19^th August, Altai – Ulaanbaatar

Of course it was never going to be that easy.  Within a hundred kilometres the miserable Hyundai diesel engine had given up.  We all got out and bump started it, fully loaded, up a hill, twice, before stopping at a roadside village.  They started dismantling the engine and tinkering but they had no idea.  When it became clear we were not moving on, we camped up for the night.

I was quite angry in the morning.  I could see nothing but trouble dealing with these people and would have preferred to have dumped the car at Altai.  I was getting quite ill and could not concentrate or get comfortable.  Jonno tried to talk with them but I could not see the point.  When a minibus for Ulaanbaatar arrived I jumped on with my bag.  Jonno soon followed having got the phone number of one of the driver’s brothers.

We were now a day behind and would not arrive until the night of the 20th August.  As we drove I got more ill, having windy gut pain and the obvious associated symptoms.  I could hardly keep myself upright which I needed to as there was a person in every seat.  It was doubly painful as I could neither sleep nor stay properly conscious.

However, we travelled on right through the night, the driver sleeping for about half an hour in his seat and the minibus pulled only slighly off the road.  By the following afternoon I was over the worst and began making an effort to take in the view and observe my fellow passengers.  The Mongolians seemed to have a curious attitude to the landscape.  Throwing rubbish out of windows was perfectly acceptable being the ‘Mongolian national rubbish bin’.  I have read that the steppe is suffering desertification, that grass and other life is diminishing.  Whether or not this is true, the barrenness and harshness of the place was not only awe-inspiring, it gave me vertigo.  I was so desperate to look down on the land, so overwhelmed by sickness and by the wide valleys and surrounding mountains, I felt I was in perpetual freefall and there was nothing to hold onto.

We arrived at our destination quite late.  It had been a challenging trial but now we were through it.  All I wanted was a wash and a bed.  We still had to arrange the delivery of the car and it was ‘The Rally Party’ the following night.  As we got off the bus, we emerged into an alien environment.  Where there had been nothing but mercilessly open plain and distant mountains, we were now in what appeared to be a low budget Tokyo.  Above us, hanging from several storey buildings, electric bill boards flickered while a circus of broken cars flew past.

A very attractive young lady pulled at my arm.  I was unsure of what it was all about and really more than anything I wanted a shower and a bed in a western hostel.  We finally deciphered she was Cheq’s sister and that she and her friend had come to pick us up.  We got into her friend’s car.  The driver was just a little cool.  He wore a red felt pork pie hat and smoked cigarettes.  It was amazing how the car was holding together.  It seemed as if everything was being held on by hundreds of patch up jobs.  He raced through the busy streets and then darted up a muddy track, fences bordered us on each side.   As we came into what must have been a main junction we circled a huge pile of rubbish and accelerated off up the opposite bank.

We stood for a moment beside a rough plank and pole fence that enclosed the suburban plot which was to be our home for the evening, thanked and shook hands with the driver and went in to be introduced to the family. Cheq’s family house was not used in the summer, instead they lived in a ghur pitched in their yard.   In addition to Cheq’s mother and father were his auntie and niece.  Cheq’s father was a marvellous character.  He had been a soldier in the Soviet days and had fought in Afghanistan.  He was very proud to have fought for the Russians.  His mother was quite stern and a little intimidating although she didn’t try to communicate much.

We looked at some photos and had some food before getting some much needed rest.  During the night it began to rain quite heavily, it came through the canvas and soaked through the felt and we got wet.  We moved the mattress and carried on sleeping.

When we woke we had some breakfast and relaxed for a while.  Before we left we had a little photo shoot.  Jonno dressed in a white fox fur hat.  It was beautiful – shot in winter when hunting must require remarkable endurance and skill.

We got a taxi downtown and had intended to have our photographs developed there and then so we could give copies to Cheq’s sister to take back to the family.  Having already lost my camera in Kazakhstan we were resting all hopes on Jonno’s camera, whose screen had been faulty since the beginning of our trip.  Our disappointment, particularly Jonno’s, was complete when we came to see not only our photographs of the day were ruined but also our record of the crystal clear waters of the Kyrghiz lake and

the numerous stops with local families or repairs.  All were a poor likeness of Rothko’s abstract modes of colour.

It was a little difficult leaving Cheq’s sister as she was obviously upset that she would have no record of our meeting.  The illusion of our western superiority and efficiency was shattered.

After a short and silent walk we arrived at Sükhbaatar

Square, Mongolia’s answer to Trafalgar Square.  It was a little odd, with a huge, level, open space – one could imagine a bitter wind blowing across it much of the year – surrounded by a ring road and a series of dwarfing classically inspired Soviet buildings.  At the head stands the Mongolian Government Building and in the centre of its strange arrangement of pillars and glass sits a massive monument of Genghis Khan, Temüjin, The Great Khan of the Golden Horde.  Cast in cold, immovable, blackened brass he sat legs wide in an immortal and defiant pose.  Not too dissimilar, if a little friendlier, than the identical likenesses of our good old Queen Victoria dotted around Britain’s city centres.  Perhaps better loved, Genghis’ image is not covered in pigeon poo.

Genghis is undoubtedly Mongolia’s most famous son.  He was born to a relatively minor ruling family who belonged to a clan of herdsmen.  From the steppe, through coalition and conquest, he built the largest land empire the world had seen.  With the unprecedented speed, skill and tactics of

his army, The Golden Horde grew to span from the

Caspian Sea through to the Pacific, encompassing large parts of modern day Russia and China, and all within just twenty one years.

Mongolia has now fallen on humbler times, sandwiched between its two great neighbours, China and Russia.  The Mongolian people seem to ally themselves strongly with Russia yet their identity as ‘Mongolians’ is inarguable.  You may remember Cheq describing everything as “Mongolian national” this or “Mongolian national” that and Genghis is often used as the figurehead for this peculiar nationalism.  His face can be found on benign and symbolic objects alike; on key rings, on vodka bottles and on bank notes.  I was surprised to find his image used in such an objectified fashion not just for the tourists but also for the Mongolian people.

To the right of Genghis was another bizarre pillared structure.  This was The Mongolian National Centre for Theatre, host to Dave’s Bar.  Dave’s Bar was our finish line, a home away from home, offering fish and chips, German beer and fresh conversation with other teams.  Dave’s Bar was tucked around the side of the building on the plinth, nestled behind a row of gigantic pillars.  A number of Rally cars were parked outside in various stages of ruin.  We climbed up to the plinth, passing a near immaculate mini with a union jack painted on the roof – we had arrived.  We forgot about our lost car and enjoyed our first proper knees up in nearly a month.  Finally, we had completed the challenge that we had committed ourselves to months before.

Cool, hoppy, ‘Khan Beers’ were ordered from the bar, a small wooden shed which lent the terrace the exotic spacey feel of a beach bar.  Among the throng of excited ralliers we soon bumped into ‘Team Sussex Best’.  They were a quirky pair, Andrew and James.  James was hilarious.  He talked about a wonderful variety of nonsense and all at a hundred miles an hour.  Andrew was also a good guy.  Fortunately a little more reserved but clever and on top of it.

Andrew had driven into a river at full speed, letting water into the engine, causing the con-rods to bend and the engine to seize.  They had spent a week repairing the ruined engine, living in with a retired mechanic who lent them his garage and organised spare parts to be flown in from Ulaanbaatar.  It was incredible that they had managed to fix such terrible damage.  They had problems further down the road when tyres kept rupturing and they drove on their rims for miles.  Dave, the owner of the bar, bought the totally destroyed  wheels to use as plant pots and as far as I know they are still in use, sat proudly in front of the pumps.

We then went over to check in at the hostel, ‘Nassan’s’.

Nassan was so nice that Jonno and I competed with each other to be the most polite to her.  It was great to be settled again and to have a shower.  Now we just had to get comfortable and wait for our car to arrive.

We got chatting to a guy called Pat.  He was from the Grand Canyon region in the US where he taught rafting.  Pat had bought a Russian motorbike to travel around the country.  It was impossible to buy a decent second-hand motorbike in Mongolia as they all get sold to family members and a stranger would never be offered one.  So Pat had been forced to buy a brand new bike.  It also seemed impossible to buy a decent new bike, the Russians only shipping the broken and defective models to Mongolia.

While testing the bike out, Pat found that when the cylinder heated up the piston jammed.  He rectified this by sanding the piston down by hand.  He was in for an interesting ride. I was quite envious and would love to have been doing it, after a rest of course.

We took Pat along to the party.  It was disappointing how few people had arrived in time.  The long route across the centre of Mongolia was very demanding on the cars and many teams who had arrived were having their cars delivered on lorries.  It was great to see Rupert and Jim.  They had struggled through intact but ‘Moon Unit Alpha’ had been pranged by one of the Transsyberian Rally drivers who must not have seen their car for the dust.  However, the driver and co-driver must have felt the crunch and yet they did not stop to check the damage.

We also got to see Herwig and Jacob again and meet Jacob’s girlfriend.  She had flown from Austria to meet them and have her own Mongolian adventure but was a little delicate and found the rough cuisine quite challenging.  Herwig and Jacob had had a difficult time trying to take the northern route through the most mountainous, dangerous and, in fact, plague-ridden part of Mongolia.

En route they were navigating across a river and had become stuck mid-course.  Herwig had to get underwater with a jack and put rocks under the wheels before a couple of horses pulled them out.  Following this ordeal they discovered that their cylinder head gasket had broken during the struggle.  They proudly told us that they had managed to replace the broken gasket with a spare and rebuild the engine again in under an hour.

The party was marvellous.  Almost everyone had got suited up in dinner jackets and black ties, and it was great to see everyone having a good time, relaxing and talking about their adventures.  Jonno snuck in a bottle of Genghis Khan’s finest quality vodka and we got drunk on the cheap.

Rising/Falling – Always Hoping -can be bought online at Amazon.co.uk, - ordered by your local bookshop for just £8.74 (the price the team’s car was auctioned for at the end of the rally) Just note the ISBN:0956196608 - or bought direct from the suppliers @ £10.99 (£8.74 plus £2.25 p&p) Address Cheques to Craig Chamberlain, Glovers Cottage, Lazonby, Penrith, CA10 1AJ