Stage 34: From Beijing to Ulan Bator - the Gobi Desert awaits
The 34th stage of XWORLD led from Beijing to Ulan Bator and held an extraordinary challenge for the eight participants: Their mission was to drive across the Gobi Desert! The Gobi consists mostly of bare rocks or desert steppe. One of the participants wrote an account of how she and her fellow adventurers handled these conditions and everything else they experienced:
- Photo op and press conference in front of the Kempinski
- Listening to the stories of the guide in the Forbidden City
- The Forbidden City
- The Great Wall in the rain
- 17.6 Yungang grottoes. Visiting the UNESCO World Cultural Heritage site
- 17.6 Lunch break
- 17.6 Yingxiang: Wooden pagoda, the oldest wooden structure in China
- 17.6 Two XWORLD adventurers in Yingxiang
- 17.6 Yingxiang: Chinese NGO
- 18.6 Datong: Linking cultures with cameras
- 18.6 Just outside of Erenhot (Chin. border town with Mongolia)
- 19.6 Erenhot, refilling canisters
- 19.6 The border near Erenhot from the Chinese side
- 19.6 Mongolian border; vehicles being checked at the border crossing
- 20.6 Mandakh; Horses on the steppe
- 20.6 Mandakh: Muddy road
- 20.6 Mandakh; The camp at twilight
- 21.6 Mandakh: The camp at daybreak
- 21.6 Mandakh: Preparing camel milk in a yurt
- 21.6 Mandakh: Sheep shearing
- 21.6 Mandakh: Training horses for the Naadam festival in Mongolia
- 22.6 Vulture Canyon: Hiking in Vulture Canyon
- 22.6 Vulture Canyon: Mongolian vistas
- 22.6 Vulture Canyon: Lunch
- 22.6 Singing sand dunes: Walking down the sandhills
- 22.6 Singing sand dunes: Driving fun on the dunes
- 22.6 Singing sand dunes: Walking down the sandhills
- 23.6 Ongyin: Driving fun on the road to Ongyin monastery
- 23.6 Ongyin: The ruins of the monastery at Ongyin
- 24.6 Avaikher: Milking horses to make airak
- 24.6 Avaikher: Talking with a nomad family
- 24.6 Avaikher: River crossing
- 25.6 Kharakhorum: Monks call to prayer
- 26.6 Ulan Bator monk in Gandan monastery
