We were warned the night before that today would consist of a lot of driving. We were heading out of the Gobi region and back north towards Ulanbaataar. This day was quite challenging for most of the people in the van, however it also highlighted something to me about myself. Naturally, I can get quite stressed and I am not the most positive person in the world. For those who know me in person, I am quite a negative and sarcastic individual, perhaps even bordering on bitchy more often than not. I find it hard to let things go, however for some reason when I travel a lot of these traits take a backseat (ha, I literally had a backseat in the van). I am definitely more carefree and stress a lot less about things I have no control over. It's a little bizarre but I think it's very much a good thing.
This day was a turning point in terms of the company that I was with. It was when the Canadian and American started to become quite grating and largely it was due to their negativity. Our vehicle was quite slow, going only at around 70kmph and had horrible suspension which made for a very bumpy car ride. The van was travelling with two others from the hostel (on shorter length tours) and we could never keep up with them which was very frustrating. They would be able to cruise at 100kmph and we would be trailing behind. The situation for this day was that we got separated from the vans (since they never waited for us) and we took a different route to our destination. It was a slightly annoying situation as the driver and the cook in the van did not speak English and we had no idea where we were going or if it was even the right direction. The American and Canadian (I was wedged between them) started to complain constantly that they didn't know where we were going and in the end I ended up putting in my earphones and listened to my audiobook (or maybe it was music). I was travelling through some beautiful and desolate landscape with people who ultimately would be able to communicate to Mongolians if we really ran into trouble.
The drivers having an argument about which direction the town was.
The bandanna was to prevent me breathing in the dust. However I looked slightly ridiculous.
We stopped at a town and filled up on water from the water station. This was a very cool experience as I had wondered how people accessed water.
Our destination for the day was the Flaming Cliffs or Bayanzag. The area is known for the first discovery of dinosaur eggs and fossils. The first discovery was made by American palaeontologist Roy Chapman Andrews in 1922. This was followed by expeditions by the American Natural History Museum and they found a complete protoceratops skeleton, oviraptor eggs, velociraptor claws and a collection of ancient mammals. These were moved to the American Natural HIstory Museum in NYC however apparently they are being returned to Mongolia for their own museums. However it has been said that only a small percentage are being returned.
What had happened was that the other two vans went to the town (where we got water) and had lunch, thinking that we would be there. However with the lack of communication between the drivers we ended up at the Flaming Cliffs first. I didn't mind as we arrived before the hoardes of tourists.
Downside of manual focus.
We headed to our next destination and on the way we got lost again. Truth be told, I am amazed that the driver even knew where we were going since he didn't have a navigational system and just relied on knowledge / asking the locals. We arrived at Ongi Monastery at sunset and it was a rushed experience. But I was paying for a budget tour and with my research, I already knew it wasn't going to be the most extensive tour in terms of information. What I did learn was that the monasteries were founded in 1660 and housed 1000 monks. However it was destroyed in 1939 during the religious purge by the Communist Party and over 200 monks were killed.
On the way to the nomadic family, we got lost again and only arrived at 10pm. There was no dinner since I was quite tired and really didn't want to have another meat heavy meal. It was a very long and tiring day mentally and physically.
This was my ninth trip as part of #take12trips. To see previous trips please click here.
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