Flight across MongoliaOgyii on the edge of the Altai Mountains
And in case you interested,
the Mazaalai is the Gobi bear.;
a subspecies of the Brown bear and critically endangered.
(we did not see any, but then again, we were not in the Gobi)
On the other hand, what we did see, is almost impossible to describe.
But being me, I will try 🙄
Ogiiy is the regional ‘city’
It is the capital of the Bayan-Ölgii Aimag (province) of Mongolia,
located in the extreme west of the country on the banks of the Khovd River.
Populations 50 000
The airport
A slog up to a viewing point
Gave us our first images of the AltaiAnd Ogii In the distane
and if you look carefully, you will see a massive land slide
and destroyed homes.
The entire suburb had to be moved and rebuilt.
All those are destroyed homes
and then off we went to our new ‘home’
not a great distance in kilometres,
but an enormous distance in experience.
Helping along the way……
And it was so so cold, I felt so sorry for this woman, pillion and half frozen.
That is Yerlan, our amazing driver, cook, mechanic, clown,
general Great Guy.
This was to be our home for the present.
A very humble, beautiful, warm, friendly home.
Two doorways. The first into a small, shall we call vestibule.
It houses animal food, animals, and general ‘stuff’
like baby bleating goats brought in from the cold at night.
Our beautiful translator and care giver, Shuakh
Our generous hostess Minekhan;
who opened her home to a stranger, me,
who when I left, felt like family
and the famous Khairatkhan, eagle hunter, our host.
He has lived with eagles for 40 years and had about ten of his own.
(they release them back into the wild after 5 years)
The eagle (almost always female) are fed once a day
and never too much (ie kept alert to hunt)
There is a fascinating video for those that are keen to know more about
eagle hunting.
Meanwhile, we stayed with him and his wife.
and I had the BEST time.
Language was no barrier as we muddled through the day,
laughed, pointed, showed and shared.
There were goats to sort
Yaks to feed
Cows to milk
Eagle to be fed
There is dung to collect
Fires to stoke
There was patience required as the tea heated
Tea, dates, biscuits, bread and honey. 🥰
Meals to share – for some reason our faces are not as happy as our souls were 😂
But here our smiles matched our soul connection.
The ubiquitous mobile – the link to the family, the country, the world.
Down Time.
Before bed
Our rooms for the night.
Beds, a luxury.
I was honoured with sharing our hosts‘ room at their insistence.
I am sure they sleep each in their own bed usually,
but they ’snuggled’ up into thesmall stretcher bed –
honoured.
A moment captured as Khairatkhan nurtures his horse
Our fridge for winterAlways waitingIf you know, you know, if to you dont, you wont want toFluffy, uncomplicated, patient, fast, and dont try to cuddle me 😳
And here is an attempt to highlight the eagle hunter,
and I am confident I shall be both challenged and enchanted.
And where are we going?
To Mongolia,
to the Altai Mountains,
via Beijing, Ulambataar….
Add to that the flight from
Melbourne to Biejing
You can see it is a Long Way.
The Altai Mountains are in the north west of Mongolia and the Britanica states :
The Altai mountains are a complex system extending approx. 2000km from the Gobi Desert, through the Western Siberian Plain, through China, Mongolia, Russia and Kazakhstan.
The name comes from Turkic-Mongolian Altan meaning Golden.
Okay, enough words about the geography.
How about the weather?
Right now in Melbourne we are sweltering in temperatures of 39-40 ‘C.
Yes Celsius.
We are living in semi darkness trying to keep the heat/light out.
The kids (and dog) have moved into the living room –
it being marginally cooler than their back room.
And ME?
I am navigating the thought of -23’ Celsius –
yup, that Is Minus!!!!!
The mind is baulking at having to think of such cold weather
when we can barely move from the heat…….
But navigate I must…..
Thankfully not the way to UB (Ulambataar)
Air China will do that,
but round the idea of cold, cold, cold.
Sharing accommodation, (which is common when I travel), is one thing –
the added dimension of such cold makes me wonder if we will be sharing body heat too 😉 if you get what I mean.
So I found a thermorest I last used in 2001 in Nepal (long before blogging 😂) ; does it still work, am I too old to sleep on it ;
will it keep some of the cold off?
So, just like trial packing, I have done a few trial sleeps. 😉
Seems okay. 🥰
And now to the “BIG REVEAL”
I am still pinching myself at this opportunity.
I am not going on a tourist trip to Mongolia,
where we ride around on ‘tourist horses’
seeing the ‘tourist’ things.
That would be great, I have no doubt,
but often leaves one feeling a little like a voyeur,
Brave New World of Blogging 