Wanderlust: I've Been Through the Desert on a Horse with No Name

Breakfast was a dairy and rice base with chunks of beef. Tasty and hearty.

The plan for the day was to take a camel/horse ride to a sacred mountain. Here are the friends/vehicles that were awaiting us this morning.

This is me sitting atop my camel, “Shaar”. A little bit about camels... If you think the goats from yesterday were jerks, then I can't politely say what camels are. But in the grand scheme of things, they are the "jerks of the animal kingdom". I think this is universally accepted. They spit, they snort, they scream, and in general, they are ornery. Now, if you are convinced that camels are not so nice, then you should know that Shaar is the king of the jerks. He is particularly difficult and mean. As we walked, he kept moving to the right, forcing his fellow camel, "Hoar", to move further from our guide. This would seem harmless except that the rein held by our guide is connected to her nose with a wooden peg. So, everytime she was pushed too far away, the lead rope would pull painfully on the piercing in her nose and she would cry out. Some animals are just jerks!

Our guide for the day was number 2 son. I don’t know his name, but he wasn’t the cheerful sort, so I nicknamed him Broody and after a while, forgot that it wasn’t really his name.

While the picture above makes a camel ride look like a relaxing way to cover some mileage, let me assure you that riding a camel is novel, but it is not fun. Don't believe me? Watch it in action... (While you watch, listen closely and you might be able to hear Broody singing a Mongolian "long song".)

I finally understand the meaning of “saddle sore.”

We rode for over an hour to the mountain, which never seemed to get closer as we rode across the open steppe. Distances can be so deceiving in those wide open places.

About a kilometer from the mount, Liz and I asked to walk because it was just so uncomfortable. But it allowed me to take this picture. (Notice how short Mongolian horses are.)

The mountain is a sacred place that people come to seek assistance from a higher power. In particular, we were told, women come here to pray for fertility.

Blue lengths of cloth are tied to the rock as a part of their prayer.
We relaxed here for a while and took in the immensity and beauty of the steppe.

We spied a local man moving his horses.

On the return, I rode the horse, which is the smallest horse I have ever ridden. Being on the tall side, I am used to always getting the tallest horse in the stable. But Mongolian horses just aren’t that tall and you have to keep the stirrups short so they don’t tangle with the horses’ legs (and so a real cowboy can stand in the saddle). The saddle is also covered in metal and is high in the front and back, presumably to facilitate their standing riding style, but it leaves a heck of a bruise on your lower back if you aren’t used to it. So it was the least comfortable horse ride of my life. But I came here to experience the culture and have some adventure, not to be comfortable.

When we returned, our five year old was back in our ger, playing with us, sitting on our laps, and bringing us outside to play with him.He took the only picture we have of the three of us.
We told Dad we were going for a walk to a nearby hill. When we were about 50 meters away, Dad called out to us, and a now jacketed Batgaryl came tearing out of the ger to catch up with us. We walked up to a nearby hill, with Batgaryl in tow, at moments quite literally. We spoiled him, carrying him on our backs and shoulders. I started making horse sounds and he started making the sounds Mongolians make to get horses to move. He even called me his horse (in Mongolian, of course). This was probably not the smartest thing we could have done because we ended up carrying him all the way home, too.
The hill has a rock pile where, by our understanding, people walk clockwise around it three times, place a stone, and make a wish. We each took our turn.