took the time to learn that Cyrillic alphabet though.

I’m going to be doing a LOT of off roading on this trip. I read that Mongolia has 50,000 miles of roads and less than ten percent of it its paved. Hence the need to rent a four wheel drive. It really is just many hundreds of miles of wide open grassland with only the occasional ger camp dotting the landscape.

I finally reached my second stop, Bereveen Khiid (N 48.200777, E 109.428967) after bumping and bouncing and sliding in the mud all day.

This extremely isolated monastery apparently used to be a gigantic complex until Stalin got his hands on it. The main temple was eventually rebuilt and there are some living quarters near by, the rest is a collection of ruined temples. There’s a long trail that goes around the hills taking in all of the ruins, which I of course couldn’t resist. The views looking out over the temple and the valley were tremendous!

I left Bereveen hoping to just get as far as possible on my way before having to camp.

Along the way I passed by two deer stone sites. Awesome!

I finally found a beautiful spot next to the river to camp for night two (N 48.216898, E 109.890878) with nothing but a few ger camps waaaaay off in the distance.

Day three was just a LOT of driving! I stopped at Rashaan Khad to see some petroglyphs. They were really hard to spot and really worn down, but it was a beautiful spot for a break.

Next I hauled buns trying to make it to Dadal by nightfall, but I got turned around and wasted a lot of time trying to find my way both before the town of Binder and again after getting gas in Binder trying to leave. Eventually I found my way and just went as far as I could before setting up camp three for the night (N 48.542385, E 110.926291).

I woke up to rain again for my final push to Dadal.

Along the way, I found another car stuck in the mud. Still surprised I haven’t gotten stuck even though I’ve had a couple of close calls. In the pic below, the ladies on the left and the little girl were stuck, but we couldn’t find a way to attach my cable to their car. Just in the nick of time the dudes showed up on a motorcycle with a another type of cable and with the combination we got the job done.

After pulling them out of the mud, as a thank you, I got my first offering of the ubiquitous Mongolian delicacy, airag. It’s fermented mares milk… yes, you read that right. I wouldn’t say it was good, but not nearly as bad as I was expecting. It was kind of sour and left an odd burning sensation in the back of my throat that lasted for hours. In the time it took me to choke down my one glass, the guys had about four apiece. LOL Nobody spoke any English, but they were all ridiculously nice.

I made it to Dadal, near the Russian border, intact around lunch time and checked into Dorjsuren’s Homestay to give myself a break from the tent. It’s very very rural! A few homemade twin beds in a small cabin next to the main house. All I could do when I got here is fall asleep though. All this off roading is exhausting!

After a super long sleep, I woke up to more rain (sigh). Luckily it mostly ended late morning and I was able to get out for my day of walking/hiking around Dadal. It was cold, a bit windy, and very muddy, but it sure felt good to have a day without driving. I started with the closest site to me, the Chinggis Khan Obelisk. Put here as a memorial to the 800th anniversary of Chinggis Khans birth in 1962. Somehow the Soviets let it stand even though the mere mention of his name during the communist years was illegal. There was also a nice little lake next to it. I’m told It’s a good fishing spot.

Next, a fairly long hike into part of Onon-Balj National Park to see Deluun Boldog, a monument marking where Chinggis Khan was born. But around here they know him by his original name, Temujin.

The sign on the monument says, “Chinggis Khan was born here in 1162”. What’s not explained is why his mother chose to trek up this big hill to give birth.

The top of that hill afforded some good views of Dadal, though, in all it’s muddy glory.

Back down in Dadal I trekked clear to the other side of town to the memorial stupa (a Buddhist monument) honoring 607 Buriats (the local ethnic group) who were killed during the purges in the 1930’s.

Along the way I passed by the local Naadam arena. Naadam is like the Mongolian Olympics celebrated every year in July. Mainly horse riding events, archery, and wrestling.

Finally I walked through “downtown” Dadal and attempted to go to the Museum of Temujin’s Childhood which was closed. I wasn’t really surprised since the tourist business dried up over the last couple of years.

As far as I know the only real tourists in town are myself and an older German couple I met at the obelisk. Walking around “downtown” I got a LOT of stares. Haha!

Well, this was a long post, but I think necessary since I haven’t had internet access the whole time. It’s going to be a serious challenge on this trip. Surprisingly, I have had cell coverage for most of it though. Wierd! Anyway, I have a looong drive ahead of me tomorrow, so I’ll end this post here and I promise the next one will be a short one.