You decide to go right, to the north, and drive across the sunlit mountains and through the long shadows of mountains imprinted on the beautiful valleys. But keep your windows up on this dusty road; if you open them, the dust from the road might suffocate you. There is still the dust coming through all the cracks in the badly fitting doors which brings enough of the dust inside. It mixes with your sweat in the hot day and it stains your T-shirt and pours down along your spine. Even the surface of the water bottle is full of dust and when you drink it you feel the dust in your mouth as you swallow the warm water.
You drive on through a beautiful countryside on a rocky road, hearing the rocks bombarding the floor of your car. There is a noise of the engine, a noise of the exhaust (half of which is missing now) and a noise from all these rocks hitting the car. You just hope nothing important on the car gets damaged; and you trust your friend to drive so well as not to damage it.
As you drive, you try to persuade yourself that you took a proper road; oh, yes, it widens now so it must be the road to Tsagaannuur, yes, it is in a bad shape now, that means there has been a lot of traffic, so it is the road to Tsagaannur, you see a car, real car, not the Gazik (Russian equivalent of Jeep), so for sure he is going to Tsagaannuur. He stops at the river crossing and, fortunately, he knows some Russian. No, this road does not go to Tsagaanuur, you have to go back all the 40 km to the lake and try again.
You drive back to the lake and start again. Every time when there is a new set of tracks you take that set of tracks that goes north. And the road grows worse and worse. The rocks are getting atrocious, there are huge boulders on the sides of the road and you climb and climb one hill after another. Or is it just the same hill? There is no place to turn and go back. You just hope the old car can make it. The front of the car is jumping and skidding on the rocky road, the car whines in the fist gear, but it still climbs. Suddenly, you are on the top of a mountain and there is the most beautiful view of Altai you have seen so far with its wide valleys and sun drenched rocky and sandy hills. A couple of Mongolian kids come over, but none speaks English or Russian. They say one word "Bayram". You look it up in the map. You are 3,000 meters high, on the top of the Bayram Uul mountain, one of the highest in this part of Mongolia. And, on the map, there is no road leading to it from anywhere.
You are also running out of gas as you emptied the last gas can into the car a while ago. Apparently though, there is a village somewhere down there with a rudimentary gas station. At least that seems to be what the kids indicate in response to your international language of hand gestures and the word "benzin" repeated over and over. Just make sure you do not miss it in this maze of crisscrossed pathways. You drive down the mountain with the engine shut off to save some gas and hope for the village you think you have glanced in the distance. And, ultimately, you do get there.
You fill up the tank, all the 24 litres of it, and a spare gas can too. You ask for the way to Tsagaannuur and one person shows you to go forward, but another to go backward. Since you do not understand what they say you take the road forward. After about 10 km you get stuck in a deep sand. But in the end you push the car out, all sweaty and showing you age, and go forward. Now you are lost for sure. There is no road on the map in this part of the country, so you just guess. You think that following the little used tracks going along the hydro poles might be a good idea. You drive through the low rocky hills that make you feel that you are in a museum watching an exhibition of the modern sculptures. And then the hydro poles stop.
But you know that the road to Tsagaannur is somewhere to your right. And that is why you take the road through the swamp. It start good, but it gets progressively worse with some water crossings possibly added for fun by the nature. The water crossings are getting bigger and now there is a bit of mud to it too. The big mosquitoes are swarming all around. Then you come to the water crossing that is too big and too muddy. You have to turn around and go back to the hydro poles again.
There is another set of hydro poles joining to your old set, so you take the diminishing tracks running along this new set of poles. You drive for an hour on a rocky road in a flat field full of rocks of all shapes on all sides as far as you can see. The car jumps on the rocky road, the wheels shoot the little rocks into all the sides and you look through the dirty windshield into the sun shining right against you. No, you cannot clean the windshield as it is the plastic one (replacement for the glass that broke in Russia) and it scratches extremely easily.
After an hour of driving you reach a village that appears out of nowhere. There is a man who knows English. How does one gets to Tsagaannuur from here? Apparently, there is a river between this village and the main road to Tsagaannuur. And your car has no chance to cross it. So you pay $30 and get the guys to tow you through the river with the little Trabant at one point being submerged up to the half of its doors. You are in the marsh again, so you quickly say:"thanks" to the guys and load the stuff back into the car; yes, very quickly as to avoid the attacking mosquitoes. Now you are on the road to Tsagaannuur? You think so until you hit another muddy river in the marsh.
You turn back and then follow the marsh north hoping for a decent river crossing. But there is nothing. Either the banks are too steep, or the river is too deep, or there is too much mud. The sun is also coming down. You set up a camp in the midst of the buzzing mosquitoes. The sudden gust of wind is your only luck; it blows the mosquitoes away for a minute or two. But, luckily, it returns again and again. You wash your face quickly, do not even brush your teeth as the mosquitoes buzz around too much. You peel many of them from your skin and jump into the tent. Then you spend a few minutes inside the tent in a furious battle to kill them all.
You are falling asleep in the tent on the banks of a swampy river somewhere in Mongolia. You know that tomorrow you will have to find the way across the river and on to Tsagaannuur. You really feel your age, but, in some way, you also feel more alive that you felt in some time. It was a pretty hard day. Another day in a life.