Mon-Go-Lia

Two lots of photos up from Ads and no Blog entry from me. My excuse - Writers Block! A first for me, but i think caused in no small part by 3 very late nights and an awful lot of Beer!

However, let me start this entry about 10 days ago when we pulled into a garage on our drive out of Russia - as usual Adam went out to unlock the fuel cap and make the international hand gesture for Fill Her Up - i thought something was up as i heard voices by the car and wondered if as has happened a few times before that although Dizil is advertised on the pump that they had run out but No. Turns out the cashier, who out here in sat in a little shack with a protective grill in front of the window, had come running out with paper and pen asking the Big Man for his autograph! How we laughed, maybe the guy thought we were the first run of people coming for the Mongol Rally or perhaps Tom Cruise has put on a few pounds since we have been away - who knows.

So the next day we pressed on to the border, Adam as ever the sensible one wanted us to camp up before we got to the border and cross it early in the morning, impatient as ever i said we should push on - We pushed on. All went well on the Russian side, we had to go to a shabby hut this time before we went through the gates for a chap to enter our information on his computer - it was difficult not to laugh as he blasted out a football anthem from the late 80's in english and asked Adam to confirm his name - Adam Richards??
We got to the border which was fairly busy and seemed to get through fairly quickly, at this point we realised that we were running about an hour behind the rest of the country and they were rushing us through as we were the last people to be dealt with that day. Not overly concerned though as we had read in the Lonely Planet (>:o\) that after the border gate there is approximately 18kilometers of no-mans land before you get to the Mongolian side which opens fairly early. No worries we thought, came through the gate that signified the end of Russia, pulled over beside the road to relax a bit, Ads was hungry so we put some water on for us to have a yummy pot noodle for tea. We saw a car come past us heading speedily in the direction of Russia and had a little chuckle - "it's shut mate!" - then another car this time in the direction towards Mongolia. It was at this point my suspicions were aroused and i began to wonder if we had kept driving perhaps we would have made it through to Mongolia that night. Then we saw another car - a UAZ the 4wd car popular out here with both civilians and military personnel. Hmmmm. Water is boiling by this time and as Adam was about to splash it on to re-hydrate our dinner 2 chaps in military uniform started to shout "No, No - Mongolia" whilst gesturing over the hill. No need to panic as although it normally takes us about 10-15 minutes to pack up the car, apparently it is possible in extreme circumstances to pack up in under a minute :oD
Thinking they just meant for us to wait the night literally infront of the gate to enter Mongolia we drove over the hill and round a bend to find that we hadn't actually left Russian territory yet. As we approached the hut the Uaz got there first and we watched as they told our somewhat embarrassing error to the guy on the gate. Adam said they looked like they were going to wet themselves they were all laughing that hard. I can't confirm that as i was sat very low in my seat hiding my face with my hat in shame!!! Two things to learn from this tale, 1 - don't believe everything you read in the Lonely Planet & 2 - No camping between borders please!

After that slightly odd start to Mongolia we had an uneventful couple of days drive to the nearest City. (For City read Shanty town in the middle of a dustbowl). However this City had a recommended restaurant so we decided to forgo the usual lunch of cheese triangle and stale bread to see what they had on offer. What they had on offer was a 5 page Cyrillic Menu. Now i do my best with the dictionary that my parents bought me before i left but this was something else, in the spirit of adventure though we decided to use the "Point at random two things and hope for the best" Method. When lunch arrived we were pleased, two bowls of sticky rice and a massive plate of Chinese style beef with onions. Mmmm. Not used to having a main meal at lunch we were pretty stuffed. Slurped off the rest of our coca-cola then went to pay the bill. I was halfway out the door when Ads shouted at me to sit back down as our second dish was ready. A massive 5 egg and peppers omelet!! Still on the plus side at least we didn't order two omelets!!!

Monday 15th was a pretty eventful day which started promisingly with a breakfast of meaty soup with dumplings and a cup of my new favourite beverage King Coffee at a local truck stop cafe. Don't be fooled though, it's not actually coffee, it is mostly sugar and milk powder with 12% instant coffee - Apologies if any senior BTP person is reading this - needs must, any port in a storm and all that!
After breakfast we managed to check our emails from the telecom centre, and found that some lovely people had donated us money to the beer fund, so that was pretty cool. Then i managed to get through to my parents on the phone which is always nice, i like to call them every now and then, make sure their behaving themselves and so forth! We then drove out of town through a massive dust storm and headed up through the most stunning valley past a monastery- ( N 46 25.129, E100 48.996 ) towards the top of a mountain pass. We stopped in the basin of the valley where a large river used to flow and decided it would make an great place to camp up - just far enough away from the many Gers we had seen dotted on either side. We were sat in the cab reading ( LRO magazine for Him & The Hours for Her) when Adam said "oh look there's a horse", and i was pretty shocked when i looked up to see it's whiskers on my window! By now you will have seen the picture of our new friend and his trusty steed. With neither of us able to speak to each other he somehow managed to sell us a jar of curds and some fresh butter. Cheeky little guy! It was a very cool experience and he was uber happy when we asked if we could take his picture in exchnage for some sweets. After we'd waved him goodbye i was still babbling on about it whilst Adam started to get the sleeping bags out ready for bed. Then out of the darkness 3 figures appeared. It was a trio of ladies which we worked out through gesture had come over from the nearest Gers to say hello. They presented me with 4 little compressed pieces of sweetened yogurt/curd for which in return i gave them a fistful of our sweets. Everyone was pleased with that transaction, and we managed to introduce ourselves. Adam came over to say hi but for once they seemed more interested to speak with me. So that was nice. We compared shoes - a common interest for ladies round the world it seems - and after much smiling they finally left. Happy times.
That night was the coldest so far of the entire trip -1 i think in the end, so neither of us got much sleep that night, but awoke in surprisingly good spirits. And on the plus side Adam finally got to use the $400 diesel night heater that he installed under the driver's seat. ;oP

The next morning we made it over the top of the mountain pass down to one of the national parks with open grass plains and forests. Stunning! Then out of no-where it seemed we had arrived at Tsetserleg city just nestled in the hills on the horizon. Bit of a shock but we quickly got out the guide book and without getting lost, managed to locate our chosen guest house on the map straight away. As we turned the corner we were met with the site of AKZ Dragoman Truck!!
Well well well, what are the chances. They were setting off in 15 minutes so our timing couldn't have been more perfect. Dave - who you will remember form such things as random meeting in turkistan and Jay the other driver invited us to come up to the tourist Ger camp with them at the nearby hot springs. We were chuffed to bits to see them, and it was especially nice for Ads as these guys were two of his trainees back in the day - and AKZ was the first Drago truck that he re-sprayed in the new colours so it was all pretty special for him!
We had a fab 2 days up there chatting with the amazingly friendly group on the truck, having a few beers with the boys and a dip in the hot springs too. Lovely food and great views. Awesome!! All the peeps on the trip were really welcoming and made us feel part of the group - and for me it was especially nice to see some other ladies on the road- special mention to Deidre & Allison :o)

All in all a great time in Mongolia so far, 10 days in and it's really starting to grow on me. It is a massively diverse place with amazing scenery, unusual wildlife & birds and some of the friendliest people we have encountered so far.



I shall end this now with a little confessional from myself that Adam has been pressuring me to put on here since it happened and that in fairness i should have entered into Adam's Top 5.
It happened in Kazakhstan.

Quite often i share the driving and on this rather humid day at around 11.45 we had been having a rather heated exchange about something or other when i noticed that we were heading into a town. Speed limits over here are fairly low and it was my belief that on approach to a city one should slow down to 70k, which i had just managed to do as we sailed past a police car parked up on the roadside.
It is not uncommon for us to get pulled over, infact i would say it's a regular occurrence so i was pretty unconcerned, check of paperwork or passports usually is all they want. But on this occasion they asked Adam to get out of the car and go with them to theirs. I watched in the side mirror as they showed him what i now know to be a hand-held speed camera. Some 20 minutes later when Adam came back to the car he informed me that actually the speed limit as you enter a town is 60k not 72k which i had been clocked at. And that the fine had originally been set at $200 for my error. Oh dear! Luckily those of you who have met my boyfriend will know that he is a rather chatty confident fellow and not easily pressured by cops on the make, so he managed to get the fine reduce to a mere $20 dollars. As you can imagine i had to endure quite a lot of piss taking and general admonishments for the next hour or so, it may have even been during such an exchange that i got pulled for the 2nd time at aproximately 1.30. :o(
This time i had been going over a bridge which was on a sharp left hand bend, when i saw the sign for 50 and slowed accordingly. I even saw the cop this time with his zapper gun wedged in the V of a tree on the other side of the bridge. We were pulled over. Adam was somewhat amsued to say the least. He knew the procedure this time and went over to their patrol vehicle. As he tells it, they had quite a laugh together & they were pushing for a fine. My error this time? 51 in a 50 zone!
He managed to talk his way out of it - but i am pretty certain he's not going to let me forget about that day in a hurry.



That's it for this rather epic blog - if you managed to read all this without drifitng off then i will be pleased and take it as a compliment to my burgeoning journalistic talent ;o)
take care x