A Visit To The Countryside, Day 2: Deer Stones and Khuvsgul Lake

At seven am I woke up to a buzz. Nooooooo. It kept on buzzing. Nooooo. It's too early. It buzzed again. "Bashi!" I shouted. Please just turn that off. "Bashi!" It buzzed again. I wrapped my blanket around myself and walked to the other side of the ger. Tapping him on the shoulder, I shouted "Bashi!" His eyes opened, the alarm was turned off, and I crawled back into the refuge of my bed.

Forty minutes later Bashi is telling us that its late and he thinks we should wake up; breakfast is at eight. Okay, okay. I rolled out of bed, shoved my feet into boots, grabbed my bags of toiletries, and trudged out of the ger and toward the bathroom. Emerging into light, I immediately stop and gasp. The sky is breathtaking; clouds and early morning light merge together to form a beautiful effect of blue and yellow, dancing across the sky.

 

I make it to the bathroom and splash the cold water on my face. Oh no, I forgot a washcloth too. Our driver enters the bathroom too. Well I didn't wake up too late then, did I? "Ogloonii mend!" I chirp. Good morning! He replies likewise. I head back to the ger to see Ella emerging. Its almost eight now. We head to the central building for some breakfast.

"Were you cold last night?" Ella asks.

"A bit, but it wasn't too bad."

Ella agrees. Bashi didn't sleep as well as we did. "Somehow... my bed turned into a slide. And I kept on waking up at the bottom of my bed, moving to the top, then waking up at the bottom again." I had stared at his bed. It looked level to me. "And there were voices, just voices all night." Okay, I was skeptical.

"Looks like some sort of demon or spirit is haunting you," I joked. "Maybe you're a medium and they're trying to communicate with you."

"Okay, I think something was sitting right here," he had said, gesturing toward the bottom of his bed. "That made it into a slide."

Breakfast was bread, butter and eggs. We left wishing for more. Piling our stuff into the car, we prepared ourselves for the once more, bumpy journey ahead. The valley that we drove through on the unpaved road was beautiful: green in all directions, the sky still made up of swirling clouds. At one point the grass changed into a deeper blue-green and the ground flattened. It looked like we were driving across a sea. I tried to capture it in photos, but I don't think I did it any justice. As we reached the paved road, the ride grew far smoother, and I nodded off to sleep.

I awoke at our first side-of-the-road stop, near several horses and foals. Was it noon already? Stepping out, the air was fresh and cool. It was still a cold morning. We drove through small towns. Houses were made of stone with colored roofs, fences of wood and sheet metal. Metal gates were painted green. As we continued the landscape grew greener and greener. Trees appeared more often now, resembling the forests of North America. Meadows were dotted with wildflowers. "This almost reminds me of the U.S., in the West," I murmured. Ella nodded in assent.

 

At one valley, we stop. A stream ran through it and small flowers covered the ground. A hawk circled above us. How beautiful it must be, to live here. I could live here. 

We continued on, traversing valleys and gazing at the farm animals we pass by. Cows blocked the road more frequently now. A few honks and they moved out of the way, mooing while they did. "A yak!" I shouted. I'd never seen a yak before. They looked like small, furry cows. We crossed Mongolia's largest river, then entered a town called Hovsgol. Does this mean we're almost there? No, we're stopping to see the stone stellas first. 

"What are stone stellas?" I asked Ella.

"Uh, I don't know."

"Didn't you just speak to Tsetsrel?"

"Yeah, she doesn't know either."

We soon found out our driver also didn't know. After stopping at a ger and asking for directions, we successfully made our way to the stone stellas. Turns out they're a collection of centrical patterns made out of stones by people long, long ago. They marked places of burial, but also had other uses, and have only recently started to be studied. In the same area are deer stones, tall, flat stones with deer carvings on them. They were made by the same people who made the stone stellas. Many of these stones are faded from erosion and time, but a few still stand with clear deer designs carved on them.

We continued on; almost there, I remind myself. It was growing colder now, and it was getting late. We left the stone stellas half past five. As we got further north, yaks became common, replacing cows. They survive better in the winter. "They look like furry black dogs," Ella remarked, when we saw one herd of especially furry, all black yaks.

A little past seven, we finally made it to Khuvsgul Lake. This lake is the largest lake in Mongolia, one of the fourteen ancient lakes – its' over two million years old – and the main source of freshwater in Mongolia; the water is so pure that you can drink it unfiltered. It was cold and a breeze carried across the lake; we put on our warmer coats. Dinner was at eight, and oh were we hungry. Our only food that day had been our eggs-and-bread breakfast and a small portion of huurshuur for lunch.

We were taken to our room, part of the main building. There was no heating, but we had a fire, a tv, and a bathroom right next door. The bathroom didn't have hot water, but it had a toilet and a sink, and that's something. The room was large and cold.

We ate our dinner quickly, but both Bashi and I were unsatisfied. Still hungry, but too late, I bought ramen and decided I'd eat it as well. But wait, there was no boiling water. I waited for hot water to heat up via metal bucket above the fire. An hour or two later, I shrugged and decided it was hot enough. But wait, I didn't have a fork either. I walked toward the kitchen, with Ella's word for fork ready to go, but the kitchen was closed up. Back in my room, I ate my ramen with my fingers. Bashi laughed.

At 11 pm, Bashi and I realized the fire burned out. Oh no. "We need paper," Bashi said, and I look around desperately.

"Toilet paper?" I asked.

He shrugged. "We can try it." We tried, and failed. Then we tried again, and failed again.

Around the fourth or fifth try, I sighed. "It's burning out too quickly, before the wood can catch on fire." I looked outside the door, where our pile of firewood sat in a cardboard box. "Bashi, what if we..." He had already caught on and started ripping pieces of cardboard off of it. With cardboard in hand, we started the fire on our first try.

At midnight, I walked toward the bathroom, ready to wash my face, brush my teeth, then go to sleep. The door was jammed. I pulled and pushed, then shrugged. I was too tired for this. I looked at Ella, already asleep. Bashi tried also, then shrugged. I think he was too tired for this too. Wiping my face with a baby wipe, I changed into pajamas, then slipped into bed. My feet were cold and the fire wasn't warm enough, but I was exhausted and fell asleep effortlessly.