The eagle flies alone

When I travel alone, I truly try to plan, organize and execute those plans in a way that I am able to do them all by myself, as much as the circumstances allow me. Not needing any external assistance makes the experiences so much more enjoyable, and as I am doing it more and more often, it becomes better and better each time.

When I do end up booking a tour towards a certain POI, it means it is only done in such manner because renting a guide has a certain advantage which I lack, for example:

• I cannot drive a boat
• Covering large amounts of activities in one day & for a good price is much more efficient
• The guide needs to carry a high caliber rifle in order to keep me alive

This was one of those days – filled with activities and distances between them so I booked a guided tour. Due to the fact that I chose the tour during the shoulder season, there were no other passengers, and I ended up having a private tour for a very decent price to some of the most popular places of interest in the entire country. The guide was adamant in sharing his knowledge and was a great conversationalist, so we ended up discussing mongolian history and culture in high detail throughout the day.

Winter palace / Bogd Khan

The first stop was the Winter palace – Bogd Khan in UB, located on the south side of the city. Unfortunately, it was suddenly closed and therefore inaccessible for me, but the outside was really pretty. The building, a museum nowadays – one of the richest museums in Ulaanbaatar, served as an imperial residence for the Bogd Khan ruler.

Zaisan hill / Zaisan memorial place

An epic stop on the southside of UB is Zaisan memorial place, made to display and preserve the memory of Soviet-Mongolian friendship.

If you ever saw any Soviet monument, you know how large and epic they look and are made. Maybe it is something which is deeply ingrained in my ex-Yu DNA and maybe just I keep recognizing the childhood scraps in places I am discovering far from home, but I love the socialist realism style and how the art was used to convey political post-WW2 and victory related messages in the Eastern bloc.

This one is a mural which displays soviet support for mongolian independence, victory over the Nazis, and having mr Jugderdemidiin Gurragchaa as a part of the Soyuz space program.

It is located in an extraordinary place in the city of Ulaanbaatar, on the southside and on an elevated place. Walking to it gives you, besides a glimpse into Mongolian history, a stunning view of the city and an opportunity to see how huge it actually is and from a very good angle.

Genghis Khan statue

The world’s tallest equestrian statue is dedicated to a very prominent historical figure – Genghis Khan / Temujin / Chinggis Khan / The Great Khan. I cannot imagine a better person for such a feat, due to the monstrous immensity of his impact and historical importance. In only 25 years of reign his army conquered more territory than the Holy Roman Empire in 400 years – Mongolia was stretched between the Caspian sea and the Pacific ocean. There are countless stories about Genghis Khan traditionally passed between generations and many of them have mythical proportions.

The statue which includes a museum is located approx 50 km from Ulaanbaatar and it stands in a clear vast steppe.

There are a stairway and an elevator in the “body” which bring you to a viewpoint of this entire area.

Genghis Khan museum

Underneath the Genghis Khan statue is a small museum, with condensed Mongolian culture and a tiny bit of its history. Packed with good vibes and a lot of Korean tourists.

This is mongolian alphabet aka Hudum Mongol bichig which is written/read downwards (compared to rightwards in latin alphabet) and looks beautiful. Most of Mongolians can write / read it, along with russian cyrillic alphabet which is omnipresent.

The instrument underneath is called morin khuur – horsehead fiddle. It is as traditional as anything can be – one legend about the origin of the morin khuur is that a shepherd named Namjil the Cuckoo (or Khuhuu Namjil) received the gift of a flying horse; he would mount it at night and fly to meet his beloved. A jealous woman had the horse’s wings cut off so that the horse fell from the air and died. The grieving shepherd made a horsehead fiddle from the now-wingless horse’s skin and tail hair and used it to play poignant songs about his horse.

The eagle

Aahhh… The eagle.

I have been chasing the idea of holding a bird of prey for a long time now. They are either entirely unavailable or previously booked plans had to be canceled.

Before landing in Mongolia, I did research where to find eagles which I can hold on my arm. I assume that the need for any further clarification on “why” is redundant and futile. I cannot imagine a more majestic creature and I have no words to describe how amazing this bird was.

I was told that near Genghis Khan’s statue are oftentimes eagle keepers and it is common to stop and take pictures with these animals, along with bactrian camels.

When I was on the top of the Great Khan’s statue, I spotted the eagles and went straight to the keepers to ask for them. The price is so ridiculously low that I did several rounds of photoshoots. The keeper really understood the assignment so I found on the phone and the SD card over hundred photos of me living my dream and making it come true.

Also, on every photo is the Great Khan in the background, for every poor soul / friend of a person who did the photoshoot to be sure that it was taken in Mongolia, and near such a special person.

The eagle is very large and heavy. To hold it, you need to wear a huge glove made of thick leather for more than obvious reasons. Its talons are so incredibly sharp and there is a tremendous strength behind them, and even a thought of them ending up in our skin and muscles sounds blood curdling.

After taking the bird, the owner says to “shake the bird” with an up-down-up movement in order for the bird to spread its wings wide and look even more majestic, if something like that is even possible. He ends up screaming for a few minutes “Shake! Shake! Shake the bird!” This ended up being a workout day as the bird is much heavier than I would assume, but the result is INCREDIBLE.

She felt comfortable to move along the arm, with the tendency to sit on my head, and for a moment I felt a slight discomfort. Still, she heard my thoughts “you are such a majestic godlike creature, let me survive so I can tell the others how incredible you are” <3 loudly and decided to sit still on my arm, flailing with her gorgeous powerful wings until the guy stopped taking photos.

I did some stuff in my life which could theoretically be described as, well, not exactly mainstream, but this is probably one of the top notch ultimate badasseries in my own multiverse.

Also, Mother Nature decided to reward my tenacity and determination to hold such a godlike creature with snow which started to fall out of nowhere, and which made the whole vibe even more elevated.

Cannot recommend this enough.

Turtle rock

The entire Gorkhi-Terelj national park has a lot of stony formations with interesting shapes along the roads but the Turtle rock is the most famous one. Apparently, the entire area is packed to the brim with the tourists in the warm season, so I was very happy, as always, to have such a place only for my selfish self.

I took a moment to enjoy this place and did a short walk around it, to see it from other angles.

And this is a typical shot of Terelj in late April. I was told that I came in the “wrong” season, and that in summer all this looks much better, but I disagree. Even though all this would be as green as anything could be, it would be wayyy to warm for my taste and I would not have the luxury of having such place only for myself.

Aryabal temple

Aryabal is a buddhist temple in Gorkhi-Terelj national park, not far from the Turtle stone. It is located on a mountain slope and the trail leading to it guides you through a meditation garden. The location is spectacular, Aryabal is surrounded with a stunning piece of nature.

Notice how the shape of the temple resembles an elephant.

Reaching the entrance includes 108 stops with a thoughtful phrase written on a board, whose purpose is to remind us of our lives’ fragility and the intention to live those lives with intentionality and purpose through our actions and their impact. I am as spiritual as a knife sharpener, but I truly enjoy visiting such places and seeing the angles of different religions on us, brittle humans, who are in desperate need to reach inner peace through an illusory connection with higher beings we created ourselves.

The temple is expectedly colorful on the inside. This explosion of beauty and strength of all of these colors which are dancing in this screaming visual chaos really is something to see.

On my way back I stumbled upon pine nut seeds which were as delicious as I remember them. Bought a large bag from a woman who was selling them by the road and it was such a special treat at that place.