Mongolia | Töv Aimag | Horse Trip #4

I planned the trip so that we would be at the lake for the Full Moon. The night before had been overcast, but we were hoping for clear skies tonight. The moon was scheduled to rise at 7:41 pm.

Somber reflections by the campfire as we wait for the moon to rise

We were not disappointed. It was a perfectly clear night and the moon rose right over the lake.

Saraa with the Full Moon behind her. This photo is particularly fitting since her full name is Sarantuya, which means “Moonbeam.”

Mongolia | Töv Aimag | Horse Trip #3

The Way to Khagiin Khar Nuur

Finally we reach Khagiin Khar Nuur

Günj and Zevgee vie for the most stylish footware. And check out Günj’s silk jammies! She has been temporarily demoted from günj to female badarchin, hence the begging bowl.

Saraa reading her tea leaves. Is there Love in her Future?

Two kittens playing

Saraa trying on Günj’s hair

Günj with her own hair, which she apparently inherited from her Circassian grandmother. And we all know about those Circassian Women! There's a reason why female Circassian slaves always brought the highest prices in the Slave Markets of Nineteenth-Century Bukhara! See more on Circassian Beauties.

Saraa with still-lustrous locks from shampoo in Khiidiyn Gol

Badmaa, Saraa, and Olzii prepare dumplings while Günj offers advice.

Dumplings! This was worth two days in the saddle!Luscious dumpling!

Mongolia | Töv Aimag | Horse Trip #2

At the last moment Zevgee’s son-in-law Badmaa decided to come along on the trip. He would help Zevgee with the horses. Thus there was six of us: Zevgee and his wife Tumen-Olzii, Badmaa, Saraa, Gunj, and myself.

Badmaa and his three boys

Our group at Biren Buren Pass, the Continental Divide of Inner Asia. East of here drains into the Kherlen River, in the Pacific Ocean Watershed, and west of here into the Tuul River, in the Arctic Ocean watershed.

Günj and Tumen-Olzii, who although sixty-five years old is always ready for a horse trip

Dropping down to the Tuul River from Biren Buren Pass

Crossing the the upper reaches of the Tuul River

From the Tuul River we headed up Khiidiyn Gol. Around two in the afternoon we stopped for lunch and I immediately brewed up some Yunnan Gold black tea. Both Saraa and Günj remarked on how good the tea tasted. This was in large part due to the remarkably pure and soft water found in Khiidiyn Gol. I had been here on a previous trip and had sampled this excellent water before. Saraa immediately decided to wash her hair, knowing that the soft water would bring out the luster of her locks.

Saraa doing a quick shampoo in Khiidiyn Gol

Mongolia | Töv Aimag | Horse Trip #1

Came out of Occultation to make a short horse trip into the Khentii Mountains. Accompanying me were my friends Saraa, who had some vacation time coming from her job as office manager of a software firm in Ulaan Baatar, and Ms. S, a Turkish-born but New York-based auteur and adventuress who visits Mongolia each summer with the regularity of a demoiselle crane. From UB we drove four hours east to Zevgee’s ger on the Kherlen River north of the sum center of Möngönmört in Töv Aimag.

I first met Zevgee, now seventy years old, in 1997, as described in my book Travels in Northern Mongolia. This is the ninth trip, either by Horse or Camel, that I have done with him. This past winter he broke his leg and was on crutches for a couple of months, but now he claimed to be just fine, and while perhaps not ready to ride off to Poland to battle the Teutonic Knights appeared fit and fiddle enough to ride to Khagiin Khar Nuur, a small but exceeding picturesque lake in the Khentii Mountains about thirty-five miles ATCF west of his ger. This was a short and simple trip, but Ms. S had never ridden a horse before so I did not want to do anything too strenuous: I figured two easy days of riding to the lake, two days of relaxing at the lake, and then two days back.

Zevgee (third from right, standing) and his extended family

Ms. S. was promptly nicknamed “Günj’ (günj = princess) by Zevgee’s family. Here she looks like she’s getting ready to invade Armenia.

Günj, looking like she just spent an pleasurable morning whipping peasants

Saraa—linguist, calligrapher (she did the traditional Mongolian script frontpiece for my book Illustrated Guidebook to Locales Connected with the Life of Zanabazar: First Bogd Gegeen Of Mongolia, and office manager

Saraa in real teal deel

Günj and Saraa bonded immediately

One of Zevgee’s silver-chased saddles, valued at over $1500