2011 Field Outings - Mongolian Countryside
Here's a 15 minute video summarizing our field experiences (mainly) during summer 2011. There's also a short section near the end in Ulaanbaatar...working in the core warehouse and driving back to the office from there. Some of the captions in this video are in Cyrillic...(boroo! (Rain) and the last one being "back to Ulaanbaatar"). I showed this film at our company Christmas party, and the staff really enjoyed it.
Some other highlights (or lowlights) that happened this past summer:
One evening, after dinner, on a 2-week field stint, I was getting ready to head to my tent and was brushing my teeth. I went to grab some bottled water out of one of the vehicles to drink/rinse my mouth out with. Typically on a trip, we drink entirely bottled water for obvious reasons, so they are just sitting in the back usually in large packages. This time there were only a few left loosely lying in the back of the vehicle. I grabbed one of the last bottles, walked over to my tent, finished brushing my teeth. Now time to rinse. Open the bottle....tilt it back, let the liquids flow into my mouth....and almost instantly my natural reaction was to spit out the liquid as I quickly realized I was not drinking water. Maybe I should have realized the cap wasn't sealed....anyway you might be thinking I had chugged some vodka or other hard alcohol by accident, but nope, this was worse. This was DIESEL fuel! Now I don't know if you've ever had the unique experience of diesel in your mouth, but let me assure you, it is not pleasant. Even if you're one of those weird types that sort of likes the smell of gasoline, this is never something you want in your mouth. I'm lucky I didn't swallow any of it, but I certainly spent the next 45 minutes brushing/sloshing/washing/spitting and scrubbing. I still couldn't get the taste out of my mouth that night, I think it worked its way into my skin, yuck! Somebody (Miranda) complained that night that I had diesel breath. Sorry about that, ya know, I just can't help but drink diesel before going to bed :)
One night later, the same exact thing happened to our cook. He, however, was the one that had been filling extra empty bottles up for additional fuel if needed. Never underestimate the importance of having a sharpie to label things with around!
A couple days after this, we were on a long hike and it was lunch time. It was a sunny day in the mid-80's, quite hot really with no cover (you're in central Mongolia, there's nothing anywhere)....and Miranda being her usual water-consuming addict self, had already drank one of her bottles of water. So we're sitting there, and she opens up her other bottle. As you can probably guess, it wasn't water....it wasn't diesel......it was home made Mongolian vodka from one of the local nomads! What a nasty little surprise....she quickly turned around for the day and went back to camp to get some of that real H2O.
Hmmm...other things that happened last summer....oh yeah! On one particular day in the field, we were headed to our next camp and had several hours of driving ahead of us. Usually, the Mongolian drivers are pretty good about keeping an eye out for the vehicle in front of them/vice versa. We even have a general rule that you should at least be able to see the dust trail of the vehicle in front of you (it is quite easy to get separated when you have a troop of 3-6 vehicles, especially if you aren't driving on roads). Well, things don't always work out like they should, and drivers have different styles and speeds they like to drive. Our lead driver was more of a pedal to the metal type of guy. He doesn't always make sure he can see the vehicle behind him either. So our front vehicle leading the pack got so far ahead of us that we became separated. We pulled off the road for a good 20 minutes waiting to see if they would turn around to look for us, with no luck. We were probably less than an hour from our planned general location for the next camp, so I made the decision to lead the rest of the vehicles to that location, in hopes that our lost vehicle would be waiting for us there. An hour later we get there, with no sign of the other vehicle. We are at a high point though, and can see quite a ways. Even looking down on the vast flat peneplain below us, we were looking for a needle in a haystack. Sometimes a faint dust trail could be seen (normally dust trails can linger for minutes, and be ~100' high and 1/2 mile long), but it was almost too small to see with the eye because it was probably 20+ miles away from us. Is that them? Who knows....Crap crap crap! Atleast we have the food/water...This was really turning into a stressful situation for me, I had to figure out how to get us reunited. Don't we have CB radios? Nope. Satellite phones? Yep, but only one, which the other vehicle has. To this day, that has irritated the hell out of me. Each vehicle needs its own communication device!
With no luck finding our lost vehicle, it is time to drive towards a town that will have cell phone service. Too bad the nearest town is 2 hours away. And, to get to that town, a large river needs to be crossed that was on the verge of flooding last time we crossed it. There was a strong current with water near the hoods of the Land Rover Defenders we were driving in. I want to avoid that this time. So, looking on the map, the nearest town is maybe 3 hours away, 100 miles as the crow flies. Since we are not on any road, I have to put the coordinate of that town in, trust the GPS, all the while trying to utilize any roads that we may be able to take advantage of along the way. Navigating in the countryside in Mongolia is always tricky. A lot of times, you just have to pick a road (faint dirt path) and go with it until it starts leading you 180 degrees from the direction you want to go, then you go offroad until you find a new road. Anyway, about halfway to the new town, we luckily picked up a cellphone signal, called our headquarters in Ulaanbaatar, and got the coordinates of our missing vehicle, who happened to be waiting for us in the general area we had originally lost them in. Doh! 1.5 hours later and nearing sunset, we were reunited (9 hours after we were initially split up). We each had our stories and defenses, but I learned that each vehicle having its own communication device is essential!
A little sidenote to this story that makes it even more interesting: Apparently, when the lost vehicle called UB headquarters with the satellite phone it had (this was around the same time our group had contacted UB headqaurters as well)...their group was given our current coordinates (even though we were going to head back towards the lost vehicle). Maybe due to the phone signal or whatever reason, there was a miscommunication and the reported coordinate they were given for our group was something like N46.34544 W104.32333 when in actuality our coordinate was N47.34544 W 104.32333, which made it look like we were 100 miles south of where we actually were! Finally, once we reunited, they told us that had we not shown up within the next 10 minutes, they were going to go search for us (100 miles to the south....)! Haha....I think we need some protocol in place. Funny story though, glad it worked out.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the video. Make sure to click the button to the left of "vimeo" to make it full screen, or just click on vimeo to watch it straight from their website.
Some other highlights (or lowlights) that happened this past summer:
One evening, after dinner, on a 2-week field stint, I was getting ready to head to my tent and was brushing my teeth. I went to grab some bottled water out of one of the vehicles to drink/rinse my mouth out with. Typically on a trip, we drink entirely bottled water for obvious reasons, so they are just sitting in the back usually in large packages. This time there were only a few left loosely lying in the back of the vehicle. I grabbed one of the last bottles, walked over to my tent, finished brushing my teeth. Now time to rinse. Open the bottle....tilt it back, let the liquids flow into my mouth....and almost instantly my natural reaction was to spit out the liquid as I quickly realized I was not drinking water. Maybe I should have realized the cap wasn't sealed....anyway you might be thinking I had chugged some vodka or other hard alcohol by accident, but nope, this was worse. This was DIESEL fuel! Now I don't know if you've ever had the unique experience of diesel in your mouth, but let me assure you, it is not pleasant. Even if you're one of those weird types that sort of likes the smell of gasoline, this is never something you want in your mouth. I'm lucky I didn't swallow any of it, but I certainly spent the next 45 minutes brushing/sloshing/washing/spitting and scrubbing. I still couldn't get the taste out of my mouth that night, I think it worked its way into my skin, yuck! Somebody (Miranda) complained that night that I had diesel breath. Sorry about that, ya know, I just can't help but drink diesel before going to bed :)
One night later, the same exact thing happened to our cook. He, however, was the one that had been filling extra empty bottles up for additional fuel if needed. Never underestimate the importance of having a sharpie to label things with around!
A couple days after this, we were on a long hike and it was lunch time. It was a sunny day in the mid-80's, quite hot really with no cover (you're in central Mongolia, there's nothing anywhere)....and Miranda being her usual water-consuming addict self, had already drank one of her bottles of water. So we're sitting there, and she opens up her other bottle. As you can probably guess, it wasn't water....it wasn't diesel......it was home made Mongolian vodka from one of the local nomads! What a nasty little surprise....she quickly turned around for the day and went back to camp to get some of that real H2O.
Hmmm...other things that happened last summer....oh yeah! On one particular day in the field, we were headed to our next camp and had several hours of driving ahead of us. Usually, the Mongolian drivers are pretty good about keeping an eye out for the vehicle in front of them/vice versa. We even have a general rule that you should at least be able to see the dust trail of the vehicle in front of you (it is quite easy to get separated when you have a troop of 3-6 vehicles, especially if you aren't driving on roads). Well, things don't always work out like they should, and drivers have different styles and speeds they like to drive. Our lead driver was more of a pedal to the metal type of guy. He doesn't always make sure he can see the vehicle behind him either. So our front vehicle leading the pack got so far ahead of us that we became separated. We pulled off the road for a good 20 minutes waiting to see if they would turn around to look for us, with no luck. We were probably less than an hour from our planned general location for the next camp, so I made the decision to lead the rest of the vehicles to that location, in hopes that our lost vehicle would be waiting for us there. An hour later we get there, with no sign of the other vehicle. We are at a high point though, and can see quite a ways. Even looking down on the vast flat peneplain below us, we were looking for a needle in a haystack. Sometimes a faint dust trail could be seen (normally dust trails can linger for minutes, and be ~100' high and 1/2 mile long), but it was almost too small to see with the eye because it was probably 20+ miles away from us. Is that them? Who knows....Crap crap crap! Atleast we have the food/water...This was really turning into a stressful situation for me, I had to figure out how to get us reunited. Don't we have CB radios? Nope. Satellite phones? Yep, but only one, which the other vehicle has. To this day, that has irritated the hell out of me. Each vehicle needs its own communication device!
With no luck finding our lost vehicle, it is time to drive towards a town that will have cell phone service. Too bad the nearest town is 2 hours away. And, to get to that town, a large river needs to be crossed that was on the verge of flooding last time we crossed it. There was a strong current with water near the hoods of the Land Rover Defenders we were driving in. I want to avoid that this time. So, looking on the map, the nearest town is maybe 3 hours away, 100 miles as the crow flies. Since we are not on any road, I have to put the coordinate of that town in, trust the GPS, all the while trying to utilize any roads that we may be able to take advantage of along the way. Navigating in the countryside in Mongolia is always tricky. A lot of times, you just have to pick a road (faint dirt path) and go with it until it starts leading you 180 degrees from the direction you want to go, then you go offroad until you find a new road. Anyway, about halfway to the new town, we luckily picked up a cellphone signal, called our headquarters in Ulaanbaatar, and got the coordinates of our missing vehicle, who happened to be waiting for us in the general area we had originally lost them in. Doh! 1.5 hours later and nearing sunset, we were reunited (9 hours after we were initially split up). We each had our stories and defenses, but I learned that each vehicle having its own communication device is essential!
A little sidenote to this story that makes it even more interesting: Apparently, when the lost vehicle called UB headquarters with the satellite phone it had (this was around the same time our group had contacted UB headqaurters as well)...their group was given our current coordinates (even though we were going to head back towards the lost vehicle). Maybe due to the phone signal or whatever reason, there was a miscommunication and the reported coordinate they were given for our group was something like N46.34544 W104.32333 when in actuality our coordinate was N47.34544 W 104.32333, which made it look like we were 100 miles south of where we actually were! Finally, once we reunited, they told us that had we not shown up within the next 10 minutes, they were going to go search for us (100 miles to the south....)! Haha....I think we need some protocol in place. Funny story though, glad it worked out.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the video. Make sure to click the button to the left of "vimeo" to make it full screen, or just click on vimeo to watch it straight from their website.
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