home on the range
by Rachael
Orkhon, Mongolia (don’t even look for it on a map! Darkhan is the closest town you’ll find)
First day on the ranch (Anak Ranch, that is) and we’re in for another sensory overload, this time of a totally different nature to other times. This is no city, you won’t get more country than this.
- smell
that distinctive open dunny stench mingles with wood smoke from the firebox, horse hair, sandy dust and traditional meat and vegetable soup - taste
milk, fresh from the cows, yoghurt made from more of the same, tomorrow there’ll be hot steaming rice porridge with even more…not to mention Mongolian dumplings, crunchy fresh salad, brown bread with strawberry jam, sausage and eggs….. - touch
fire heat bursting out of the ger onto our cold noses at 4:30 in the morning when we arrive, after a few more hours sleep, smooth silky goats snuggling in our arms, warm wet tongues licking us, the rascals nibbling our shoe laces
- hear
tractors humming, goats bleating, cows mooing, a large black bird’s wings pumping as it soars past overhead, Martin’s stories
- see
as far as your eyes let you
I *should* write a description, but words cannot do this place justice. It has a feel to it that I have not yet identified. Maybe it’s the sheer vastness. Maybe it’s the shimmering brown fields of grass, that show a hint of green only when you sit down and inspect closely (as you do when you take the goats out to pasture). Maybe it’s the fact that the temperature (positively wintery by Auckland standards, but Bahamas-balmy for these folks) makes us feel the days should be short, but the sun does not set until close to 8pm. Surreal. Maybe it’s the mountains – way way off in the distance. The way they totally enclose the plain reminds us of Yangshuo, but there the closeness was claustrophobic and here they surround us, but the space between them makes you feel very very insignificant. Yes, maybe it’s the open-ness and scale that lends a unique air to this place.
Our fantastic first couchsurf set a high standard for our Mongolian month, but the next week ranged from nondescript to disappointing. One day at the ranch, however, is everything we had hoped for and then some….and we’ve got a full week here.
Tags: food, postcard: Mongolia
rayres
welcome back! I missed you! Thanks for all the vivid updates. I can’t wait to get current!