G'day from Samarkand, Uzbekistan. It already feels like a lifetime ago, but Mongolia left a mark on us like few places ever could.
Our entry into the Gobi Desert started with high hopes and 12 litres of water strapped to our bikes, exactly what the GMX+’s had been designed for. We'd just rolled off a high-speed train in Hohhot, Northern China, and were buzzing for the adventure. That excitement lasted about 10 minutes, right until the headwind hit. An unforgivable, unfathomable headwind of unimaginable proportions.
For the next week, we were locked in a relentless battle with a Siberian-born northwesterly. Think 40-knot gusts straight in the face, every single day. We arrived at the Mongolian border physically rattled, emotionally frayed, but somehow still laughing. A local policeman who spoke a bit of English confirmed our fears: the wind wasn’t ending, it was just beginning. It's non-stop northwesterly winds all spring, and spring has just begun. We thought surely entering Mongolia you know it might change, no it was relentless, it got worse and obviously always laughed our way through these grim situations. That was kind of a pivotal moment. We thought, are we going to get curvy? Are we going to channel our inner Guswagon, Jesse and Rhino? And yeah, continue into the desert. Yeah, are we going to man the f&*k up essentially? Or are we going to be cowards and shy away from the challenge? And we thought, let's go for it.
Into the Gobi We Go
When we crossed into Mongolia, we met a hardcore Japanese bikepacker. No GPS, no hat, no sunglasses, he was going to navigate the entire desert using screenshots of google satellite maps but this guy was badass and hardcore so we teamed up with him.
We left the roads behind and we started our traverse of the desert. And mate, it was absolutely horrible in so many metrics. I mean, the first day was beautiful, maybe the second day was beautiful. And then s@&t just got pretty, pretty grim. The corrugations and soft sand slowed us to a crawl. And you know, like we've got pretty low gearing on our bikes (Sam & Luke are running SRAM Apex Mechanical with 32t chainring and 10-52t cassette) and I remember there being a few patches of absolutely flat ground, maybe even slight downhill, where Luke and I were both pedaling in the lowest gear we had with like heart rates like pinned, you know, mid zone three, right? Like that was pretty crazy compared to everything else we've ever done.
That said, at the end of the day, the wind would stop and you would have these magical moments of silence. I remember the observations of that beautiful desert silence was so fascinating. One night I know we were all in our tents maybe 30 or 40 meters away from one another and I remember Luke like rolling over on his mat and coughing and I thought he was outside my tent. Like I genuinely thought he was next to me or I thought he might have even been in my tent because it just, it was so quiet, the sound travelled so perfectly, so crisply and then one night we were once again sitting in the desert and a flock of, I don't know, I think it's called a murder of crows flew overhead and I remember hearing the sounds that their wings made as it traveled through the air. I just sat there in awe like what the hell like this is a sound I'd never heard before and it was so loud and so beautiful.
One last thing from the Gobi, we met Boris. Poor old Boris was a dog we met in a small little village somewhere in the Gobi and we spent the night there surrounded by all these little kids playing volleyball and everything, and this village dog had kind of like a love-hate relationship amongst the people in the village. They were patting the dog and spending time with it until it got annoying and then, the kids would start kind of like kicking it and smacking it.
Anyway, I think maybe the dog thought we were showing a bit more love than the locals. So the next morning when we set off, we thought we were by ourselves until we saw this little dog trailing behind us. It was Boris. Anyway, we thought he'd follow for a few hundred meters and then that became a kilometer or five. Because we were off road for so long, he could keep up with us and the pace we were going but it kind of became an ethical and moral dilemma for us as you know resources were running thin.
So Sam started feeding Boris some Spam out of the tin, I fed him my leftover rice, and then we used up some of our water to hydrate him during the evenings. And for us it became a love-hate relationship because in the evenings he was a wonderful company. We got to cuddle him and pat him and talk to him about our lives.
But then during the day, we were running out of resources and we thought, are we going to take him all the way to Spain or are we going to leave him in the desert? We've got two options. So one day we decided on,it's pretty cutthroat, but let's cycle as fast as we can away from this dog and leave him in the dust. And that was when we hit the tarmac. So we were just naturally a lot faster than him. He just wasn't going to keep up.
Yeah, we sped off, but after 15 minutes, you know, after a few tears were shared and some sad music was played, we saw this little dot on the horizon behind us. We were like, he's back. He's catching up. Anyway, yeah, over five or ten minutes, he caught up, gave us a few nasty looks like, come on, guys, what are you doing? We're brothers.
So he carried on following us that final night and the next day we really sped off and left him by a nearby village in the desert. So, you know, hopefully not. Rest in peace, Boris. I hope he's found another lovely life in a Gobi village.
Curve Mongolia Expedition Recon
On their journey from Vietnam to Spain, the Garbage Bag Boys are reconing our Mongolia Expedition route! To find out more about Expeditions, check it out HERE.
After tapping out of the full Gobi traverse, we rerouted north to ride Curve Cycling’s Expedition routes through the Mongolian Steppe. Massive kudos to Gus for designing them, they were stunning, rideable, and gave us a new lease on our battered cycling souls.
We were looking down into the valley below and Gus on his GPX taking the sensible road down. Luke took that and I decided to like, I'm like, I'm on a mountain bike, like f&%king oath. Essentially just ride down the side of the mountain. I’m like I'm the coolest guy ever and sort of fishtail down in the loose dirt and stuff. Yeah with those tires man and the geometry of the whole thing it just came so alive and it felt great!
But I was completely off track, trying to get back on track and meet Luke, when I saw maybe like 50, 60 meters up ahead, quite clearly a very small yak. And as I was riding up to it, all I could think was like, please be dead, please be dead, please be dead, because there were no other yaks anywhere in sight. As I got close to it, the little thing stood up. I was like, oh s£$t, and it didn't run away, it sort of actually came towards me like it was a bit confused. I wrapped him in my blanket and put him in my empty rear pannier. Saw like the only other yaks in the valley and was like, surely that's them. It wasn't very heavy at all and rode down the mountain.
He was actually very chill and crossed a river and then made it to the other yaks. And as soon as he was near them, he was like, started to get a bit more agitated, I guess, was like making strange yak sounds. Unpacked him and then, yeah, after some time of him walking around, one yak came up and smelt him and he smelt her. And there was a second one that looked very similar to him and they walked off into the distance. So a bit of a happy ending.
Everywhere we sort of camped, we tried to find a place not in the tents, protected from the wind. Mongolia taught us appreciation for food, water and shelter, you know, the three survival things you need. Shelter is definitely at the top of my list now.
We came across a small locked building and we were very desperate at this point, so we got these abandoned little metal car parts of all sorts and started picking them up and hacking at this lock. You know, me with a bit more muscle behind me, I broke the lock after probably six goes. Neither of us were really asleep and then around midnight, the storm had either passed or we were in the eye of the storm and everything was very quiet. And then within like a 30 second window, the wind picked up from zero to unimaginably loud and it was strong enough that it actually tore part of the tin roof off the hut, this building that's been standing there for god knows how many decades. This night is apparently the night where it just had enough. And yeah, it tore open the roof like a sardine can, man.
It's a cliche, you hear it all the time, but the Mongolians are very hospitable people. After our night in the hut, a Land Cruiser drove up the hill. It can only have been the owner coming to check up on it because of the storm. There’s us, having broken in overnight and set up two tents. So we apologized unconditionally, as you could imagine. And, having a bit of money, not much more we could have done and said we'd get out of there.
And they watched us. Our last like six bucks. Watched us pack up the whole morning and then he was gesturing, you know, pretty much saying, my house is three kilometers down this hill. Come for tea, come for tea. It felt like they saved us from the elements out there that day and we just couldn't believe, you know, getting off to the start we did with someone, how it could turn around into something beautiful and we spent about an hour or so there and reset. Before we set off into the Steppe again. So that was, yeah, bloody amazing from the herders there.
After that, things sort of took a turn. We finished the route, which was just so beautiful. Like, really had an appreciation for what, you know, I guess good gravel versus GREAT gravel. And Gus definitely chose a very beautiful route.
Heading back across the border to China
We wrapped up the final Curve routes with our biggest off-road day yet: 160km and 2,000m elevation gain. We rolled back into Iktamir in golden light, smashed some ice creams, and took a bus to the Chinese border to dodge more headwinds as we were happy with our time in Mongolia.
The 20-hour ride went from 8°C and rain to 38°C and sun-blasted desert. That was a bit of a slap to the face and kind of like be careful what you wish for moment, because we've been hoping and wishing and waiting for the heat to return.
So yeah, I guess the thing, the takeaways from Mongolia, you know, the Curve routes are f&£king insane. Gus has done an amazing job and we're very happy to and grateful to test run those routes before the expedition in September.
Headwinds, sand, corrugation and the cold, you know, things we'll probably remember the most from Mongolia. Definitely type 2 fun. And yeah, the hospitality of the nomads and the herders, just really, yeah, made us think about our ways and generosity and selflessness going forward.
So, yeah. Any last words, Sam? Yes, just such a strange country, so beautiful and brutal and I think I sort of went into a bit more in one of my own Instagram posts but like objectively the worst food spread I've ever experienced in a country and yet probably some of the best meals I've ever eaten in my life.
If you’ve been following along with the Garbage Bag Boys and their adventure from Vietnam to Spain, and their time in Mongolia has inspired you; get in touch with Gus, expeditions@curvecycling.com , to hear all about where our next Expedition could take you!
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