Mongolian Activities

Saturday was a rest day and we were invited to go on a trip to the Terelj National Park in the country to participate in 'Mongolian activities'. No one knew what exactly this entailed but we were excited to find out. We piled into two vehicles and left UB in the distance. Even thought it was a Saturday, there was still a lot of traffic until we got out of the city.

This was the side of Mongolia I was looking forward to seeing. We drove for about 45 minutes outside of the city and although the roads were paved, there were a lot of potholes. A lot of swerving was necessary to avoid the holes, as well as other vehicles. Once we turned off the paved road onto an unpaved road, dust was added to the mix.

There were some places to stop on the side of the road where vendors were earning money by allowing tourists to take pictures with their eagles and camels.

Our first official stop was at a large rock that looked inviting to climb. I was the only one of our group to climb up into the cave. There were a bunch of school kids there and they each took a turn to say hello to me. I could not resist taking a bunch of pictures of them. We continued on to see a big rock that is shaped like a turtle and had a few people decided to ride camels. The scenery was breathtaking under the blue skies.

I was growing very hungry as this was the first physical activity I have done since I left home and it was well into the afternoon. We were looking for a place to eat lunch but since tourist season is over, it was hard to find something that was still open. We finally found a ger camp that was open and had food for us and had a delicious meal with soup, salad, chicken, potatoes and tea and cake.

The area was beautiful with the fall colours of green and yellow on the trees. We stopped by the Tuul River to enjoy the scenery and drink some Chinggis, Mongolian beer. The landscape reminded me of Northern Ontario in the autumn. This was a fantastic day that I won't soon forget and I was so glad I had the opportunity to see another part of Mongolia.

The drive back to UB was treacherous and of course traffic bottlenecked as we got closer to the city. Due to some creative driving by our driver, who decided to take some back alleys to avoid traffic, we made it back to the hotel.