Thursday, July 1st

After another breakfast at the hotel, we packed up and checked out by 8am. Our flight to Moron (pronounced Mo-roon), which is the provincial capital of Hovsgol, was at 10am. Rather than attempt to get our own taxi and have to communicate where we needed to go and negotiate a fare, we asked the hotel to call us a cab. This actually ended up being a bad decision because we paid twice what we should have, which I tried hard to not let bother me, especially when the cabbie made a fuss over one of the Mongolian notes we used to pay him because he thought it was a counterfeit. On the bright side, our flight to Moron went as planned. It was only an hour and a half and we were in the arrival gate grabbing our luggage and meeting our driver to the ger camp by 11:45am.

I guess now would be a good time to stop and give some information on Hovsgol. Hovsgol is a northern Mongolian province, “aimag” in Mongolian, right on the Russian border. It is often touted as Mongolia’s most beautiful province and tourist brochures refer to it as the Switzerland of Mongolia. Lonely Planet describes the area as a land of thick forests, rushing rivers, sparkling lakes, and rugged mountains. Gorgeous in the spring and summer, it is insanely cold in the winter – duh. Our destination within the province was a ger camp in Hovsgol Lake National Park. Known as the Blue Pearl of Mongolian, Hovsgol Lake and its surrounding forests and mountains are a major destination for both Mongolian and international tourists.

From Moron we still had to cover roughly 60 miles of rutted dirt road to reach our camp. It took us a little over 3 hours in a private Land Cruiser, which we hired through the camp. I know, we were traveling in style. The road was quite bumpy and we had no idea how the driver knew his way (although Scott pointed out that he seemed to just be following the power lines for most of the time), but the scenery was stunning, especially when we crested the lip of a valley and caught our first glimpse of the lake. All along the way to the camp we passed countryside dotted with small gers and large herds of livestock. We even got our first glimpses of yaks. That’s right, a year in Mongolia without seeing a yak up close and personal. Passing through such scenes really made me think about the very different lives these herding families must lead.

We reached the camp just after 3pm and about an hour ahead of a rainstorm. The camp, Toilogt Ger Camp, is a collection of gers, teepees, and wooden shacks situated at the end of a dirt road sandwiched between Hovsgol Lake and a much smaller counterpart. The scenery was gorgeous. In the sunshine, the lakes were a mix of deep blue and turquoise. The fields were green and covered in patches of wildflowers with horses, yaks, and cows grazing all over. The mountains sported thick alpine forests. It was such an idyllic scene. We finally discovered the beauty of Mongolia that tourists keep telling us about.

We spent our first afternoon and evening sitting in the camp’s dining hall watching an awesome summer thunderstorm pass through the area and sipping steaming mugs of Mongolian milk tea (“suutei tse”). Milk tea is a Mongolian staple and it’s a drink that is heavy on the milk and salt and light on the tea. Everyone seems to make it differently and no two brews taste the same to me. In fact, one of the most popular Mongolian pop songs at the moment is by a guy named Javkhlan who is singing about how his mom’s milk tea is the best. Scott said the “tea” tasted like a cup of warm salt water.

The storm passed by dinner time, leaving everything looking fresh and vibrant and the sky was painted with the most brilliant rainbow that I have ever seen. After snapping a few photos and stoking a fire, we hit the sack.