The adventure of the Orkhon Valley on the horseback

Following day at about 9 a.m, your tour guide and driver will pick you up and start the Orkhon Valley journey along 290 km of road trip from Ulaanbaatar to Kharkhorum. The drive takes between 4 and 5 hours. 

The Elsen Tasarhai sand dune,mini desert, rises during the journey, is an 80 km long dune plateau and offers a delightful view of the Mongolian Gobi from the Bactrian camel. Bet, you never rode a Bactrian camel, riding a Bactrian camel is much more comfortable than the camel in Sahara, India or anywhere else. Its two humps support you from both sides, and the leisurely pace is quite soothing.

The journey will furtherly carry on to the ancient capital of Great Mongol Empire, Kharkhorum, founded by Genghis Khan in 1220, where you visit its picturesque monastery called Erdene Zuu built in the 16th century, containing remarkable development and fast expansion of Mongolian Buddhism. The city, Kharkhorum, was one of the most crowded and important gathering points along the Silk Road, an ancient trade route. Have lunch in a local restaurant and take a short break in the ancient city where you will have many different photo shooting sights. 

The guides for horse trekking will greet you by setting up a camp on the river named Khujir close to Kharkhorum from where our ride will start.  Dinner and Overnight near an ancient capital of the Mongol Empire. 

Every morning is special and feels like the breezy and peaceful atmosphere of Mongolian plateau. Then, our final destination heads to a camp called Buurug on horseback and exciting adventures will be 90 km on horseback through scattered basalt rocks, vast grassland plain, meandered rivers. Steep drives will direct to Buurug camp and pass through nomad families, yurts, livestocks along the route. You certainly experience the adventures like passing through swamp, racing with horses and feeling wind on the horseback. 

The route will bring us to Herder’s family where we find specific features of culture and lifestyle of nomads, Central Mongolia. Eventually, we will retreat to the herder’s family near Tuvkhun monastery for overnight and dinner. For the best experience about nomadic people and their horse culture, plan on spending 2 nights at Nomad’s family.

Mongolian livestock eat 80 species of plants. 30 of the plants are medicinal plants. Therefore, they use most traditional dishes to relieve tiredness. For dinner, Mongolian cuisine is to serve visitors by the Khorkhog, meat grilled on a very hot stone or Tolgoi shiir, boiled head and leg of goat and sheep.

Orkhon Valley trip

Today, we will cross the River Orkhon to Tuvkhun temple.

In the morning, a around 5 km trip up to Mountain top for Tuvkhun monastery, as a borderline between the Arkhangai and Uvurkhangai provinces. The region is well-known for its rich history and historical remnants containing the Mongolian Buddhism during its rush hour. Here you can see an interesting listen to monks chanting Buddhist sutras.

Once retraced from the temple, knuckle bone with a gun and Khalkha archery, one of the national archery sports, are available to test your skill and strength which requires a sense of open space, thumb strength, and special technique. Especially, usually the person who is more into hunting is considered as highly skilled and could be more competent.

Today is a wonderful but quite busy day. Horse milk is a traditional beverage, well-known in central Mongolia, because it is a little more familiar than other regions. Every two hours, the herder milks a mare before  needing to confine the foals. When you visit any region, nomads usually use a lasso to catch foals. It is considered one of the most interesting and rival activities even if you can personally participate in this.  

Local horse festival

Mongolians have a history of domesticating wild horses a thousand years ago, has not been ridden before, and is considered a tricky thing because it requires highly developed skills and bulk experience. Also, Mongolian horses have a reputation for having remarkable power, endurance, and stamina if going back thousands of years, they are considered relatively short, though. Both mare and stallion also have an array of advantages. The stallions are responsible for long treks and horse racing, while producing dairy products from mares. Throughout all four seasons, both humans and animals need to build up a strong immune system, strength, and bulk stamina. Mongolians believe that consuming more horse meat during the cold months ramps up their strength and immune systems.

It is also an inspiring moment to see how the horses are prepared to be ridden. 

Local horse festival – Agenda. 

• Catch Uurag which is a long, narrow, twisted tree used to catch a horse, from horse.
• Mitigation of unhandled horse
• Catching free horse with a lasso and Uurag from the horseback

Lunchtime – Short break

After lunch, competition between fellow tourists and locals to make a mixed team. Hundred percent sure, fun and best activity to add knowledge of Mongolian horse culture, practices. 

Following included:

• To catch horse with a lasso and Uurag
• Make and tie headstall
• Traditional fun games like below

If a danger occurs to livestock in pasture, horses should be ready to evacuate the livestock. Including taking off hobbles, bridling, and saddling should be fast. Let’s try by yourself and who is the best one. 

• Horse racing in short run
• Dinner time – Free time – is your own

After a short rest, you would experience cattle entrepreneurship. You and the local herders could cooperate, for instance, herd cattle off the mountaintop once sundown. Overnight in the yurt of a nomadic camp. 

After breakfast, we will load our packages on horseback and mount them to be prepared for a trip. On horseback, ride to the Redfall, which is over 20 meters high and about 50 kilometers away. Along the trip, we will pass through interverse basaltic rocks, beautiful wild nature, and grassland, which obviously inspires you. Also, there are available shooting spots right under the Redfall with pine trees.

Lunch time with short break

Horse trip will keep going forward and set a camp in the foothills of the Khangay mountain range, one of the top five highest mountain ranges, with dinner. 

From here, our ride is moving forward to Eight lake with exclusive natural formation. A car trip is impossible for the destination due to the surrounding pine forest and natural formation of rock cliffs. During the trip, you will experience wild nature, livestocks, yak, goat, horse, sheep, and wild animals. Also, the landscape today would vary—from wide open steppes to rolling hills, and all the way to the rising Khangai Mountain range, Mongolia’s second largest mountain range.

Overnight at the shore of Lake Khuis. 

Today we pass through the Eight Lakes Protected Area, which is 2500 meters above sea level. We stroll by numerous small lakes on the way and arrive to Shireet Lake in the afternoon, which is arguably the most beautiful of all the lakes in this natural reserve. We continue our ride into the southern half of the nature reserve after a picnic lunch on the lake’s banks. We take a break near the gorgeous Galuut and Shana Lakes before returning to our camp near Huis Lake for our final night of camping.

Downhill to the Khangay mountain and depart to hill called Khyatryun. The rest of the day is at your leisure.

Overnight near to the hill, Biluut. B, L, D

We’ll be trekking to Biluut valley on the horseback. There is a small waterfall called Uurtiin Tokhoy along the way. In the evening, drivers will be waiting for us and we’ll join them. It is the last day with horse trip guides and we thank them with a little party.  Overnight B, L, D

We’ll drive back to Ulaanbaatar about 400 km away. Night at hotel downtown.