This is the first day that we are ready to leave before nine in the morning. To be able to achieve this we had to get up at five thirty, of course and we also had to take on (from our guides) the responsibility of packing together the kit of kitchen and various other equipment. Of course, we did this not only to speed up our departure but also to make sure that the packs didn’t fall off. The ones that we had secured the day before were not much for the worse in terms of tightness upon arrival in the evening, while their knots lasted about two-three hours after which the equipment simply fell to the ground. It had almost become an instinctive movement: the kit pack loosens, Hungarian rider turns back, hands the horse to Mongolian, gets a freshly secured, new horse, tightens the straps and ropes of the loose one, all continue the journey. But, even this proves little to change them. They keep using their own knotting techniques without batting an eye. This, of course is perfect for a saddle pack not weighing more than three four ponds, but is little more than nothing when it comes to our forty-pound-bundles.
The lakeside is simply beautiful, the meadows sparkle with wild flowers, the water is azure, the mountains circle us with their white heads bowed. We reach Khar Os, which is at the mouth of a bigger stream, and we carry on riding for another relaxed three hours (this has become a coined phrase for us, we note with a laugh: another three hours of relaxed cantering) we reach our campsite, a grassy cliff directly over the water. Hundred-year-old red pine trees crown over our heads. At the foot of them we see tiny cavities in the trunks. Later a tiny red fluff streaks across the clearing: a small fox from its lair. We harvest fresh puff-balls for hors d’ouvre, as today it’s the Mongolians turn to cook our meal. Not half as bad as we had expected it to be. The bread we had brought with us is finished by tonight so we switch to expedition cuisine. Our friend, Anar fries us Mongolian flatbreads. This consists of flour, water, salt, sugar and fried in a little oil. This will be our lunch the following day. Our guides tell us they we have covered the distance in good time. Other groups usually take four five days to get to this point to which we had arrived to only after two. Although this does not seem such a shiny number any more, if we consider the fact that we never rode more than 15-20 miles per day.

By nine in the morning everyone stands packed and ready to leave. Of course, this does not include the Mongolians, who stand around in the entrance of their tent rubbing their sleepy eyes. The road to Toilogt is a forgettable one. Huge machines rumble on the fresh gravel of the new road, lorries carry tons of soil. The new tarmac road is being built occasionally only 20 metres from the lakeside. So much for nature conservation and the protection of the National Park. Fortunately later on the road turns back into a dust one with only two wheel tracks to show us the way but topic stays in our minds long after. We wonder aloud how many years, months before destruction reaches this part of the region, too. In a local hut someone is smoking fish over a fire built of jak droppings. We immediately buy about ten succulent taimen (local fish) and by lunchtime all that is left are the bones. Later on we buy along the road a few pounds of fresh salmon and grayling. At around seven in the evening we set camp, grill the fish. Finally we are only surrounded by peace and quiet. We sit around the fire for a long time, feeling as if we had already been journeying together for a long time. Nobody has any issues, we are all thankful for the calmness of nature, the opportunity to be here, the horses, the food and each other.

We pack our stuff early in the morning and begin to prepare our saddle kit bags. Even though we had it down in the contract and were promised at Nature’s Door office in Ulaanbaatar to get huge bags for our equipment, instead we receive 2-3l cubic capacity kitbags that are hardly big enough to attach to our saddles. Of course, this comes as no surprise, so we are well prepared. We have in our possession canvas, jute bags, rope, plastic strings, pieces of material and a whole arsenal of various random items to assist us in packing. We put the contents of our backpacks into the strong jute bags, we tie, tie again and retie them and are all set and ready by ten. The horses of course are nowhere to be seen. It turns out that the previous set of guides got offended and although they accepted our bacon and brandy, apparently at two am they informed their boss that they refuse to give horses to such an un-tourist like group. The price of the guides is twenty dollars per head plus the same for the horse of the guide. In the end, they would have earned more than what a local teacher would over the time span of three years! But not them! They would rather wait for a group where all they have to do is ride around for four hours per day, all control is in their hands and in the end, and they get the same amount of money. By 11 am the kind manager of the camping, Orkhon secures 18 horses for us from another family. She seems to be the only person around here who is actually interested in what is actually is that we would like to get for our money. Even the saddles are brought from somewhere else today. The blankets are in rags, the stirrups are mostly broken. The quality fails even to reach the Mongolian standards. We start taking the saddles apart. At least we will learn something about the basics of saddle making. We out our own padding into the seats and exchange the stirrups and straps with those brought with us. In the means time our guides (their numbers have increased to three, but one of them would join us only until halfway) start packing our kit and we are not able to leave earlier that three in the afternoon. We have not been on horseback for half an hour when the first kitbags come popping down. However, the lake shimmers in sparkling blue; the weather is pleasant, life could be much worse. We head for the next camping of Nature’s Door where we are promised that a previous group had left a whole lot of new or quality saddles and equipment. Apparently, here we are also able to meet the British owner of the camping. Of course, both promises turn out to be false ones. No saddles and no owner in sight. What we do get is a power plant that hums and croaks on until midnight and the boom of traffic from the freshly build road along the shore. The manager of this camping is an arrogant and problematic individual. He dose not want to let the horses in, saying that they would mess up the knee-deep and un-kept grass of the camping (no more than two acres. This is no joke). We are forbidden to light a fire, as obviously this would set the whole forest ablaze. No wonder that the participants rant on for a while in indignation. We should never have believed a word we were told. We should have just pitched our tents further up in the mountains.

At six in the morning we poke our heads out of the jurta where we had packed our equipment and we see that all around the campsite Hungarians are walking around, talking, packing their stuff. After having come this far, we were not expecting to meet any of our compatriots. By eight, we are ready to leave and by ten, the horses arrive, too. It slowly dawns on us that Nature’s Dorr will indeed be no different from what any other Mongolian herdsman can offer. We set out with four guides altogether who are all very proud of the fact that they are to be the guides of tourists from abroad. They assure us that there would only be one of them by the following day. There is nothing we can do about it, so we set out. Of course, our intention is to put them to the test straight away and we do so when we decide to choose a route through a different valley. We turn away from the direction they are pointing into and this sets off a chorus of angry shouts and yelps from our guides. No! No! They screech and wave, but we just smile and carry on further. They are just unable to put up with the idea that we wish to follow a different route than from what they told us to. This becomes soon even more obvious. Whenever we want to cross a forest, they say the horses are too scared, if we wish to cross a stream, they predict terrible ravines on the other shore. Of course, none of their predictions turn out to be true and by two in the afternoon, they demand that we all turn back to Hatgal. This was hardly our idea of a warm-up expedition trip so we carry on riding ahead. At this, one of the teenager groom boys looses his cool and fumes at us that the horse belongs to him and he wants us to dismount immediately. We all agree that we need not have traveled to Mongolia to endure such treatment, and decide to ask for another set of guides on the following day. On the way back we stop for a rest by the lake and start a game of friendly wrestling with them, at which of course we are not allowed to win. The view from here is breathtaking and we are relieved to see that all participants are happy with the area and are satisfied with the horses. In the evening, we opt for a relaxed, traditional Hungarian bacon-roasting-on-the-spit. We pare our skewers from rough wooden boards and taste the long-forgotten wonder of mangalica (special Hungarian traditional pig breed) and toast with the smooth flavour of homemade plum brandy. Of course, our Mongolian friends have their own concept of how to do things and although we show them the hot charcoal and the slice of bread with which to soak the fat up with, to no avail, they push the bacon right into the flames. While burning the bacon to cinder they eat the bread, then pop the black bacon into their mounths, and happily swallow it. We will never find out if they actually liked what they had eaten.

The road the driver had chosen is nothing less than a nightmare. The traffic from the other direction amounts to one vehicle per every four hours. It soon becomes obvious to us that this is not the official UB-Murun route. But there is not much we can do; we ought to be thankful to have four wheels under us. At two in the morning we stop for a bite at a roadside restaurant. Now we see a few more cars gathering. Families headed north crowd around the tables, covered with plastic. They slurp their milky, salty teas. Clear their throats noisily and spit huge gobs out the window and persistently stare at our completely wretched company. In the meantime our driver has at a sudden whim decided to take the frame apart. Apparently he has recently begun to hear a rattling noise and he bangs and fiddles with every bit of the bus before he is satisfied about the cause of the noise. While waiting we meet a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, a tall, blond, young bloke also heading north. There he means to research the throat-songs of the Tuva. We regret not being able to spend more time talking with him. In the morning light is shed on our strange choice of route. The driver stops in a tiny village in front of a tiny wooden hut and kindly invites us in to meet his tiny parents. We are given tea, steamed mutton, meat rolled in pastry, vodka and loads of kindness. But time is not on our side, we need to hurry on it is has almost been 20hours on the road by now. We arrive to Murun; the local police officer awaits us at the edge of town and after checking our registration plate escorts us to the locals market to purchase the remaining foodstuff for the expedition. We buy a few bottles of kumis and stop by at the travel agency were we pay for the plane tickets for the journey back and by four in the afternoon we are bumping down the road towards Hatgal. We arrive to a camping named Garage 24, belonging to the Nature’s Door travel agency. Of course there are no horses in sight (we have it laid out in the contract that the horses wait for us upon arrival) but we are not in the least surprised, we unpack our stuff onto a stretch of asphalt in the middle of the camping. We light a fire, cook tea and slice home made Hungarian salami onto the bread brought from Ulaanbaatar. The members of the group have already made friends during the “short” journey, and we allow ourselves to relax a bit. Everyone seems to have the right attitude and there won’t be any troubles with the communal spirit during the trip, we conclude.

It’s seven in the morning. The owner, an arrogant individual, is greatly offended that we wish to inspect the vehicle. What on earth are we thinking of, his is a serious establishment. With fourteen years of experience in the travel business, that is Nassan Tours. She points repeatedly at the photocopied A4 sized paper on the wall. Some sort of certificate, where they praise themselves to the high heavens. See the certificate, she gesticulates, everything will be in top order, their services include car rental, with driver. What are we trying to suggest, anyway and how come a Mongolian phoned them in our name, why did we not phone them ourselves? They are perfectly capable of speaking English. We close our eyes for a brief second, heave a big sigh and patiently wait for her to phone the driver to collect us and take us to the airport. The money is already in our hands (650 USD, one way) we move to hand it over when the driver phones. He is tired, no can do. So much about Nassan.
09.00: In three hours time we are due to meet the arriving group at the airport. As our last resort, stressed out and anxious we head for the local cab station. Here jobless cab drivers wait sometimes days for someone to come and hire them. Anar’s mom is there to help us. We manage to find a driver who for 100 dollars a day will take us to Hatgal in his UAZ minivan with luggage rack, and we can set off straight away. Of course the cost of fuel falls to us, which means 600 miles, 30ltrs/100 miles and 1500 local currency for 1 liter. Of course we have to pay for all four days in advance. Our hands are tied, we agree to anything. He asks for an hour to go home and collect his stuff, then we head for Anar’s house where we collect our own luggage and off we wiz to the airport.
At the airport we bump into a high-ranking military official whom we had to contact when both Hungarian and Mongolian diplomatic organization realized that a well-known Hungarian politician intended to join our upcoming expedition. I explain our situation to him. He pats me on the back and kindly reprimands me for not asking him for help sooner. Of course we ask the same questions. He makes one phone call, informs us that the border crossing permits are ready at our disposal. All we need to do is register ourselves at the border crossing point. They know about us there and are expecting our arrival. He makes two phone calls and all of a sudden there are flight tickets available for our journey back from Murun. All we need to do is collect and pay for it upon arrival. The group arrives; we pack our bags into the booth of the UAZ, pile into the crammed seats and fire the engine into life. Late at night, in the middle of a thunderstorm along flooded roads in the pitch black darkness we decide not to set camp for the night but to press on till Khatgal. 650 miles, no less.

The only way to illustrate the latest Mongolian “incident” is in telegraph style.
June, 2nd: Anar reserves 8 return flights to Murun with Aero Mongolia.
June 28th: Anar assures us that there is no need to, but we insist that he calls the airways company to confirm the reservation. Everything in order, they are quite offended that we might imagine anything not to be.
June 29th: We are still waiting for the photocopies of the passports of all participants so that we can arrange the border crossing permits.
July 9th: We arrive personally at the offices of Aero Mongolia to purchase the tickets. We get an electronic queue number. We sit around, we wait. Anar browses the posts on the ad wall where he sees a notice with the information: the company has decided to stop all national flights from the 1st of July. From then on it will only fly international. We wait for another hour, but we finally can’t stand it any more (Mongolians are not exactly great fans of queuing) and we call the company from their own office building. The posting is correct, they inform us, there are no more flights to Murun, and the reservations have all been cancelled. We should seek the services of other companies.
10th July: We visit all airway companies. The only possibility seems to be the local low-budget flight company, EZ Nis, but here all tickets have been sold out. Anar phones all his possible acquaintances and many of them volunteer to take the group by minibus for about half the price of a flight ticket. In the mean time we admit the necessary documents to the border control to ensure that we can cross with the expedition unhindered. They return our papers, saying that only an official travel agency can do this.
24th July: We arrive from the previous trip, Anar is on the phone all day, and all his acquaintances cancel their offers. Obviously not only are there no flights, there are no vehicles to take us either. We manage to find a contact person to assist us with the border crossing permits. The best friend of Anar’s grandmother used to be a high-ranking official in the army, and her daughter works at a travel agency. We should get the permits by nightfall, they assure us, but at this point we cannot trust any more promises.
25th July, 09:00: We start roaming the town looking for a car to Murun, preferably immediately. Although there is a scheduled local bus headed for Murun we dare not risk it. We do not know the members of the new expedition team and we are not sure that they would be able to put up with a 20 hour bus ride crammed in with 18 other Mongolians and the various stops made during the journey of which only three would obviously be related to some sort of technical bust-up. As our last resort we turn to our Lonely Planet and throw ourselves into the search. There are a lot of lessons to learn from what happens next.
Active Mongolia, Karakorum Expeditions, Nomadic Journeys, Radiant Sky and Tsolmon Travel: this involves only fixed, complete trips to the Huvsgul Lake, horrible prices, and a strict program.
Happy Camel, Hovsgol Travel Company, Mongolia Expeditions, Nomadic Expeditions: they are either unavailable when we call them, or they promise to return our calls. All with the same result: nothing.
Khövsgöl Lodge Company: we should check out there website, they are unable to give us any information.
Juulchin: finally some hard facts, 836 USD for eight people, one way only.
Tseren Tours: this seems to be the best so far, 540 USD one way, we pay up front, carefully put the receipt and the contract away and heave a sigh of relief.
13:00: We get a call from Tseren Tours. They sincerely apologize but their driver has cancelled the trip. And this is one of the biggest Mongolian travel agencies. They ask us to come to their headquarters so that they can return our money. What a generous offer. After all this rejection we are at loss where to look further. All the travel agencies recommend the guesthouses of Ulaanbaatar. This is Mongolia for you. An official travel agency is unable to transport eight tourists to one of the most popular destinations of the country.
16:00: We receive a call from the Frontier Guards that their client service representative is on a two day management course, so our permits have not come through, and tomorrow they would be closed, it being Saturday. Take that.
21:00: We call and visit around 15 guesthouses. Some interesting info:
Khongor Guest House: agrees to it for six hundred, then when we go back to pay they inform us that it’s not worth for six hundred they can’t do it for this much and they won’t do it for more. We ought to rather book a group-tour with them. We conclude that the information on their website is a shameless lie.
Chinggis Guest House: Two rovers would cost us 1600 dollars all together.
UB Guest House: it’s a possibility , we should come and talk to them the following afternoon in person.
Nassan’s Guest House: they agree to it, we agree to go there the following morning, inspect the minivan and pay for it in advance.

Yesterday afternoon we all said our goodbyes. At the airport we exchanged the usual contact details, promised to keep in touch and all agreed that it had been an awesome experience, no regrets. This trip would fuel many a conversations and stories in the coming months. While the members left us, we, the organizers sat down to reflect on the lessons learned from the trip.
The negative incidents spring mainly from the difference of the Mongolian way of thinking. Here a promise is no more than a word, the future is never certain and no matter how much time and money we invest into the preparations, the promises for horses and vehicles can always be taken back, even half an hour before our arrival. The advice that the participants had imparted to us was that in the future we ought to put more effort into the organizing of the trip. This perfectly reflects the difference between the European and Asian mentality. Coming from Hungary, we will never be able to understand why a cab, previously reserved and paid for, cancels the journey half an hour before departure even though this means that the driver falls away from about half a local monthly income. And in return they will never understand why is this a problem for us, why we are annoyed and upset. The only solution to this problem is to perhaps sending detailed information to all participants about the fickle nature of such trips, explaining that the program might change as we go along. (Including a paragraph solely dedicated to the nature of the food served for meals, in a day-to-day fashion).
We had to admit that an escort vehicle is not so very amateur on a trip like this. On one hand way we could save ourselves hours of packing and strapping the luggage onto horseback and on the other hand everyone would feel safer a bit. We also agree that in the future we need to prepare everyone for the fact that if we want to break camp before ten in the morning we will have to fold our tents wet as they are, that morning tea does not mean chatting for an hour as well and that our escorts will only start packing out stuff if they see us all ready to go. The difference between map-measured and GPS-measured distances needs to be cleared, and it must be stated that horses are no Japanese high-speed trains and that we arrive to our campsite when we arrive. This depends on speed, on number and length of stops, the fitness of beast and human and the availability of possible camping environment. We need to give the opportunity for participation even to those who perhaps favor comfort over hardship, a slower pace over speed and who do not have so much experience in wild camping. All in all we need to inform our guests in a much more detailed and specific manner with tailored description of each and every separate trip. Following our most recent trip a few of our guest where quite a bit disappointed. Some because we did not stick to the official plan as due to complaints about tall grass, flies, a general sense of uncertainty and fatigue the majority opted to spend the last five days in a 15 miles radius of our campsite. Others, yet again, would have welcomed a more westernized cuisine, more visits to towns and exact GPS measured distances. It is impossible to satisfy everyone at the same time. The solution is to break the trips up according to the different levels of expectations.
It must be said, though, that it never ceases to be inspiring to see that Hungarian horsemen and horsewomen (some with no more than six months of riding lessons behind them, others not far from the retirement age and yet again others with minimal travel or camping experiences) face challenges, that might seem everyday to us, with such flexibility and courage.
Seeing such everyday examples of human willpower over hardships and hunger, the flexibility and an enraptured enthusiasm for the beauties of nature help us forget the homesickness, the anxiety-attacks, the stress, the frustration and the ever-looming possibility of failure that overshadowed the organizing of this trip.
A happy incident brightens our darkening mood over the numerous difficulties involving the arrival of the next group: on the main plaza of Ulaanbaatar we meet a Robur truck painted in our national tricolour: red, white and green. Parked by its side stands a battered Pannonia motor sidecar. We can’t believe our eyes yet on closer inspection we must believe what we see. Both vehicles have Hungarian EU registration plates. The owners don’t seem to be around but one of the bumper stickers tells us all we need to know: Robur Expedition. These people have decided to drive from Hungary to the Olympic games in Beijing. Currently they are at the games in Beijing.

The journey back home started yesterday morning with everyone just standing around the fire and saying things like: “we’ll pack our stuff when the other minivan arrives”. Finally we managed to get everyone ready (most common excuses being: the tents are wet, the others are not packed yet, either, do we have more tea?) and started with cars and horses, our journey towards Bat-Ölzi. At ten in the morning we met the mother of Anar who had guided the other van to us, we said goodbye to Erchim who tied the dozen or so horses together and embarked on a solitary journey back home. In the afternoon we returned a few saddles in Harhorin and by nightfall we were a few hundred miles from Ulaanbaatar. As we were adamant to have a look at the Przewalsky horses, as planned, we forced ourselves onwards. Today, after midnight, we ask the workers of a roadside slaughterhouse for directions and it turns out that we had miscalculated the entrance of the Hustai Nuruu National Park by about sixty miles. We turn back eventually find the right track in the gentle drizzle. More than once we get stuck on stretches of the road that had been flooded and finally at around three in the morning we decide to sleep till dawn and not to stumble around in the dark any longer. In the morning we find the entrance in an hour. Various voices in the group question whether it is worth going to this much trouble for the sight of a few wild horses. To the relief of everyone the park guard arrives, we catch sight of a group of takhi horses; pile back into the bus and at around noon we arrive to our hostel where the arguments centre around who should be taking a shower first and which room should belong to whom. Our accommodation is clean and the standard is impeccable Zaya Backpacker Hostel, where the owner charges us ten dollars per head for a letter of invitation, even though previously he had promised not to do so (lately in Mongolia there is no visa without such a letter). When we leave his room to go and get the money he starts yelling at us that nobody is allowed to turn their backs on him like this while he is still talking. Real customer service; the urban Mongolian attitude. The hostel costs us thirty dollars per room. We are asked to pay the rooms of the next group too or else the reservation shall be cancelled. The owner informs us with a straight face. In the evening to cheer ourselves after the complications we eat a huge Chinese dinner at the Ghingis Khan restaurant and polish it all off with a beer on the main plaza before finally collapsing into our beds.

Today no serious discussion is needed about what to do; some are experiencing digestion problems, others are tired from the bathing yesterday, so we split, the smaller group mounts horses and heads for the 10000 feet high Totsonegel peak, while the others move the camp a few miles downstream to a quieter spot. The view from the peak is spectacular, but there is no path leading up, so we have to find our way through the pine thickets, over moss-covered pit holes and century-old, fallen tree trunks. At last we reach the tree line, the alpine meadows are dotted with wild flowers of every color, another half hour and we are gazing at the Orhon valley in a cold, blasting windstorm.
On the way back we choose a different route but halfway we come across a hillside covered with loose slates and the horses slide towards the depths on their flanks. We have to dismount and lead them on foot for an hour. It is late afternoon by the time we get back to the campsite. The others in the meantime had been visiting the shops in town, they had frees a starving yak from the thicket growing on the banks of the stream and have been generally trying to overcome the symptoms of light and severe stomach ailments.

The morning confronts us with a difficult decision: what to do next. All this is obviously the effect of the easier pace: in past years the less we rode each day and the more we rested, the less inner energy we had to complete our trip. Some are not in the mood to stay with the plans; others would like to ride even more each day. Finally, we make a hard decision; we will turn back, and will not visit Naiman Nuur and Tsetserleg. The argument: the grass is too tall for camping, mountain riding is difficult, rains are frequent, etc. At least we all agree that the common objective is having fun and not pressing our limits or proving ourselves. So we gear up and visit the Moglodytin thermal spa, making a shopping detour in Bat-Ölzi on the way.

We decide it is a perfect day for resting with an alternative trip to the mountains on horseback. Everyone chooses the alternative, good news, which means no one is too tired. We walk up the closest, 2500 m high mountain, the view is magnificent, and ascend on the other side looking for a place to cross the river. It is not an easy feat, but finally with the help of a local equestrian we manage. There is just enough time to visit the waterfall, buy a beer, and feel sad about all the new ger camps and garbage dumps sprouting up every year and return to camp very late.

There is not much to see in the 15 km wide valley of Orhon apart from the incredible heat. After crossing an odd stone bridge and bathing in the river, we reach Orhon Kukree (waterfall) by early evening. We find a perfect spot for camping with water, wood and grass plentiful, horses and yaks are herded across the river, around them huge splashes and waves prove there are some capital fish under water. Of course, this is the first year no one has fishing gear at hand.

Early morning we head up towards the monastery, the crowds are larger every year, clouds of flies cover the sick rental horses of local alcoholics, while foreigners in panama hats and sun burnt arms click their cameras. On the way back we reach the river again, and make camp under a beautiful cliff with trees scattered all around. Further activities: repairing saddles, making whips, lazing around.

After a late start we cross the Orhon river, our van cannot follow, the rains are exceptionally heavy this year. Heading up towards Tuvkhun monastery, the wide, hot valleys tighten and swarms of flies ascend on us. It seems we over planned this day, everyone is very tired by the time we reach the valley at the foot of Tuvkhun, although relieved to find the van already there. It crossed the river with the help of a tractor. After pitching our tents and our dinner half-ready, two men arrive on a small motorbike, and tell us to leave; it is prohibited to camp inside the nature reserve (the entrance is about a kilometer downstream). No use arguing, they are simply proud of their ranger badges and shout at us arrogantly. They leave and we take our chances. It is dark when they return, start kicking our stuff around and threaten to call the police. Now that is one big fat joke in these regions, but Anar, our guide is afraid he might have problems later if they take his ID so we pack up and make our way back to the entrance, where we rent one of the gers in the local ger camp. Their mission is obvious: foreign tourists should pay for high-class accommodation. They tell us it is all in the nature park rules, but of course, at the entrance there are no signs, not even in Mongolian. We start to cook from scratch, and go to sleep well past midnight. It seems in the future we will have to plan for such situations; Mongolia is not the same as it was.

After all the haggling yesterday we could persuade Erchim to leave us ride alone, so he is sitting in the van while eight Hungarians make their way alone in the middle of the vast landscape. In the afternoon, we get some heavy rains, complete with thunder and hail. One of our extra horses breaks loose and heads back home with full speed. While pursuing it one of us gets a broken saddle-strap and falls. After a quick repair, we continue our pursuit, and luckily, we find our horse grazing peacefully and manage to catch it. Wet, cold and tired we continue, our van is nowhere, so we stop at some ger-camp beside the road. We ask for help in the event our van does not catch up, all our tents, sleeping bags and other equipment are in the car. Christopher and Enkhe, a German-Mongolian couple living here greet us, they operate the only horse polo club in the country. We passed through here last year, but did not find the owners at that time. They invite us to the guest ger, and to our complete surprise offer us hot tea, clam salad, tinned fish and real bread with jam. They take turns in visiting us and asking if we needed any further help. It seems real hospitality has not disappeared yet from this region, the last representatives are still around. Christopher gives us one of his jeeps and a driver, and we go looking for our van. After an hour, we give up. We return to find further presents: three bottles of Californian red wine and a whole ger with fire going. We are speechless. Late at night our van arrives, they tell us it was stuck several times, lost the road, rolled, broke down, etc.

In the morning the whole community crouches in front of the main ger and start their usual chatter in Mongolian. We can only guess what they are talking about. They can provide us with horses, but only for riding, not for our oversized luggage, which could injure them easily. Although we offer double the rental fee, they are adamant, it is not about money, they just cannot imagine horses carrying our packs, and they have never seen such a thing before. There goes all the planning and organizing since February, these people can give us eight horses in half a day. True, we have to buy five saddles to be able to mount them, and our luggage will be brought after us by one of the vans. Our guest are flexible, and agree on the change of plans, after all, this means easier riding, longer distances, less work. We buy some last-minute supplies, ride out of Harhorin and make camp further down in the valley of the River Orhon.

Everyone wakes at their own pace, and slowly we explain the issues. Anar signed a deal with a local herder several months ago about renting horses and equipment. We tried to reach him on his cell, but he was too drunk to talk. He knows very well he could make over 8000 US$ worth of clean profit on our groups, but he does not care, and later switches off his phone for good. We buy a goat from the family and ask them to prepare the famous Mongolian national dish, the horhog. They put stones into the fire, and the whole animal is cut up and placed in a huge pot over the fire. The stones are then thrown into the pot with some salt, and after an hour the steamed-fried-cooked greasy mass is served, help your hands. After dinner we discuss horses, maybe they can rent us some. No problem, they will bring them soon. Relief. After an hour, they tell us it is not possible, sorry. Panic. We visit the Erdene Monastery nearby, and continue searching for horses. It is the same story everywhere: yes, of course, we have hundreds of horses. No, sorry, it is a bad time we cannot help. Late that afternoon we are surprised: Anar is talking to someone we know from past years. Erchim, our guide in 2004 remembers us after a few seconds, and we recall our adventures on the Tsetserleg-Harhorin trail long ago. He promises us 16 horses early tomorrow morning. Of course, remembering his “reliability” from the past we choose to visit him immediately. A short visit to the ironically popular Phallic Rock and an afternoon disco with heavy curtains giving us a “night” sense all add to the general Asia-feeling. Erchim offers us one of his gers (yurts), so we huddle up nine of us in the small space and go to sleep at once.

Right after their arrival our guests receive a shocking example of Mongolian mentality, it is well after midnight and we are standing in the parking lot of the airport with our bags and equipment and waiting for Anar to organize a second van, as this one does not have a roof rack, making it impossible for nine persons plus equipment and food to fit inside. Around 1 am, the second Hyundai microbus arrives, the driver jumps out all smiling, and shocks every inexperienced onlooker by starting to change break pads behind every wheel. Finally, two hours later we are on the road. Until the sun rises, we get stuck at least five times in the mud, floodwaters, and quicksand on one of the major “highways” in Mongolia, but our driver always finds solutions with the help of his toolbox or fellow drivers. Later we stop and wait for the other car, as it turns out, some major part had to be fixed along the way. It feels so weird watching Anar and the other locals all using their cell phones, shouting into it in the middle of the steppe, all because there is network coverage all along the Ulaanbaatar-Harhorin road since this year. Of course, life did not become easier or more effective because of it. An hour later the road turns to asphalt, smooth and hard, so we reach incredible speeds, over 80 km/h at times. Soon a huge pothole tears off our rear bumper, the driver shrugs and throws it in the back of the other van. We are already halfway when the drivers stop for a chat and tell us the road we are on is in a very bad condition, but they know a better shortcut. After experiencing the local conditions we do not argue, and agree to go via Dalangarshiri. Of course, it turns out that the whole gearbox of our van is broken, but our drivers have friends living close by, they will help. Yeah, they can help us buy a new gearbox from them. Our drivers explain they do not have the money, and they will not go further without us paying for the metal. Typical Mongolia, we sigh and pay up. With wide grins and at a very leisurely pace, they start dismantling the van, thousands of oily parts all thrown around in the dust, we can’t take more, so we leave with the other van and tell them to catch up. It is late afternoon when we finally find the proper road (rather overgrown dirt track) to Harhorin, our guests are sick of it all; they have been on the road for more than 48 hours now. In a local guanz (roadside restaurant) we eat khusuur (a kind of pie stuffed with mutton and fried in oil) and start searching for the bathrooms. We find it, a pit-toilet leaning against nothing in the middle of a weedy backyard, guarded by eight black dogs. Spending the next few hours searching for the family who will rent us our horses we are faced with a serious problem: no family, no horses, and no trip. But, after all this is nomadic country, people move to fresh grazing grounds few times a year, so we go looking for their relatives. No one can help us there, but they know a family who can help us. It is almost dark when we find them near the River Orhon, pitch our tents and creep into them.

While last year Ulaanbaatar was quite a stressful, rapidly developing city, this year all hell broke loose. On one hand, charred window frames and blackened walls of the Art Gallery and Socialist Party buildings remind us of the violent demonstrations a few days ago, recalling similar pictures in anyone present at the stone-throwing party two years ago on the streets of Budapest. On the other hand, globalized development did not stop. While a few years ago the surrounding green hills could be seen from almost anywhere in downtown, now everything is engulfed by people and their homes. The city spreads along the valley as a giant amoeba, and everywhere one hears talk about property, real estate and new constructions. Here, in Mongolia, the last truly nomadic country in the world. Anar, an old friend from Hungary is our local contact this year, he moved back to his home country four years ago, and he will assist us with organizing and translating. We feel at home at once in his home, a simple but welcoming few rooms and the ger district of Ulaanbaatar. Anar will leave his wife and 3-month old son at home to join us for more than a month of adventure on horseback through Mongolia.
We make beef jerky (biltong), buy equipment, and wait for the first group, due to arrive before midnight from Budapest via Beijing. At 10 pm the relative of Anar, who would take us around the city and down to Harhorin where the horses wait for us, cancels the trip, explaining that his van broke down. But we heard that before dozens of times. A few panicky phone calls ensue, and luckily, Anar manages to find someone else, so we arrive to Chinggis Khan international airport ten minutes before the group emerges from the arrival hall.