Day 12

After waking up to the six camels outside our ger, we had some tea and breakfast and headed into town for a shower and some lunch. Vegetarian bouz and a potato salad.

We headed to Khongoryn Els, a seemingly everlasting wall of sand dunes, jutting up out of nowhere on the vast flat expanse that is the gobi desert, a natural barrier for wind and whatever lies on the other side.

The land dotted with hundreds of white gazelles, darting off here and there as we disturb their grazing.

Quiet and empty, we eventually find a family with three gers where we can stay. The family invite us in, serve Georgian tea (with animal fat and salt) and Arias eats what only looks like horse penis. It doesn't go down so well and let's leave that story to the imagination. Let's just say it involves digging an emergency hole. The man of the ger shows us some of the gold he has found with his metal detector, Aggie says these people are known as 'ninjas'.

Aggie tells us about how it is custom in the gobi to be able to stay wherever there's a ger, occupied or not, it is ok for you to sleep there and use their home as if it is your own.

She tells us of the drought in the summer, and how it is predicted to bring an extremely harsh winter, why many nomads are slaughtering many of their stock in preparation so at least they can get some money, and why meat now is very cheap because of this. How mining companies have made an already dry gobi drier, rivers and lakes completely gone, particularly because of gold mining. It's heartbreaking, knowing how resource rich and beautiful the country is, and hearing how it is being exploited by other countries taking the majority of the profits. Yet the people remain hopeful. Hopeful for a protective and prosperous future.Read more