Mongolia: Naadam, the Gobi and Karakorum

Arrive in Ulaanbaatar

Chinggis Khaan International Airport to your hotel in Ulaanbaatar

• Welcome dinner
• Nuit : Ulaanbaatar
• Environ 1 h de route

Soir

In the early evening your See Sight Tours guide meets the group for a briefing on the festival days, the meeting points in the crowds, what to pack in a soft bag for the Gobi flight and which days are long in the vehicle. Then a welcome dinner of buuz dumplings, khuushuur and grilled meat, with vegetarian dishes on request.

Compris

• Pick-up at Chinggis Khaan International Airport (UBN)
• Welcome briefing with your guide
• Welcome dinner

Gandan, the National Museum and a concert

Ulaanbaatar: Gandan Monastery, the National Museum of Mongolia and an evening concert

• Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
• Nuit : Ulaanbaatar
• Environ 30 min de route

Matin

We begin at Gandan, the largest working monastery in Mongolia, in the morning when the monks are at prayer; turn the prayer wheels in the courtyard and see the tall gilded statue of Migjid Janraisig in the main temple. Then the National Museum of Mongolia, a short drive away, which follows the country from its rock art and Bronze Age deer stones through the Mongol empire to the deel robes, saddles and wrestling costumes of the 20th century. Your guide explains the three manly games, wrestling, horse racing and archery, and how a wrestler earns his title, so tomorrow makes sense.

Après-midi

Lunch is at a restaurant in the centre. The afternoon is free: rest before the festival, browse the cashmere shops, or watch the crowds gather at Sukhbaatar Square.

Soir

In the evening we go to a concert of Mongolian music and dance, with khoomii throat singing, contortion and the horse-head fiddle. Dinner is on your own.

Compris

• Gandan Monastery with your guide, at morning prayers
• The National Museum of Mongolia
• Lunch in the city centre
• An evening concert of Mongolian music, dance and throat singing

Naadam: the opening ceremony

Ulaanbaatar: the National Sports Stadium and the festival grounds

• Petit-déjeuner et repas du midi
• Nuit : Ulaanbaatar
• Environ 30 min de route

Après-midi

Lunch is at the festival grounds. In the afternoon walk next door to the archery ground, where men and women shoot at small targets of leather cylinders tens of metres away, and to the tents where players flick sheep knuckle bones at a target. Stalls sell khuushuur and airag, fermented mare's milk.

Soir

The evening is free: Sukhbaatar Square usually has concerts and celebrations late into the night.

Compris

• Reserved seat ticket for the Naadam opening ceremony at the National Sports Stadium
• The opening rounds of wrestling
• Archery and knuckle-bone shooting on the festival grounds with your guide
• Lunch at the festival

The Naadam horse races, then Terelj

Ulaanbaatar to Khui Doloon Khudag, then Gorkhi-Terelj National Park

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Gorkhi-Terelj National Park
• Environ 3.5 h de route

Matin

We leave at 7:30, the one early start of the trip, because the races start in the morning and the road west of the city fills quickly. About 40 km out, at Khui Doloon Khudag, the festival horse races run across open steppe rather than round a track, over distances of roughly 10 to 30 km depending on the age of the horses, and the jockeys are children, some only a few years old. Thousands of people camp along the finish, many on horseback. We watch from the finish line as the leaders appear as dust on the horizon, and the winning horses are blessed and their sweat is said to bring luck.

Après-midi

Lunch is khuushuur, fried mutton pastries, from the stalls, the classic festival meal. Early in the afternoon we drive back through the city and on to Gorkhi-Terelj National Park, a valley of larch forest and granite outcrops. We stop at Turtle Rock, then walk the stepped path up to the Aryabal Meditation Temple in the late light.

Soir

Dinner and the night are at a ger camp, quiet after two days of crowds.

Compris

• The Naadam horse races at Khui Doloon Khudag with your guide
• Khuushuur lunch at the races
• Gorkhi-Terelj National Park entry and Turtle Rock
• The walk to the Aryabal Meditation Temple
• Dinner at the ger camp in Terelj

Fly to the Gobi, walk into Yolyn Am

Terelj to Ulaanbaatar airport, fly to Dalanzadgad, then Yolyn Am

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Yolyn Am
• Environ 3.5 h de route

Matin

Early risers can ride for an hour with local herders on their stocky Mongolian horses before breakfast; everyone else sleeps in. At about 9:30 we leave Terelj for the two-hour drive to Chinggis Khaan International Airport and the flight south to Dalanzadgad, the capital of the South Gobi, about an hour and a half in the air. Flying saves the two days of driving across the Middle Gobi that most trips spend in the vehicle. Our 4x4s and drivers, sent down from Ulaanbaatar ahead of us, meet the plane, and we drive about an hour west to our ger camp at the foot of the Gurvan Saikhan mountains.

Après-midi

In the late afternoon, when the day visitors have gone and the heat is easing, we stop at the small museum at the park gate, then walk into Yolyn Am, a gorge that narrows between steep rock walls with a stream along its floor.

Soir

Look for ibex on the slopes and bearded vultures overhead, then dinner at camp under a very big sky.

Compris

• Early horse ride with local herders in Terelj (optional to join)
• Flight from Ulaanbaatar to Dalanzadgad (DLZ)
• Gobi Gurvansaikhan National Park entry and the museum at the park gate
• Late-afternoon walk into the Yolyn Am gorge with your guide
• Lunch on the way and dinner at the ger camp

West to the Khongor dunes

Yolyn Am to Khongoryn Els along the Gurvan Saikhan range

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Khongoryn Els
• Environ 5 h de route

Soir

There is no shorter way to the dunes and no scheduled flight closer to them, and stopping halfway would mean a night in a place with nothing to see, so we break the day up instead. We leave at 8:30 after breakfast and follow the mountains west across gravel plains, past herders' gers, camel herds and the odd lone well, with a stop every hour or so to stretch, take photos and swap seats. Lunch is a hot meal on the way, at a camp where one fits the route or set up by our crew with tables and chairs, never a box in the vehicle. By mid-afternoon the dunes rise ahead, a pale wall of sand along the foot of the mountains. We settle into our ger camp for two nights, and the evening is free to watch the light leave the sand.

Compris

• Drive west along the Gurvan Saikhan range with stops for photos
• Hot lunch on the way
• Dinner at the ger camp by the dunes

A day at the singing dunes

Khongoryn Els, from a herding family to the crest at sunset

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Khongoryn Els
• Environ 1 h de route

Matin

In the cool of the morning we visit a camel-herding family nearby to see how they live: the ger, the milking, the Bactrian camels that still carry a family's home when it moves to new pasture. In July the family may have their own small Naadam memories to share, from the local festivals held across the country. Then you ride a camel for about an hour along the foot of the dunes with a herder leading. The middle of the day is free at camp, when the sun is strongest.

Soir

In the late afternoon we drive a few minutes to the highest part of the dunes and climb, about an hour in soft sand, slow and steep near the top, and from the crest at sunset you see the sand sea on one side and the plain on the other.

Compris

• Visit to a camel-herding family
• Camel ride of about an hour along the dunes
• Sunset climb of Khongoryn Els with your guide
• All meals at the ger camp

Across the Gobi to the Flaming Cliffs

Khongoryn Els to Bayanzag (the Flaming Cliffs)

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Bayanzag
• Environ 5 h de route

Soir

As on day 6, the alternative would be a night in between with nothing to see, so we leave at 8:30 and break the drive with a stop every hour or so and a hot lunch on the way. We reach our ger camp near Bayanzag in the afternoon, with time to rest before the light softens. Then we walk the rim of the Flaming Cliffs, red and orange sandstone that glows in the low sun. In the 1920s expeditions from the American Museum of Natural History, led by Roy Chapman Andrews, found here the first dinosaur eggs recognised by science, along with Protoceratops and the first Velociraptor. Your guide shows you where the finds were made, and fragments of fossil bone still turn up in the sand. We stay until the sun goes down, then drive back to camp for dinner.

Compris

• Drive across the Gobi with stops for photos
• Hot lunch on the way
• The Flaming Cliffs at Bayanzag from late afternoon to sunset, with your guide
• Dinner at the ger camp

Saxaul forest, then north to Ongi

Bayanzag to the Ongi River and the ruins of Ongiin Khiid

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Ongi
• Environ 4 h de route

Matin

For anyone who wants it, a dawn walk back to the cliffs while they are empty and the colour returns with the first sun; in July sunrise is early, so this is optional and the rest of the group sleeps in. After breakfast we stop at the saxaul forest near Bayanzag, a stand of twisted, drought-hardy trees that hold the sand together, then drive north for about four hours across the edge of the Gobi to the Ongi River.

Après-midi

Lunch is at our ger camp by the river. In the afternoon we walk the ruins of Ongiin Khiid, two monasteries on either bank that were among the largest in Mongolia until they were destroyed in the purges of the late 1930s, when monks were killed and temples pulled down across the country. Since 1990 a small community of monks has come back and rebuilt a temple among the ruins.

Soir

A small museum tells the story, and the riverbank is good for an evening walk.

Compris

• Optional dawn walk at the Flaming Cliffs
• The saxaul forest near Bayanzag
• The ruins of Ongiin Khiid and the site museum, with your guide
• Lunch and dinner at the ger camp

Arvaikheer, Shankh and on to Karakorum

Ongi to Arvaikheer, then Shankh Monastery and Kharkhorin

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Kharkhorin
• Environ 5.5 h de route

Soir

The longest day, and the reason for the night at Ongi: about 300 km and five and a half hours of driving to reach Karakorum. There is no shorter way out of the Gobi to the Orkhon valley, and this route puts the rough part first and the paved road last. We leave at 8 am on tracks north to Arvaikheer, the capital of Ovorkhangai province, and stop there around midday for a sit-down lunch in town. From Arvaikheer the road is paved. An hour or so on we stop at Shankh Monastery, one of the oldest in Mongolia, founded in the 17th century and linked with Zanabazar, the first head of Mongolian Buddhism and its greatest sculptor; it was closed under communism and is active again. The land turns green as we drop into the Orkhon valley, and we reach our ger camp near Kharkhorin, the town beside the old capital, in the late afternoon. Dinner is at camp, and the evening is free.

Compris

• Sit-down lunch in Arvaikheer
• Shankh Monastery with your guide
• Dinner at the ger camp near Kharkhorin

Karakorum, Erdene Zuu and the Orkhon valley

Kharkhorin: Erdene Zuu, the Karakorum Museum and the hill above the valley

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Kharkhorin
• Environ 30 min de route

Après-midi

Lunch is in town. The afternoon is free: rest at camp or ride with a local herding family across the valley. Late in the day we drive up to the hill above town, where a monument to the empires of Mongolia looks over the Orkhon valley, a UNESCO World Heritage cultural landscape since 2004.

Compris

• Erdene Zuu Monastery at opening, with a local guide
• The Karakorum Museum
• The stone turtle of Karakorum
• Sit-down lunch in Kharkhorin
• The empires monument on the hill above town, late in the day
• Horse ride with a local herding family (afternoon option)

Mongol Els and on to Khustai

Kharkhorin to Elsen Tasarkhai, then Khustai National Park

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Khustai National Park
• Environ 4.5 h de route

Matin

We leave Kharkhorin after breakfast on the paved road east towards Ulaanbaatar, about 285 km and four and a half hours of driving, with the last few kilometres on a dirt road into the park. That runs slightly over our four-hour cap, so we break it near halfway at Elsen Tasarkhai, where a strip of sand dunes, the Mongol Els, runs across the green steppe below Khogno Khan mountain.

Après-midi

Walk out onto the sand, then lunch at a camp nearby. We reach Khustai National Park in the middle of the afternoon and settle into our ger camp. Khustai is where the takhi, or Przewalski's horse, often called the last wild horse, came home: it died out in the wild in the 1960s, and from 1992 horses bred in European zoos were flown here and released. At the visitor centre we hear how the project worked.

Soir

In the evening, when the horses come down to graze and drink, a park guide takes us out to find them.

Compris

• A walk on the Elsen Tasarkhai dunes
• Lunch on the way
• Khustai National Park entry and the visitor centre
• Evening takhi viewing with a park guide
• Dinner at the ger camp

Dawn at Khustai, back to Ulaanbaatar

Khustai National Park to Ulaanbaatar

• Petit-déjeuner, repas du midi et repas du soir
• Nuit : Ulaanbaatar
• Environ 2 h de route

Matin

Early risers go out with the park guide at first light, when the takhi are still low in the valleys and marmots sit up outside their burrows; everyone else joins after breakfast for a short walk on the hills near camp. Then we drive about two hours east to Ulaanbaatar, a little over 100 km, back to the hotel where you left your extra luggage.

Après-midi

Lunch is in the city. The afternoon is free, and the city is calm again after the festival: visit the Choijin Lama Temple Museum, a group of early 20th century temples now hemmed in by office towers, climb the steps of Zaisan Hill for a view over the Tuul valley, or shop for cashmere and felt at the State Department Store.

Soir

In the evening we sit down together for a farewell dinner, and your guide goes over the transfers for the next day.

Compris

• Dawn takhi viewing with the park guide (optional to join)
• Short hill walk at Khustai
• Lunch in Ulaanbaatar
• Farewell dinner

Depart from Ulaanbaatar

Your hotel in Ulaanbaatar to Chinggis Khaan International Airport

• Petit-déjeuner
• Environ 1 h de route

Matin

Breakfast at the hotel, then the trip ends. Chinggis Khaan International Airport is about 50 km south of the city, an hour's drive and more at rush hour, and we time your transfer to fit your flight: plan to leave the hotel about three hours before an international departure. July is the busiest month for flights out of Ulaanbaatar, so book your onward flight early. With a later flight the morning is yours for a last walk around Sukhbaatar Square, a visit to the Zanabazar Museum of Fine Arts, or the market stalls for felt slippers and cashmere to take home. If you would like more time in Mongolia, ask us about extra nights in Ulaanbaatar or Terelj before you fly; hotels book up in festival week, so we arrange them when you book the trip. Your guide says goodbye at breakfast and checks that every transfer is booked.

Compris

• Drop-off at Chinggis Khaan International Airport (UBN)