Day 27, to Ulaangom  87km , 2201km to date,  286m up, 1031m end

And another ugly riding day with gorgeous scenery.  The good news is that I now have a rest day in Ulanngom.  We have two  more off-road riding days then into Russia and pavement for a long time.  I’m expecting these two days will be rough, not sandy., but with 1,500m of climbing.  The sand has been responsibly for me falling 8 times - all zero speed falls but still falls.  To prevent further falls, I have ridden with one foot unclipped from my pedals for the last two days.  This makes it difficult to ride as I have one sided “touring” pedals, but I survived without over flexing anything and without further falls.

The  area (desert) we have been riding through is called Zunngobl,  it is now a desert, the most northern in the world, but up until recently it was grassland.  What I am seeing is another example of global warming.  In the last 30 years Mongolia has lost 25% of its land mass to desert, it has lost 850 lakes and over 2,000 rivers.  Very concerning.

We are now seeing snow capped mountains to the west.

Unfortunately we are going to leave Mongolia without trying Airag (sp?), fermented mare’s milk, apparently not in season.  I’m disappointed (truly). 

Near us is a very large lake, Uvs Nuur.  It has 5 times the salt level of open ocean.  We considered going to the lake to see if even I would float, but resting was more important.  For those of you that may not be aware, in even the ocean, I barely float,  Queue the "dense" jokes...

I am expecting I will be out of cell and web connections for at least a week, so my next post may not be for awhile.

Some recent pics:

Evening chat in camp:

Highway milage markers:

I am the tourist attraction, it is very common that a family travelling will stop simply to talk to you.  Having the route map on my phone really helps the “conversation”: