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selenakIn the later part of our journey, we camped at two famous Mongolian lakes, called "White Pearl" and "Blue Pearl" of Mongolia, respectively. In this post, you shall see them both, complete with an old volcano, Yaks and a lot of wrestling.
I may have inadvertendly slandered Mongolia when implying we often crossed rivers by car for the lack of bridges. There ARE bridges when necessary. Like this one:
The closer you get to Therkin Tsaagan Nuur, the more obvious it is that this is a deeply volcanic era. Not in current day, of course, but see for yourself what the lava left:
Also, of course, herds. With and without humans attached:
The lake in question, Therkin Tsaagan, has a mythic origin: a rich man forbid his daughter to marry a poor young man, she killed herself, and her mother's tears filled the entire lake. The more prosaic lake story is that it's called the White Pearl because it unfreezes as late as May. This is it:
As I said, the old lava is ever present:
So are horses:
But the star attraction is the old volcano. Which you climb up to in the morning, as the light is best then, and then you walk around the crater.
Taking a look back the lake pays off:
A word about fellow travellers of the Western kind. One thing drove me more and more crazy. In every single camp, there was a house for bathing facilities. With a sign in Mongolian and English asking the guests NOT to wash their dirty laundry in the washing basins; if it was necessary, they should hand over the laundry to the camp people. The rationale was obvious. These are solitary regions where you can't get a plumber for months sometimes. But what did happen in every single camp? Tourists washing their dirty laundry whenever I entered the bathroom. For some reason, it was mostly French tourists, but there were some Americans and Germans indulging, too, and I had to restrict myself from asking whether none of them could read, since it wouldn't have done any good - they'd have continued anyway. Argh.
On a more joyful note, en route to the Blue Pearl, there are more bridges and horses:
Of course, nowadays while the nomads use horses for herding, they go by car and motorbike for other reasons. However, a habit they share with Indians is putting kids on the bikes without any helmets. This looks cute but is deeply dangerous.
Also met en route: boys training for the upcoming Naadam festival. As you shall see in my concluding Naadam post, the horse races there, the most famous in the country, use children as jockeys, because of the weight. The avarage age of a jockey is about ten years, official legal age limit 7 years, but I did spot a four years old at the festival, unless I'm mistaken. Not on the road, though. Here are some of the boys training their horses for Naadam:
In case you're thinking "thin horses!", they get put on diet about a month before the festival. But on to more heavy animals as we approach Khuvsgul Nuur.
Yaks: the St. Bernards' of cows. They taste similarly (to cows, not St. Bernards), which I happen to know because they serve you camel in the South and Yak meat in the north. They're generally shyer. Not these Yaks, though. Get ready for some Yak-on-Yak action:
That's the Khuvsgul Lake in the background. Large enough to compete even with the American big lakes. Unfortunately, the weather kept changing on us when we were there. Being on the rainy side when, non-equestrian that I am, I nonetheless decided I couldn't be in Mongolia without having sat on a horse at least once. Poor horse.
The locals were also undeterred by the occasional rain from celebrating the Reindeer Festival. Reindeer being local, too.
At which point we were introduced to Mongolian wrestling, and closer than we'd be at the grand Stadion in Ulan Bator a week later. The rules are simple. Try to make your opponent touch the ground.
Like this:
You then do the victory dance. Where the point is to imitate a bird. Not just any old bird, but the one according to the rounds you've managed - five is hawk, but I don't remember the rest.
Then you do the victory rounds:
Once you've done that five times, you can pic your own opponents in the remaining rounds.
Or sit out a round with your kid:
It's very popular to watch, both with the young and the old.
And wouldn't you know it, for our farewell to Khuvsgul Lake, the weather cleared up again. Farewell, oh blue pearl!
I may have inadvertendly slandered Mongolia when implying we often crossed rivers by car for the lack of bridges. There ARE bridges when necessary. Like this one:
The closer you get to Therkin Tsaagan Nuur, the more obvious it is that this is a deeply volcanic era. Not in current day, of course, but see for yourself what the lava left:
Also, of course, herds. With and without humans attached:
The lake in question, Therkin Tsaagan, has a mythic origin: a rich man forbid his daughter to marry a poor young man, she killed herself, and her mother's tears filled the entire lake. The more prosaic lake story is that it's called the White Pearl because it unfreezes as late as May. This is it:
As I said, the old lava is ever present:
So are horses:
But the star attraction is the old volcano. Which you climb up to in the morning, as the light is best then, and then you walk around the crater.
Taking a look back the lake pays off:
A word about fellow travellers of the Western kind. One thing drove me more and more crazy. In every single camp, there was a house for bathing facilities. With a sign in Mongolian and English asking the guests NOT to wash their dirty laundry in the washing basins; if it was necessary, they should hand over the laundry to the camp people. The rationale was obvious. These are solitary regions where you can't get a plumber for months sometimes. But what did happen in every single camp? Tourists washing their dirty laundry whenever I entered the bathroom. For some reason, it was mostly French tourists, but there were some Americans and Germans indulging, too, and I had to restrict myself from asking whether none of them could read, since it wouldn't have done any good - they'd have continued anyway. Argh.
On a more joyful note, en route to the Blue Pearl, there are more bridges and horses:
Of course, nowadays while the nomads use horses for herding, they go by car and motorbike for other reasons. However, a habit they share with Indians is putting kids on the bikes without any helmets. This looks cute but is deeply dangerous.
Also met en route: boys training for the upcoming Naadam festival. As you shall see in my concluding Naadam post, the horse races there, the most famous in the country, use children as jockeys, because of the weight. The avarage age of a jockey is about ten years, official legal age limit 7 years, but I did spot a four years old at the festival, unless I'm mistaken. Not on the road, though. Here are some of the boys training their horses for Naadam:
In case you're thinking "thin horses!", they get put on diet about a month before the festival. But on to more heavy animals as we approach Khuvsgul Nuur.
Yaks: the St. Bernards' of cows. They taste similarly (to cows, not St. Bernards), which I happen to know because they serve you camel in the South and Yak meat in the north. They're generally shyer. Not these Yaks, though. Get ready for some Yak-on-Yak action:
That's the Khuvsgul Lake in the background. Large enough to compete even with the American big lakes. Unfortunately, the weather kept changing on us when we were there. Being on the rainy side when, non-equestrian that I am, I nonetheless decided I couldn't be in Mongolia without having sat on a horse at least once. Poor horse.
The locals were also undeterred by the occasional rain from celebrating the Reindeer Festival. Reindeer being local, too.
At which point we were introduced to Mongolian wrestling, and closer than we'd be at the grand Stadion in Ulan Bator a week later. The rules are simple. Try to make your opponent touch the ground.
Like this:
You then do the victory dance. Where the point is to imitate a bird. Not just any old bird, but the one according to the rounds you've managed - five is hawk, but I don't remember the rest.
Then you do the victory rounds:
Once you've done that five times, you can pic your own opponents in the remaining rounds.
Or sit out a round with your kid:
It's very popular to watch, both with the young and the old.
And wouldn't you know it, for our farewell to Khuvsgul Lake, the weather cleared up again. Farewell, oh blue pearl!
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