Our Ger in a cute little valley (Photo by Taya G)
Mongolia was/is amazing. The capital city Ulaanbaatar looked very run down from the outside and had lots of black particles in the air. The city attractions included an amazing multi-performance show with throat singers, traditional instruments, dance and a contortionist!
In terms of cuisine I was very surprised that one of the restaurants we went to in Mongolia was very similar to the Mongolian restaurant in my home town. The main difference being much more flavoursome sauces.
Musicians and contortionist. (Photo by Jaime O)
Just like the rest of the journey, the cold winter seemed to have deterred other tourists from visiting. This was great as it acted like a filter and it was easy to see what your everyday local was doing.
Getting out to the countryside was fantastic. We got to visit a local nomadic family. In general the 'roads' in Mongolia were sparse with Wiki saying that 'in 2007, only about 2600 km of Mongolia's road network were paved.' Surprisingly the mini-bus survived the journey, and only needed a few attempts to get up the inclines of ice when we went 'off road'. There are many rules and customs regarding the Mongolians houses called yurts. Being the retard that I am I practicably broke one on first arrival when trying to find a place to sit. Crossing between the two central poles is very bad and the guide managed to push me back through before I even realised my mistake...oops, :(. The food given to us was a dairy based and included dried milk curd and a salty milk tea. I personally liked the tea (unlike everyone else) but maybe I didn't get much salt in my scoop, or my body was in need of some salt! The yurt is set up so that the beds line the outside and the center has a fireplace which is fueled by dried dung (surprisingly odourless).
Awesome Mongolian grandmother who shared her home and some dairy products with us for an afternoon. (Photo by Taya G)
Snowplay!
New monument to Ghengis Khan, in the middle of nowhere. Soon to become a tourist village.
Back at our own camp there was plenty of activities to be had. Going to the outside drop toilet in -40degrees at night was definitely a highlight, and I'm considering putting it on my resume as an achievement. The most difficult thing is undoing 3-4 layers of clothing while not dropping your gloves down the hole. Two more words are needed to complete this picture. Stalagmites and steam.
Archery with 200m tall slope in the background which we walked up then tobogganed down (Photo by Taya G)
Snow crystals that look like butterflies. (Photo by Taya G)
Cooking classes. Mongolian noodles and dumplings. (Photo by Jaime O)
In Mongolia the fattier the meat the better quality it is considered. This lead to many dishes having large chunks of fat in them. Perfect for the cold weather!
We arrived in Beijing during the 4th day of the Spring festival. The Spring festival begins with the
Chinese New Year. This was the last day in which firecrackers should be used up, and boy they had a lot to use!
Fireworks in Beijing (Photo by Taya G)
A trip out to The great Wall was fantastic, but also very tiring walking for hours when sick!
The Great Wall. Stunning, steep and tourist free. (Photo by Taya G)
My past tourist visit to China in 2010 was fantastic as I got to see the Shanghai World Expo. Some of the exhibitions took almost a full day of lining up to get into. And was somewhat surprised that out of the 100,000s of people I saw that day, 99.997% of them appeared to be Chinese. This experience made me not surprised that there were next to no foreign tourists at the Forbidden City. Even though there were enough tourists to spoil photos, relatively speaking it was a very quiet day according to our guide.
A garden in The Forbidden City.
A 'little' smoggy.... at The Forbidden City, Beijing (Photo by Jaime O)
Dumplings for breakfast! (Photo by Jaime O)
