Horse Guitars, Gers, and two humped camels part 2...

"He's so fluffy, I'm gonna die!"

- Agnes, "Despicable Me"

     We continued our amazing trip with a daytrip to a temple.  Again the scenery was just breathtaking everywhere we looked.  On the drive we were talking about places we wanted to visit and Russia was mentioned at one point.  Then our host said, "Oh if only you had brought your passport we are really close to the border and could have spent the night in Lake Baikal" If only Russia had 30 day visa free entrance! Oh well we will save Lake Baikal for a different trip.  The temple itself was very strange with weird sculptures of hybrid creatures (think a snake with an eagles head) but the grounds were stunning with paths up the mountain side and carvings in the rock face.

We also had our hosts 85 year old grandfather climbing the mountain with us.  I am terrified of slipping and falling so I move at a snails pace going down.  At one point, the 85 year old reached out his hand to help me down.  That put me to extreme shame of myself and in complete awe of him.

The road to the temple was closed for construction so you could either walk to pay these guys to drive you on their motorcycles.  We opted to walk into the temple but as I had never been on a motorcycle Lindsey and I chose to ride the motorcycles back.  The ride itself was extremely fun, but when we were dropped off Lindsey and I were in the super awkward situation of just standing in front of a group of 15 Mongolian men who didn't speak English trying to figure out who we were supposed to give the money to.

The rest of the group decided to walk back to the car so Lindsey and I had time to kill while waiting so we sat on the grass next to the parking lot.  These two little girls just kept walking back and forth in front of us.  Everytime they would pass they would say, "Hello, how are you? See you later!"  It was so cute seeing them so proud of the few English phrases they knew.

We also had time to become experts in being in multiple places at once in a panorama shot.

 I love how it looks like he's telling us, "everywhere the sun touches is my land" a la Lion King.

And then we went to the camels!!!!!! My students taught me that Iphones do a super cool thing where they make movies with your photos so while I encourage (and will force my family) to scroll through the photos individually, the video with "epic" music (yes you get to choose what theme you want for the music and epic seemed to fit the best) is also pretty awesome.

The camels were not at all what I thought they would be.  First of all they were extremely fluffy! I expected them to have hair similar to a horse or a cow.  Their fur was instead similar to a curly sort of rabbit.  Secondly they were very, very calm.  I love horses but horses in general are just anxious animals.  All of the camels we saw just seemed to go with the program not bothered by anything around them.

The third and most surprising thing about the camels was that their humps are soft and almost blubbery.  Lindsey and I had a lot of fun making the humps jiggle.  Some of the other camels humps had sort of flopped over.

The boy in the blue was our guide and we were riding his camels.  I'm so used to my Korean students and how their parents keep them in such a protective bubble.  Its fun to travel and see these kids in charge of giant animals.

Although it looks like we are in the Gobi desert, we weren't able to make it that far this trip.  We went to a national park called Elsen Tasarkhai.  We drove for about 5 hours outside of the capitol city past huge green plains and green rolling mountains and then suddenly boom, sand dunes.

The clouds also participated beautifully to give us nice photos.

We have taken up the Korean art of posing in photos.  Here we were trying to make the heart the Koreans always make.  We were told it looked more like a potato.

We were even treated to a rainbow!

You have moments in life where you feel like this can't possibly be happening, it can't possibly be real.  Riding camels, in Mongolia was one of those moments for me.  Lindsey and I kept saying through the entire trip, amid a lot of squealing, that we never ever envisioned ourselves sleeping in a ger or riding a camel in Mongolia.  It is truly amazing what I have been able to experience so far in my life.  

  

Another surreal, although not so magical, moment on our trip was when we tried horse milk.  Now if you think about it, it is strange that we find it strange to drink milk from other animals than cows.  Why? Drinking cow milk should be just as weird as drinking any other animals milk, but I digress.  Horse milk is extremely sour, slightly carbonated, and if you drink enough of  it alcoholic.  Lindsey hates cows milk to begin with so drinking horse milk was a struggle for her.

Because I saw her reaction, I knew what to expect and so could control my reaction better.  At the end you can hear me just say, "its ok, its ok." That is me convincing myself that I am fine.

Our last afternoon in Mongolia, we were able to try horse meat.  Again, it is strange that we find it strange to eat certain animals and not others.  It basically tasted like roast beef.  

Our time in Mongolia was amazing.  Somehow this trip was adventurous and relaxing at the same time.  A mix of serenity and adrenaline, the perfect combination.  That all ended when our plane took off, because the next 24 hours were the craziest of my life, but for now I will just continue to stare at these photos.