Your Mongolian Horse Treks. Tell me about them.
October 20, 2015 10:30 AM   Subscribe

We came across this trek on national geographic. We are very interested in doing something similar (the natgeo trip seems expensive) but have no idea of how to start planning or what to expect. Mefites that have vacationed in Mongolia and gone on these treks, please give me your recommendations!

We're interested in going on a extended Mongolian Horse trek next year to see Mongolia - i'm thinking we'll have something like seven days to make the trip as we have limited vacation days and will likely spend another week in Beijing first. The natgeo expedition seems a little expensive for us.

-Is it even possible to do a meaningful trek in that amount of time?
-We enjoy camping, so yurt stays are welcome.
- How hard is this on moderately fit novice horse riders? (In that we've both ridden horses a few times and did some posting in those few times - but it's been years)
- Would love to hear your stories and recommendations, best times of year to go (hearing July is the best for the festival), specific trekking companies you booked through, itineraries, must sees, and any other thoughts!
posted by Karaage to Travel & Transportation around Mongolia (8 answers total) 10 users marked this as a favorite
 
I would look at a few more reasonably priced tours to study their detailed itineraries for exactly what is possible in what amount of time. I think OAT is one agency that does a well paced (not super rushed) and comprehensive job wherever they go for a fair price. And their itineraries online are very detailed.
You can do some further research on Trip Advisor and other forums to find out what local tour agencies they subcontract out to- I noticed a lot of people who wanted to do shorter or slightly cheaper trips have done this.
posted by TenaciousB at 10:56 AM on October 20, 2015


Re the riding, I would prep by doing as much riding as possible beforehand. Otherwise, that's quite a few hours in the saddle, using some muscles that don't get much of a workout normally, and you will be very sore.
posted by OolooKitty at 1:05 PM on October 20, 2015


You might find out what outfitter NatGeo uses for the riding portion of the trip and book with them separately.

Also regarding the riding: I went to a dude ranch for 5 days during fall roundup one year (which meant about 8 hours a day in the saddle). I rode horses extensively as a kid, but had not for like 15-20 years. I did a fair amount of muscle conditioning before hand.

While all my riding skills came right back, the parts of me that contacted the saddle were in AGONY the entire time. Not so much my muscles, which adapted and I could train a bit beforehand, but the bones and ladyparts and posterior unpadded areas (bottom of hip bones, butt bones, whatever you call them). I mean like SO bruised. I was wearing special riding underpants with a gel seat, under jeans with padding, with a special memory foam seat cover on the saddle, and I was still sore. Very sore. (It was still fun but next time I would seriously sit on a pillow the whole time).

Granted, those were western saddles, which are hard as a rock. Not sure what Mongolian saddles are like. If this is a romantic trip though, bear in mind that this much riding could interfere with your enjoyment of certain activities.
posted by bluesky78987 at 3:00 PM on October 20, 2015 [1 favorite]


A word of caution about a woman's recent experience with one of the trek companies.
posted by judith at 4:40 PM on October 20, 2015


Mongolia is wonderful-- one of the best trips of my life and I'm definitely going back. This summer I did a two week hiking trek in Mongolia with a group of friends. We worked with a smaller local company based on the recommendation of a hiking friend who had used them for. We put it together as a custom trip and were able to make it really cost effective by agreeing that we didn't need a luxury tour (we had camel and horse support, but we put up our own tents). I'm biased, because I don't love Beijing, but if I were you I would try to maximise the time in Mongolia.

Our company was Nomadic Adventures and we had a great experience with them for trekking. The owner is really flexible, so it may be that if you contact them directly and explain what you want to do then he can suggest an itinerary. (Their web site is not very exciting, I fear.) Otherwise, you can probably work with some of the big companies for Mongolia-- in the end, they'll refer you to a local guide, but they generally do the vetting on the company for you (which is what you pay for).

7 days is a little short simply because Mongolian infrastructure isn't good. We were trekking in the Northwest of the country in the Altai mountains, and it took a full day travel just to get to the starting camp. I would definitely go in the summer. You may be a bit warm, but maybe not. (We had snow. In July.) I was also there for Naadam this year in UB. Everyone warned us that it was better to see Naadam in a smaller town and I wish I had listened. It was interesting, but too big to see much and I understood very little.

Feel free to memail me if I can provide more information.
posted by frumiousb at 7:29 PM on October 20, 2015 [2 favorites]


(I don't know how Nomadic Adventures is for Horse Trekking, but I have colleagues who do a horse trek every year in Mongolia, so when I'm back to work on Thursday I will ask them for the names of their companies.)
posted by frumiousb at 7:31 PM on October 20, 2015


Contact a few of the outfitters in the capital and let them know what you're interested in. They can develop custom itineraries for you. Unless you start really close to the capital, you will typically require a day or so to get packed and driven to your starting point (or more, if you go further afield). Also a day drive for the return trip. That means that you'll have five days of horse riding, if you don't schedule any time in the capital. (It's worth seeing a few things in the capital - Gandan Monastery and the History Museum, for example.)

You can ask to do ger-stays with local families (the word in Mongolian for yurt is ger). The company may also have a ger camp on your route that you can stay in one or more nights.

As others have noted, you will be very sore after even just the first day of riding, unless you already ride regularly. Traditional Mongolian saddles are wooden, but you will be offered leather Russian-style ones. Remember that you will be squatting to go to the bathroom, and if your thighs become very sore from riding, this can become a difficult exercise.

Summer and autumn have the nicest weather, though getting more specific than that would require knowing a bit more about where exactly in the country you were interested in going. In July the country is deluged by tourists and accommodations/flights/drivers are heavily booked, so unless you have a strong interest in Naadam, you may want to avoid that. Smaller countryside Naadams occur earlier than the national one, but often their exact dates are up in the air until shortly before they happen.
posted by scrambles at 8:31 AM on October 21, 2015 [1 favorite]


judith - that's a terrible story for that poor traveler. And a most unprofessional response from the outfitter. Thank you for sharing this, the story contains good advice about being careful, not only in Mongolia but anywhere as a solo traveler.
posted by seawallrunner at 12:54 AM on October 22, 2015


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