Day 5 Ride to Reindeer people

Day 5 started off early as we had to have all bags ready for loading up on the pack horses. Our trek today was the to the reindeer people in one of the most isolated areas of Northern Mongolia. During the night, one of the horses wandered off, so a wrangler had to go and chase him down. This delayed the departure, and we got away around 9am. We rode across a wide open plan before heading up a hill and into some low lying shrubs and fir trees. Our first stop was over the top of the hill alongside a running stream. Dismounting from our trusty steeds we grabbed a drink and had a comfort break. We had just covered 8 kms and according to a wrangler the whole trip was around 50km. It was shaping up to be our longest ride to date, so we were eager to get on our way to make it by dark. 

Our first leg was about five kilometres We stopped for lunch around the 12 kilometre mark, on the side of a hill overlooking a beautiful little stream. We saw two more groups of horse riders, going in opposite directions. These groups were a lot smaller than ours.  After lunch we set off on our way and it was going to be all uphill for quite some time. The riding was pretty hard going, but these horses handled it with no problem at all. 


We will be up at the reindeer people's Camp for two nights, and because there was no vehicle access, it was imperative that we packed only the essentials. We also had to take our kitchen and food supplies with us. All up we had at least 30 white horses Which is a spectacular site Going up the side of the hill. There were some black patches On the side of the hills in front Which we were told was Sky that it didn't look like it Even as we got close I doubted it was snow But it wasn't until we stopped right next to a big patch of snow I realised it actually was. It was then on for young and old, with snowballs flying left right and centre and dogs rolling around in the snow There's also a massive area of wild flowers We were mounting up just as another group came up behind us. As we arrived at the crest of the hill, we stopped for another photo opportunity


Here we dismounted and walked the horses down the hill. The camp of the reindeer people now in sight. The Raindeer people live in teepee's very similar to the American Indian and our accommodation is one of these teepees


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