Welcome Back

The 4th week of Autumn:

Beautiful reasonably heavy snowfall overnight.

Good/bad news is that the snow is melting because it's too warm outside (1 degree).

Hopefully we will get a few more snowy days before it gets too cold for snow!

Why Mongolia?

During my brief visit back home I'm getting two questions popping up pretty frequently:

Firstly, why Mongolia?

And second, after seeing some photos and hearing some stories,

Are you seriously going back there?

Then I got home and saw this cool link:
photographing-native-mongolians-who-had-never-seen-a-photo-of-themselves/

Which answers both those questions, to my thinking. But to my thinking, the questions are pretty bizarre anyway!

As challenging as things are, there are plenty of wonderful experiences and beauriful people and amazing places!

Location:Australia

Steppe Riders - Take #2

After 4 months in Mongolia I have had the opportunity to ride horses half a dozen times. This is following 24 years with no opportunity, or desire to ride a horse. But things change...and not being a person to become obsessed often or easily (cough, cough), I am just as surpised as you are to read that I am now all but obsessed with the brilliant experience that is riding a horse! This weekend we spent a night and day out at Steppe Riders - a horse riding ger camp about 45 minutes south-west of Ulaanbaatar. The location is stunning. We were treated to a handful of shooting stars across the amazing clear night sky - my first clear night in the countryside, seriously, in four months. Truly stunning. The forecast rain arrived about 3am, so by 8am it was a beautiful, clear, crisp day. It was a great ride, my horse wasn't as amazing as in Terelj (see earlier posts...), but he was OK. The whole group moved at pace and we weren't bothered by the usual frequent stops for adjustments or problems you expect with a dozen newbie jockeys.

After the ride, this gorgeous little boy found a plastic bag...the most amazing toy ever invented, he would have said. He was cackling away running up and down this little hill with the bag for wings...for over an hour, and still going when we left.

The Steppe Riders ger camp:

The bathroom at Steppe Riders:

(there is actually a decent pit toilet as well, a luxury in these kinds of places)

On my horse:

An example of the countryside....