After waking up and realizing that we actually all finally arrived in Switzerland we took advantage of our excitement and went on a morning run at seven AM. When we started stretching our jetlagged bodies it was still dark outside. We really enjoyed seeing it become lighter with every step we took, so that soon we could see the beautiful mountains surrounding us. We ran past cows, farms, crossed a river on a wooden bridge and it seemed a bit surreal that we were suddenly part of this idyllic postcard scenery. It was not very easy to stay together as a group since our running speeds varied quite a bit. But we tried to push and motivate each other.

The next event of the morning was an eco-driving experience led by two Mercedes Benz representatives. After telling us about the BlueEfficiency Technology and engine development they presented us different car models of the future. What fascinated us the most was the F-Cell that runs completely emission free. It consists of a Hydrogen tank and a battery that gets charged by just letting the car roll and not accelerating. We were very fortunate to have the chance to test drive this car, since there are only very few models available today. Unfortunately there are not enough Hydrogen gas stations around yet, so they are doing their best on convincing more businesses to sell hydrogen. Best case would be if this hydrogen was produced eco friendly and CO2 emission free as well. It got us excited that there is a chance that one day we will be able to drive without harming the environment if we take the right steps of further development these next couple of years.

They also gave us efficiency driving rules, which are easy ways to save gas. We did two test-driving, one before and one after hearing these possibilities of saving gas. It was amazing to see how easily you could save gas and even reach your goal faster.

After talking about cars and technologies we had a more creative activity later on: Dimitri and Ben gave us some useful tips on photography such as choosing the optimum frame, settings on the camera and choosing the right position of your object. We took portrait pictures of each other up by the beautiful church of Château-d’Oex while the sun was going down.

It was a good day, we learned a lot and are now going to get a good night’s sleep to prepare ourselves for the Mayo Clinic Fitness Tests tomorrow!

Selection Camp News Timeline

D-day – It's an exciting day for our new group of Young Explorers! Today they meet up in Switzerland after traveling from all corners of the world.

They appear tired after their long trips but are already familiarising themselves with their new environment and friends. Even after a few hours the YEP's are already getting on very well. It certainly seems that  a lot of laughter and fun will be on the cards this week!!

As soon as the last YEP's arrive, dinner will be served and we will start with the formal introductions from the Mike Horn Team.

Below are the new YEPs' that will be battling for their place to join Mike Horn in Kamchatka in December;

Julia Neme, 16yrs, Argentina / Saraya D'Ath, 15yrs, Australia / Romeo Wong, 19yrs, China / Leena-Maret Kröger, 18yrs, Germany / Yolanda Rohde, 16yrs, Germany / Ariane Sivam, 16yrs, Malaysia / Hayden Cockburn, 20yrs, New Zealand / Andrea Lavarello Schettini, 16yrs, Peru / MaÅ‚gorzata Sadowska, 16yrs, Poland / Zhixin Ee, 17yrs, Singapore / Carla Mckenzie, 19yrs, South Africa / Megan de Villiers, 15yrs, South Africa / Natalia Perez-Campanero, 15yrs, Spain / Nadine Terrier, 18yrs, Switzerland / Michaela Korodimou,18yrs, UK / Maricella Uribe , 19yrs, USA

Selection Camp News Timeline

On Saturday September 25, 2010 we launched the first Pangaea Theme Project: Earth Cleanup Day. This was a 1-day Pangaea Project around the cleanup theme. Our aim was to get the international YEP community to initiate, organise and collaborate on a wide range of cleanup projects that specific day, selected by a multitude of other organisations around the world for similar actions.

Our objective was reached in getting many Young Explorers and people from their community to join in different cleanup projects around the world: cleaning the streets in their neighborhood, selecting a forest to cleanup with their family and friends, and joining forces to organise a gathering of YEPs to clean up a river or lake shore… the geographical location, the number of volunteers and the ecosystem type and size do not matter, but participation is! Cleanup, sort and recycle, and promote the three R's of the environment: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle while acting!

But of course, this was hopefully just the beginning of many more cleanup projects in the future, and we are hoping that a snowball effect will happen within our YEP community. The 1-day cleanup action is just an excuse to raise awareness that the environment we live in, whether urban or rural, or located in a developed or developing country, no matter what season, needs our help on a regular basis to retain its beauty and health.

To learn more about the various clean-ups held all around the world click here….

A sad thought has overcome Mike Horn and the Young Explorers.. the Mongolia Expedition is winding down and soon the YEPs will be back home with their families, telling them of the amazing experiences they have had in this majestic country.

Back on the bikes once again (ouch – the backsides!!) Mike Horn leads the Young Explorers through the Gegeet Valley passing the sectacular Flaming Cliffs, which as the name implies, nearly comes alive with its orange glow during the sunrise and sunset of the Gobi Desert.

As history says, the Flaming cliffs are famous for the first nest of dinosaur eggs and other fossils found in the 1920s. Sure enough (and to the delight of our geography spectalist, Dr Roswitha Stolz) it wasn't long before the YEPs discovered bones and fossils resting on the sand. More amazing lessoons for the YEPs!

The last few days were very long and the one thing the YEPs will be looking forward to after returning home is a liitle rest and relaxation.

Today, the 6th of September, the Young Explorers said 'Goodbye' to Mike and are currently on driving back to Ulaanbaatar where they will sleep overnight and tomorrow morning early will take their flights.

Blog written by Lucas and Inge

Our biking adventures started on the 14th day at 4am in the morning. We had a very small breakfast of Mongolian biscuits before embarking on our 70km journey from the Hongoryn Els to our campsite for the evening. In the darkness we headed out with our Petzl headlamps, gaining 500m in altitude over the first couple of hours towards the Gegeet Valley. After riding through the valley we were all relieved to see the flat plains that lay ahead of us – but we soon found out that the going would not be easy. With food and water being difficult to come by in a desert environment, we were forced to ration our supplies and test the limits of our bodies. Everybody found the ride incredibly difficult due to this and the corrugated dirt roads that often found us in sandy patches. Navigating which of the various paths to take was also draining since it required constant concentration and movement. Despite the difficult and pain suffered by all, the challenge was an incredibly worthwhile experience since we were required to push ourselves through difficult weather and circumstances. Upon arriving at the campsite, all the YEPs ate a late, well deserved lunch and headed to the tents for an afternoon nap. This didn't last long however since we soon had to get back to work on soil and vegetation sampling. Roswitha explained to us how to go about selecting suitable sample points in order to gain accurate measurements with limited resources. We were surprised by the abundancy in such a seemingly dry landscape.

The 15th and final day of the Gobi leg for the expedition saw all the YEPs back on the bikes to complete the remaining 50km. We once again awoke at 4:30am and were blessed with cooler temperatures in comparison to the heat of the previous day. Although we were all tired from the previous day, spirits were high since we had nearly completed what has been a tough, but amazing expedition through the desert. All the Young Explorers came together from the word go and used the drafting technique to obtain maximum efficiency against a strong headwind. With the end in sight and a positive attitude we completed the 50km by midday before jumping in the jeeps to head out to a Ger camp for our final night together in the Gobi.

After settling in to our gers, we headed out to the dinosaur fossils and the Flaming Cliffs. It was quite amazing to see firsthand how these fossils have been preserved and remain in tact after millions and millions of years. The Flaming Cliffs were definitely a spectacle, turning a glowing red in the right light of sunrise and sunset to form a magnificent panorama across the horizon. We were also lucky enough to use this time to visit the last remaining Saxual Forest in the world – a unique form of vegetation with roots up to 40 metres deep that are designed the desert landscape.

As Mike, Martin and Moose would not be travelling back to Ulaanbataar with us, it was nice to be able to close the expedition with a team dinner, sharing of stories, exchanging of gifts and a few inspiring words.

The next morning after a 'short' photo shoot at the Flaming Cliffs, we said our final goodbyes and began the long journey back to Ulaanbataar. We headed off at 7am and travelled 500km across the desert steppe, arriving at 10:30pm. Since we were too late for dinner in the hotel, we ordered pizzas, coke and sat around chatting until the early hours of the morning. We crawled in to bed for about an hour's sleep before having to wake up and load the jeeps to go the airport.

This experience has been amazing. We have learnt so much from the team, each other and the Mongolian people we met along the way. Although sections of the expedition were both mentally and physically demanding, we have all grown as young adults and have become more aware of the importance of teamwork, leadership and respect. We are all inspired and motivated to make a difference in the world and use the opportunities given to us to spread Mike's vision for a healthy planet.

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Where are we? We're in MONGOLIA!!

FACTS

The Flaming cliffs – this area of the Gobi desert is most famous for the first nest of dinosaur eggs and other fossils found by the American paleontologist Roy Chapman Andrews in the 1920s. He nicknamed this site "Flaming Cliffs" for the surreal glowing orange colour of the rock.

In this region researchers also unearthed many other dinosaur skeletons and other fossils. When dinosaurs died at Flaming Cliffs, they died quickly: burial by fierce sandstorms is the only way to account for the discovery of this dinosaur pair as well as numerous, articulated Protoceratops skeletons found standing in the upright position.

Day 13 – Tirza, Nicolette, Leni

„Time to wake up! It’s 4am and we are going to climb some sand dunes today!” These were the dreaded words spoken to tempt us out of our warm sleeping bags and do one of the most physical challenges of this expedition to date.

Half an hour later all of us set off South towards the Hongoryl Els, which are the sand dunes of the Gobi. In our Scarpa hiking shoes, we quickly walked across the sand towards the dunes in darkness with only our Petzl headlamps and the moon to guide our way. When we finally reached the first sand dune, we took a moment to take in the great height and steep slopes of sand: “What? We’ll have to climb countless of these till we reach the highest sand dune?!”

So we started our climb up and up and up. When a dune has ripples due to the wind, it is more compacted and we slid less down. We also tried to walk on the ridges whenever possible, as the sand is more stable. Furthermore, on slopes with especially loose soil, it is easier to follow the tracks the people made in front of you. Mike also gave us the perfect suggestion to remove our shoes and walk in our socks. At the start it was strange to walk without shoes, but soon we got used to the feeling of soft sand between our toes. The advantage of walking in socks or barefoot is that you don’t get the uncomfortable feeling of having sand in one’s shoes.

While we were climbing up the many sand dunes, it was quite cool due to the constant wind blowing on our faces. So when we saw the sun rise, we were glad to see the light and feel the warmth of our beautiful sun’s rays on our skin. The sunrise was just magnificent. All of us took a seat on the sand dune and just marveled at the colours in the sky and the lighting up of the sand dunes.

When we finally arrived at the highest sand dune, we could see over the whole Hongoryl Els as well as the mountain ranges. A great feeling of insignificance but also majesty befell all of us. We realized that we were probably the first people to ever climb this sand dune. After sitting over an hour on the dune’s summit, listening to Mike’s stories of the Namib desert, the Amazonas and Antarctica, we ran slid down the dune. It was really fun to jump, slide and of course fall down the dunes… This was an experience and moment we will talk about for the rest of our lives: to see one of the most beautiful places on earth with the friends for life we made here over these last two weeks.

FACTS

The Khongoryn Els dunes lie north of the Baruunsaikhan Mountains 200 kilometres west of Dalanzadgad. Extending for roughly 185 kilometres they reach heights of 200 meters. The sound produced by the dunes rises to the name "singing sands".

Certain conditions have to come together to create singing sand: The sand grains have to be round between 0.1 and 0.5 mm in diameter, need to condain silica and have a certain humidity. The most common frequency emitted seems to be close to 450 Hz.There are various theories about the singing sand mechanism. It has been proposed that the sound frequency is controlled by the shear rate. Others have suggested that the frequency of vibration is related to the thickness of the dry surface layer of sand. The noise may be generated by friction between the grains or by the compression of air between them. Other sounds that can be emitted by sand have been described as "roaring" or "booming".

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Blog written by Inge, Annika and Akira

This morning, after a lovely, warm evening’s sleep, we headed out for our last day of horse riding. With sore backs and bums, we crawled back onto our horses, terrified of the 35km we would have to cover to get to our lunch/camp site. It was certainly an interesting day from the word “Go”, since Akira’s horse tripped and she fell forward off her horse and got a cut across her eyelid. Gaynor (our team doctor) proved her worth though, and stitched her up without a problem and we were off once more.

It was tough going, with a lot of trotting, which was generally decided to be the worst form of horse riding – we all preferred walking or galloping. A few of us such as Gaynor, Moose and Roswitha (not to mention any names) opted to walk the last bit instead. With miles of open, rocky planes behind us, and a beautiful, green oasis (which we weren’t sure was real or a mirage) looming ahead, we finally approached our camp and lunch site. We had an awesome lunch of rice and chicken curry, and got a chance to relax and rest our aching backsides, and admire the beautiful view of sand dunes, mountains with fascinating formations and camels doing camel things. Once the horses had also recovered from the long day’s riding, we had a little competition amongst ourselves and we got to give our horses a go and really see what they had under the hood. It was so much fun racing against each other with the wind beating our faces and whipping through our hair, and feeling the raw power of the horses as we pushed them on towards the finish line.

We were later presented with a sort of first aid course, during which Gaynor gave us a demonstration on how to insert a needle for an IV tutbe – strictly voluntarily! After some successful and other less successful attempts, we all finally succeeded (though I think Gaynor lost quite a bit of blood with the exercise). Our photo competition for the day was themed “People” and after dinner we had a photo analysis session and the winner for the day was chosen. Nicci won the photo of the day, with her human-horse photo. The winners for the previous two days photo themes were also finally chosen after much deliberation, since there were too many excellent photos and our “judges” didn’t know which to pick. Tirza was named the winner for her photo of vegetation, and Annika, Inge, Akira and Constantin were all declared winners for their landscape photos.

Tomorrow we start trekking with camels, and though none of us are sure whether this will be more or less painful than the horses, we know that we’ll all miss our four-legged horsy friends. So, with the soothing sound of the silence that you only get in places as remote as these, we are off to bed to prepare for our camel-packed adventures tomorrow.

FACTS

The extreme continental climate has affected the traditional diet, so the Mongolian cuisine primarily consists of dairy products, meat, and animal fats. Use of vegetables and spices is limited.

Normadic herders live directly from their own animal products. Meat is either cooked, used as an ingredient for soups or dumplings or dried for winter. A lot of animal fat is eaten so the people can withstand cold winters and their hard work.

The most common and famous dishes in Mongolia are: Boodog (whole carcass of a goat roasted from the inside), Khorkhog ( meat cooked with hot stones) and last but not least Buuz ( steamed filled pockets with meat ) which is cooked on every special occasions.

One of thee famous drinks is Airag. This is a fermented mare’s milk that has an alcohol content of about 3%. Many Mongolians distil it further to produce shimiin arkhi and get it up to 12%.

Blog writen by Lucas

Peering out of our tents at 7.30 this morning, we could see the great expanse of the Gobi desert: we were the only humans for kilometers and kilometers, and couldn’t see a single ger as far as the eye could reach.
With our equipment packed up into our jeeps, the strong Mongolian horses tacked up and excitement flowing in the veins of all the Young Explorers, we started our 40km journey across the Gobi . At the beginning, we were travelling at a very slow speed, roughly 3km per hour. We soon realized that travelling at such a slow speed would mean we would arrive at our camp after nightfall, and thus started to wake our horses up and trot a bit.

While we were exploring the Gobi on horseback, we came across flash flood river beds. During heavy thunderstorms, all the water is channeled in these gullies and removes all the vegetation, leaving a barren river bed of rocks. We also noticed that the further we travelled away from the mountains, the drier the landscape became.

Of course we were all glad to see our 5 jeeps and the eating tent as we neared our camp: desperately we needed to rest our sore bottoms, scraped legs and painful muscles. Jokingly, Rosvitha called our diligent horses “torture machines on four legs”, but most of us truly appreciated the effort these animals put in to get us to our destination through wind, sun and sometimes even rain.

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FACTS

The landlocked, continental situation and the high variability in temperature and especially precipitation causes extremes. Heavy rains, snowfall, strong winds, sandstorms, snowstorms, hail, and flooding often bring substantial damages to life and property of Mongolia. There is a clear indication that the frequency and magnitude of natural disasters are increasing due to global climate change.

The average spring precipitation has dropped by 17% during the last 60 years, a fact which has likely contributed to the increased number of fire outbreaks and burned areas in recent springs.

As in most arid environments, precipitation occurs in heavy rain showers and thunderstorms causing a rapid overland flow and no significant increase in soil moisture.

Since the systematic observation (1935) period, serious floods have been observed at Mongolian rivers and caused severe property damages and loss of life. Flash floods in the rural areas are natural phenomena. Experienced herders avoid the river banks during the summer season.

Flash flood is becoming one of the main disasters in Mongolia. About 18 flash flood events were observed from 1996-2003. In October 2003 a flash flood disaster hit Ulaanbaator. The city has only 260 mm/y precipitation, but it still belongs to a heavy flash flood zone. In average 30- 40% of the precipitation is torrential.

Blog written by Lucas, Constantin and Martin.

Our day started at 7.30am when everybody woke up excited to meet our horses for the first time in the Gobi. Once we had all packed our bags and loaded them into the jeeps, we embarked on our journey out of the foothills of the Altai Mountain range and in to the desert plains.

We began the horse trek at the top of the Yol Valley before heading over the mountain range towards our lunch spot in the Dungenee Valley. We climbed to a maximum altitude of approximately 2500m where the views were absolutely incredible. We hadn`t yet experienced such a panoramic view of the range and were lucky enough to witness wild mountain goats, sheep and eagles.

From here we descended in to the valley which progressively got narrower and narrower towards our lunch spot. It was quite unique to observe the cliff formation and how this developed as the stream formed and the gorge became narrower. Everyone was however starting to feel the pain of the Mongolian saddles and were relieved to have an hour or so without the horse underneath them. We must also commend the cooks on all the effort they are putting in to our meals; it is truly fantastic and we are all enjoying the Mongolian experience.

Approximately 2km after we had lunch we burst out of the valley into the vast desert plains of the Gobi which gave us views of the surrounding mountain ranges and the Hongoryn Els. At this point there were ruins of 17th century Buddhist temples destroyed by the Soviets in 1938. Unfortunately the weather came in which slightly disrupted the views but we were all still able to gain perspective on the vastness and grandeur of the desert landscape. Being on the flats of the desert steppe, we were able to unleash the horses and gallop towards our camp in the distance. It is amazing how much we struggle with perspective and distance estimation when we can see so far – everything is so much further away than what it seems.

We arrived at our campsite at approximately 7:30pm after a very long day on the horses. We have just finished a great dinner and had a good chat with Mike about things we can do to build the Pangaea network in our respective nations upon our return. It has just begun to rain which is quite contrary to the usual perception of desert climate; however we are currently in the season of most precipitation for the Gobi region. The photo competition today was to be of vegetation – we are still awaiting the decision of the winner but have no doubt everybody will keep themselves informed.

It is quite surreal being out here in the middle of the plains and being able to see so far – a truly breathtaking experience.

FACTS

Goats, sheep, cattle (including yaks), camels and horses, these are the five animals the Mongolian normads are mainly herding. The horse is the most important of the five animals. It is even part of Mongolia's national emblem. Horse racing is the second most popular event in Mongolia, after traditional wrestling.

Maybe this is due to history the Mongolian horse was the main 'weapon' that allowed th Genghis Kahn to conquer the half of the world in 13th century and create theMongolian Empire. There is a traditional saying in Mongolian: "A Mongol without a horse is like a Bird without the wings". Genghis Khan himself once said: "It is easy to conquer the world from the back of a horse". A horse is a traditional gift to male children when they turn 3 years old. It is said that children are taught to ride before walking.

However as our young explorers have experienced already the Mongolian style of riding is different to that in the west. Mongolians carry the reins in one hand and stand up in their short stirrups. The tack is also different. The saddle is wooden and has changed little over centuries. It has a high pommel and cantle which allowed Genghis Khan's warriors to shoot with a bow and arrow from any direction without falling from their horse.
 

Blog written by Annika, Inge and Akira

A lovely, warm sleep in a Mongolian ger provided us with the energy that we would need for our long day ahead. We had a quick breakfast of a fried Mongolian pastry, apricot jam, a chocolate-hazelnut spread and tea or coffee, packed the 4x4s and headed off into the dusty horizon.

The 4x4s dropped us off at a designated point, where we grabbed our daypacks, chose our lunch and camping spots, calculated the coordinates, typed them into the GPSs and took off for what we expected to be roughly 20km of hiking.

Mike and the team presented us with a photo competition to incite us to pay closer attention to our surroundings and the diversity of the animals, insects and bird life around us. We were all surprised to find the amount of animals we saw, considering that we were in a desert steppe! We saw a variety of insects, including some green ones that looked extraterrestrial, some very cute baby lizards and pika – which are small chinchilla-like mammals with relatively large ears and a short tail, and are related to rabbits.

Initially we were making very good time and were walking roughly 5.9km/h but the terrain soon started to fluctuate as we approached the Zuun Sayhany Nuruu (means East Nice) mountain range. We found ourselves going up and down as the terrain got steeper and steeper, changing from rolling fields to jagged mountains. The going was quite tough as the mountains surface was mainly loose stone and gravel. There were parts of the mountains covered in Juniper and Salsola Tragus shrubs and patches of Stipa grass. We hiked up the highest mountain in sight for our short and only water break and summitted the 2500m peak.

We continued up and down this fascinating terrain for approximately 6 hours, passing through the famous Yolyn Am gorge, where we saw various shrines and a lovely, clear stream with petite waterfalls and locals selling handcrafted artefacts. Mike, Annika and Inge decided to follow the GPS coordinates instead of the guide and take the “road less travelled”, and arrived at the lunch spot 2 hours and 4km after everyone else since they tackled the mountains and did some bundu-bashing.

We finally had our long anticipated lunch at 16h30 and we were very relieved to find the food not only edible but very nice in fact. We were all initially a bit anxious as to what food we’d be eating during the next 10 days since a Mongolian cooking crew would be joining us on the Gobi leg of the expedition. The best part of our lunch was fresh orange slices since we were all craving fresh fruit, which is very scarce in Mongolia.

After lunch we set off to our campsite and once there pitched our tents and set up camp. We listened to a YEP Gobi Mix CD and we were all dancing and singing while selecting our competition photos. Tirza’s photo won first place with Annika’s coming second. We had a group meal of Mongolian stew with steamed buns and ended off the meal with coffee and tea.

We are all relieved to give our blistered feet a bit of a rest as we will be covering 130km over the next 3 days on horseback – and we’re crossing our fingers in the hopes that we do NOT get Russian saddles. We’ll all be crawling into bed soon since there is no firewood (since there are no trees) and therefore no fire to tell stories around and keep us warm – so from us; goodnight folks!

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VOTE Contest on the COMMUNITY

FACTS

Asia’s largest desert area, the Gobi desert is spread across Southern Mongolia and Northwestern China, covering a total area of 1,295,000 square kilometers (500,000 square miles). The term Gobi has been derived from a Mongolian word which means ‘very large and dry’. The Gobi indeed is one of the driest deserts on Earth.

The Gobi is often imagined to be place of unbearable heat and lifeless sand dunes, similar to the inhospitable and uninhabitable Sahara desert. Whereas the reality is quite the reverse. The Great Mongolian Gobi (the western part is located inside China, now) has high mountains, springs, forests, sands, steppe lands and rich animal kingdom, and has been inhabited since ancient times. Despite the fact that the Gobi desert has a harsh environment, 33 different types of animals are known to inhabit the Gobi desert, due to their superb adaptation skills. The most popular animals found here include jerboas, which are similar to kangaroo rats, golden eagles, wild camels, Gobi bear, gazelles, snow leopards, …

Blog written by Leni, Tirza and Nicolette

With as little as 30min of sleep, we all woke up at 4am this morning. The main mission of today? To cover about 650km of Mongolian style roads (bumpy, sandy and full of holes) in about 16 hours.

Split up into groups of three or four, we climbed into our 5 jeeps and made our way across the Mongolian steppes. The first stop: a Mongolian ger for breakfast. Invited by a family friend of one of our drivers, we entered the circular tent. With the boys sitting on the left and the girls on the right, we were offered a traditional Mongolian dish made of Yak milk with rice and dried meat. Clearly, some of us liked it better than others, but out of respect to the kind family, we finished the meal with a smile on our face.

During the drive, it was very interesting to see the change in landscape: slowly the scenery transitioned from green to brown and turned more and more arid. We could see the change from a dry steppe to desert steppe and finally could catch a glimpse of the sand dunes that are typical of a desert region. As rainfall becomes more and more scarce as you go south, the plants have to be well adapted to cope with the lack of water: they have very shallow but wide roots (to obtain moisture quickly from the few rain showers that happen during the rainier season) or deep roots that can tap into groundwater supplies. They have a thick waxy cuticle to prevent water loss through transpiration and there tends to be spaces between grass bundles to minimize competition for water.

We also managed to see a desert pavement: this occurs when the ground is covered in rocks and forms a “pavement” like cover, while underneath there is sand. Theories of the formation of this feature include the action of wind erosion, where Aeolian erosion blows away the sand while leaving the heavier stones behind.

It was shocking to see how degraded the soil was in certain areas. Though the grazing season is only for two months, it is still possible to overgraze the grass by having too many livestock than the land can sustain. Goats (usually Cashmere goats) tend to eat the whole plant, including its roots, and thus are particularly responsible for this loss of vegetation. With less grass available the soil is eroded, which then in turn causes less vegetation to grow, and thus a vicious cycle of degradation occurs. Livestock management is definitely a much needed solution to this problem.

After finally reaching our camp after nightfall, we were all glad to see that our lodgings for today will be a traditional yurt. Inside, it’s comfortably warm and all of us will definitely have a good night’s sleep, ready for tomorrow’s trekking (except if Moose snores too loud and he keeps us up the whole night!).

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FACTS

The vast steppe the Young Explorers are crossing on their way to the Gobi Desert is the livelihood of the nomads and their animals. 34% of the population rely directly on the nomadic / semi-nomadic pastoral systems as their major livelihood. They are scattered all over Mongolia with their 56 million head of sheep, goats, cattle, horses and camels, numbers are increasing.

90% of Mongolian territory is vulnerable to desertification, and especially these areas are used as rangelands. Grazers reduce biomass, cause soil compaction, and increase the surface area of bare soil. This leads to an increase in daytime soil temperatures and makes the soil more vulnerable to wind erosion.
Did you know that Mongolia is the only country in the world with an increase of nomadism? An increase in total livestock numbers is of concern because the country has lost the original traditional livestock herding system due to modernisation of the socio-economic system, including grazing control practices, and at the same time has not yet established mechanisms to ensure the sustainable use of rangelands through livestock control and monitoring.