Travelling In The Gobi Desert Days 8 & 9
Flaming Cliffs to Holy Mountain
South Gobi to the Mongolian Steppes
Distance 400k

We woke to a beautiful clear cold sunny morning in the Gobi Desert. The storm had bought snow to the nearby mountains and they looked stunning across the plain.

After breakfast we packed the van and headed off to visit Flaming Cliffs or Bayanzag to call it the correct name. Named by American Roy Chapman Andrews the area was first excavated in 1922, it is known worldwide for the number of dinosaur bones and eggs found in the area, which you can see in museums around the world.

Today it is a stunning collection of red cliffs over looking a vast Gobi Desert plain that was once a sea and later dinosaurs roamed.

On the day we were there it was very cold with snow capped mountains in the distance, we were the only ones there and it was eerily quiet.

From Flaming Cliffs we were heading 400 km north to Holy Mountain, we had decided that we would break the journey up and do it in two days the remainder of the day we spent bumping along tracks stopping at a small town for water, petrol and supplies.

On the way we stopped to watch herders watering their horses and ate lunch at the first running creek we had seen.

That night we camped on a plain in the middle of nowhere and not a rock bush or rise in the ground for miles to hide behind to go to the loo…
It was still bitterly cold but the wind had dropped and we drank vodka around a horse dung fueled camp fire and watch the stars.

Woke the next morning to howling winds and freezing temperatures. Packing up the tents was a challenge and the wind was so cold and strong we had to eat in the truck.

With no reason to stay on this plain we continued on our northern journey stopping at a regional town for water, fuel and supplies. In the Gobi you purchase water like you would purchase petrol, at a pumping station with an attendant who you pay. Water is pumped from the artesian water table, in our journey to date in the 100’s km we travelled we had seen 2 creeks with water in them everything else was dry.

In the town we visited a Monastery which had been destroyed by the Russians and was rebuilt in the 60’s, they are still re modelling it today.

Lunch was still on the flat plain once again with out a bush, roach or mound in sight….man!

We arrived at a stunning mountain range of which Holy Mountain is one of at about 4pm. WOW absolutely stunning, after 2 days of bumping across flat dusty plains once again Mongolia had surprised us with another stunningly and totally different landscape.