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Mongolian boy in front of his family's ger (aka yurt). |
Our train from Moscow to Vladivostok (see separate post) took a detour down into Mongolia for two nights and one intensive day in and around Ulan Batar (aka Ulaanbaatar).
In 2005, I traveled around Mongolia for two weeks and it was nice to get a refresher.
Happily, the marathon touring day hit new sites, including:
- A massive new statue to Genghis Khan
- A visit to scenic Gorkhi-Terelj National Park
- A close up all three national sports (wrestling, archery, and horse riding)
- And the mostly new city center.
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Founder of the largest (contiguous) empire in history has to have a really large statue! It's 130 feet (40 meters) tall and looks even taller on top of a 33 foot (10 meter) building on a hill. OK, sure Genghis Khan was brutal but Mongolia ruled the world, dude. (Note: The small dots on the head of the huge horse are people.) |
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Out in Gorkhi-Terelj National Park (beautiful but packed with tourist camps), we saw the three classic Mongolian sports. |
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Kids start riding horses early. These 7 and 8 year olds were fierce, competitive riders. |
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Ringside seats for the wrestling tournament.
At the big Nadam festival in July, I'd seen dozens of matches simultaneously but over 100 meters away on the big stadium field. |
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With the first and second place winners in the day's matches. |
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Since my visit 12 years earlier, the center of Ulan Batar now has many new tall buildings. My old smelly, dirty hotel has been demolished and replaced with a 17-story building with a top floor restaurant where we had dinner. The massive Government Palace (shown above) had a total renovation. |
Political footnote: I think it is remarkable that while none of the other former communist countries east of the Caucasus escaped becoming dictatorships, Mongolia has had a competitive, multi-party system since the communist regime was overthrown in 1990!