Mongolia. Chasing rainbows and reindeer.

Dateline The boreal forests of the Mongolian Taiga somewhere just south of the Russian border.

June 2026

Mongolia Series 1

, Episode 1

Mankind has evolved over hundreds of thousands of years as a curious, eclectic mob of social and tribal nomadic beings, wandering the earth, hunting and gathering for their existence. In more recent anthropological times ie. the last 5,000 years or so we have evolved into a more sedentary form of existence where we increasingly stay rooted in the same place, specialise our skills and develop means of trade with others to obtain the goods and services we require but have long since lost the skill to produce for ourselves. This has ultimately lead us to the point we are at now where there are literally millions of exceptionally skilled people living in vast modern cities around the world who actually could not cook themselves a meal if their life depended on it.

But what if there were still people living the true nomadic life, dependent entirely on ancient, inherited skills and the resources of the land for their survival?

Such people are rare indeed and until recently (the last 25 years or so) completely hidden from the outside world, but they do exist.

 

The Tsaatan people of northern Mongolia are one rare example of just such a group. They are in fact listed by the UN as the smallest tribe of people in the world with less than 300 known members living in several very small, isolated communities in the vast and mountainous Taiga or boreal forests just a few kilometres below the Russian border. Visiting the home of these people is an undertaking of some epic magnitude, requiring a four wheel drive expedition of nine or so hours over some fairly treacherous tracks, the kind of tracks that would make your average driver of a jacked up Ford Ranger or Toyota Land Cruiser with bull bar, winch, driving lights, many aerials and recovery boards, think twice.

 

 

Then, if you manage to get that far, and assuming you have obtained the necessary permits (after all you are going into an unpatrolled area very close to the Russian Border) you then must ride a horse or, get this… a reindeer for anything up to six hours depending on the time of year. You see, as I mentioned earlier these people are nomads so their camp moves with the seasons. And wow, talk about seasonal change. In the summer, midday temps hover around 20 degrees while over night it falls into low single digits but winter, oh boy winter, how does minus 50 sound? Indeed the lowest temperature ever recorded there was minus 56 point something. BLOODY HELL!!

 

 

How do we know all of this stuff? Well pour yourself a glass of your favourite beverage, put your feet up and strap in. This is just the beginning!

 

In 2019 I first went to Mongolia with a small group of like minded adventurous types for a three week motorcycle expedition. I was so bewitched by the astounding beauty of the country, it’s people and the culture that I vowed to return and this time bring Sally with me. Sally had seen National Geographic documentaries about a mysterious tribe of reindeer herders somewhere in the country and became somewhat fascinated with their culture. After an exhaustive on line search she eventually found a woman called Zaya who had married into the tribe. Zaya’s story on it’s own is worthy of a book but to summarise, she was born in Ulaanbaator (here in after referred to as UB) to parents with professional qualifications who moved to the USA when she was quite young so she speaks excellent English. She then won a scholarship to the Shanghai University where she gained a masters in International Relations so she also speaks fluent Mandarin. She then returned to Mongolia to work for an NGO doing work with nomads. There she met and fell in love with Olsen who happens to be a member of the Tsaatan tribe. After they were married and Zaya moved into the nomadic lifestyle she realised that this way of life was totally unique and needed to be protected. She understands that their way of life is under threat of disappearing for ever if for instance, too many tourists turn up and corrupt the place with their western ideas. To counter this she lobbies hard to regulate the numbers of people who visit though ultimately she is powerless to halt the onslaught of “progress” . Her only real tool is to carefully vet small numbers of guests whom she invites into the village each year in the hope that they will showcase this incredible place to the world without inviting the hordes. Sally, after five years of research and planning, many many emails and phone calls and a number of false starts, finally managed to pull the whole trip together and on June 3rd, we flew out for the most unique and inspiring thing we have ever experienced.

 

Joining us on this trip is our very good mate Bernie Brady, master saddle maker and expert horseman but more on that later. On landing at the airport we are greeted by Mollum, a former wrestler, whom Sally has organized to be our driver in and around UB. Mollum is a quiet and gentlemanly individual, shaped something like a cross between a bear and a beer barrel who speaks very little English but has a wonderful singing voice. As we later discover he does know at least one common Aussie slang term and it’s proper use and context when another driver cuts him off in traffic and he shouts “F@*K” out of the window. As well as Mollum we have Yuna, our English speaking guide who takes us around the many cultural sights of UB including galleries, museums, monuments, a National Park, the giant Chinggis Khan statue and a fabulous show of traditional Mongolian song and dance held each night in a Ger shaped concert hall in the city. (Ger is the Mongolian word for what many people call a Yurt [Russian], the traditional round tent of the nomads) The entertainment has us spellbound and includes much dancing, throat singing, the playing of traditional instruments and a display of superb acrobatics. The throat singer can produce at least two notes simultaneously using nothing more than his voice, the flute player can hold a single note for two minutes and a contortionist acrobat stands on her hands on tall stilts while firing an arrow from a bow using only her feet, at a target about ten metres away. All mind bogglingly good!

 

As fascinating as all of this is, the real attraction for us is meeting the Tsaatan and especially Zaya whom we have communicated with so often that we think of her more as a friend than merely a contact. At UB airport we meet for the first time, the 4th member of our group, Ella an adventurous  22 year old from Brisbane. She, like us, has discovered Zaya online and managed to align her travels with ours. From UB we fly to the small regional town of Murun (Google Maps show it as Moron) where we finally meet Zaya, her husband Olsen, 5 year old son Temu (meaning to rise above in the local dialect) and 14 months daughter Namuun (meaning peaceful or placid). We also meet our driver Uuche (probably incorrect spelling but pronounced Oochay) and our cook Bayrma. This is slightly confusing as the word for thank you is bayrla and goodbye is bayrta.

After a hearty lunch at a local restaurant, Bernie, Ella and I pile into a 4X4 Russian UAZ mini van along with Bayrma and Uuche while Sally climbs into a Land Cruiser with Zaya and family and we set out into the Mongolian wilderness.

I have previously attempted to convey to the others just how horrible the roads are in rural Mongolia but soon they realize I was being generous in my description. The first 50km are bitumen and even this has us jolting violently from side to side and bouncing out of our seats. When we turn west and eventually north onto the dirt road, conditions take a severe downturn. Speed is limited to about 20kph and four wheel drive and even low range are engaged regularly as we lurch, bounce and scrabble our way over increasingly deteriorating surfaces.

A thing about Mongolia that is almost impossible for westerners to get their heads around is the almost total lack of private ownership of land outside of designated towns. The landscape is vast, epic and almost totally empty! Any superlative I come up with simply cannot convey to you just how mind warpingly beautiful it is. I guess you will just have to go there and find out for yourself.

In the towns the government encourages all adult residents to apply for a free grant of about .75 hectares (approx 2 acres) of land. If successful the applicant then must fence the land and a dwelling may then be constructed at their leisure. No private farm land on the other hand means no fences. You can literally walk, drive or ride anywhere you want and no one will bat an eyelid. This means of course if the road you are on is too rough you can simply make a new path where ever you please. This naturally leads to multiple tracks around more challenging sections like creek crossings, swamps, steep hills and other obstacles. Some bogs have twenty or more sets of wheel ruts though them.

After five or six hours of this torture test for both man/woman and machine we arrive in the tiny village of Ulaan Uul (Google Maps Tugul) where we spend the night in a guesthouse with just the most basic of amenities, ie. a bed and a squat toilet. The following morning Zaya announces a slight change to the schedule. There is a mini Nadaam festival in the village in preparation for the  main annual festival  and we are invited to watch. Nadaam is the annual celebration of Mongolian culture featuring the three war like skills of wrestling, archery and horse racing. The actual festival is held in early July, this is just a practice for the main event which sees many people travel long distances to compete.

We elect to take in the horse racing as it is held some ten kilometres north of the town which is on our way. By the way, Mongolia is the only country in the world with more horses than people. Three point six million people, five million horses. Mongolian horse races can vary in length from about two kilometres to over thirty depending on maturity of the horse. Mongolian horses are traditionally much smaller than western breeds and there is now a strict height limit imposed on all competing horses. The jockeys are typically boys aged ten to fifteen years and many of them still ride bareback. The races are held point to point, not on a closed circuit as you may be used to seeing, so the starting line will be miles away from the finish and the course just follows the lie of the land across this vast open steppe. The spectacle is further enhanced by the fact that the trainers ride along side the racers on motorbikes shouting instructions and encouragements to their riders and all the while the jockeys are bellowing “Chooooo! Chooooo!” at the usually enthusiastic steeds. Sometimes a horse will tire of all this action and veer uncontrollably for a shady tree much to the disgust of the trainer and the amusement of the cheering crowd. The wild cheering of onlookers is genuine and heart felt as the winner crosses the finish line which incidentally is little more than a line of dry animal dung collected from the surrounding area.

 

After all this excitement Zaya suggests we should visit a nomad family. There is a lonely ger a couple of kilometres away across the wild open steppe.

Zaya has never met these people and they are unaware of our approach yet they cheerfully invite us in for yak milk tea and fresh baked bread with yak butter and yoghurt, all homemade of course. This hospitality is a feature of nomad culture. Any traveller can turn up at any nomad’s ger and will be assured of food, drink and even a place to sleep without expectation of payment. It goes way beyond any sense of obligation or expectation, it is just the way it is out here. It is almost lunch time so we volunteer some fresh vegetables and meat from the supplies we are carrying. The ger’s residents, a thirty something woman and her three children reluctantly accept the gift and immediately set about preparing a hearty soup with Bayrma’s help while the rest of us play football outside with the kids.

Eventually, after several more agonizing hours over deteriorating roads we make it to the town of Tsaagan Nuur or White Lake (Google Maps Gurvansaikan) which is the home town of both Bayrma and Uuche. The town is in a stunning location next a beautiful lake which does actually look white from some angles even when it is not frozen.

After a night as guests of Bayrma in her guest gers where she dresses us in traditional costume for some photo opportunities we once again cram into our van and Land Cruiser for the final push by “road”. But we are now entering a restricted area and there is a border office on the edge of town where we collect our passes that have been arranged by Zaya. Another hour or so of intense four wheel driving and we emerge into a wide flat valley intersected by a beautiful stream and surrounded by snow capped peaks. We are at about 1800 metres altitude here, the air is crisp and the sun has that sting that only a perfectly clear atmosphere can deliver. It may only be about 25 degrees but it feels much warmer. And it is here we catch the first glimpse of what we have travelled all this way to see, for across the creek, grazing contentedly on the wild meadow we see reindeer, our reindeer!!

 

To be continued……