The AFAR Guide to Mongolia

Kazakh people in the Bayan-Ulgii province of western Mongolia continue the ancient Central Asian tradition of falconry (training raptors to catch wild game). Using golden eagles, the Kazakhs capture such prey as rabbits, red foxes, and wolves in...

I wanted to go on a trip that was off the beaten path and so I picked Mongolia. I knew it was going to be quite an effort to get there so I wanted to make the most of it. I timed my trip to coincide with the Naadam Festival which is three day...

Every culture seems to have its own ways of making wishes and prayers. I’ve tossed many a coin into many a fountain and blown out many a candle on a cake. In Mongolia, the tradition revolves around the ovoo, a large stone cairn. Ovoos serve mainly...

With no roads in Western Mongolia, it's pretty easy to get lost. While participating in the Mongol Rally (driving from London to Mongolia), we were challenged in many ways. However in Mongolia our challenge was directions! With a map of the...

There aren't that many rivers in Mongolia but for some odd reason, every one of the handful of bridges we came across were crooked and in all the wrong directions. For some other odd reason, although every bridge was wide enough for us to drive...

Cross over the border from Western Siberia (Russia) into Mongolia and you will have entered one of the most scenic places in the world. The sky stretches out to infinity and the dirt path seems to lead on into nothingness. It's my perfect Zen...

After crossing Russia by train from Finland, we entered Mongolia, a country we had both always dreamed about. We were lucky enough to stay in several gers (yurts) and spent our time looking for folk music and learning as much as we could about the...