It was Mongolia’s Mother’s and Children’s day. June 1st. Everybody gets out of the city to vacation in the mountains and by the river for a couple of days. They simply camp out. As unbelievable as it sounds, there was over 10 km (6 miles) of bumper to bumper cars on the road, plodding along lightly. We were glad we were headed back into the city!!

While in school, we had learnt about the Trans Siberian rail line that went from Vladivostok on the eastern end of Russia to Moscow. During our travels, we met a gentleman who has done that trip! In fact, we also met a young lady who is doing the segment from Beijing to Moscow. She is just hopping out in the big cities for a few days each, enjoying the landscape and people there and then jumping back on….

Never thought I will actually see that Trans Siberian Rail line!

Roger Whitney, are you thinking what I am thinking? Could we be just crazy enough to…? 🙂

(not the shoes though)

Roger, for not knowing what to do with the BIG hotel room they gave the passengers who are stuck in Ulanbaatar…

Or

Me, for thinking about how to take weird pictures.

Here is Roger who cannot decide whether to enjoy the living area or the dining area or just cool off in his bed….

He almost went downstairs to request the hotel concierge if they can delay the flight further…

… but Mongolia is not quite ready to leave us! Ulanbaatar is having weather issues. Our plane is stuck in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. We are delayed for at least 12 hours as of now…

Having seen how the nomads live in the desert, we are convinced this is no big deal.

Turkish Airlines is taking good care of us so far. This is in the bus where they are taking us to the hotel they have arranged to put us up in…

Today is Mother’s and Children’s day in Mongolia. Which is a public holiday and the whole city was in festive mood. We ourselves celebrated this day by taking our wonderful guide Sara and her whole family out for dinner at their place of choice – an Indian restaurant!!!

Her husband Batnasan is somewhat of a local celebrity. He is famous for his paintings. I showed him Sharmila’s paintings. He had painted two water paintings for Roger and me and gifted us. Wonderful person. We could not understand each other’s language but I had a great time with him.

We also enjoyed meeting her sons Galbadrakh and Amartaivan (who I hope to run in some American university one day when he fulfills his dream of studying in America) and her very quiet daughter Hanna.

The best was undoubtedly the youngest child – Johnny who kept us entertained the whole evening with his impeccable English (surprising for a kid who goes to a Mongol medium school – he learns all his English from Youtube and TV) and his knowledge of Periodic Tables and Geographical facts.

One of the best ways we could have signed off our stay in Mongolia…

Now, let’s hope tomorrow morning all flights are on time and all that…

Our last place to visit was Terelj National Park. With a very different landscape from Ulanbaatar area, it offer quite some greenery and a lot of rock formation. The most curious one we visited is called the Turtle Rock. You can see why.

This thing is huge. About eight story tall, it is mostly granite in composition.

Apparently, these days they are showing up unannounced in sunglasses and Skechers shoes 🙂