Word: mongolia
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Dang. The only thing that came to mind when I rode was the pressing need for more padding under my duff. But I was happy to be among the few Westerners who have had a taste of Mongolia, the rocky, remote north-central Asian country with few fences and fewer roads--the realm of Genghis Khan and a political tug toy of China and Russia until well into the 20th century. Since the Alaska-size former Soviet satellite gained independence in 1990, it has opened to travelers seeking adventure in breathtakingly pristine country. A dearth of such conveniences as electricity...
...people's lists," says Simon Moyle, founder of 4th World Adventure, a tour operator based in London. He started the company after falling in love with Mongolia on an independent bike tour. "It's not like Kenya, where people have been there and done that. It's still so distant--not even on this planet. Once you've been to Mongolia, you feel like you've achieved something...
...inhabitants outside the capital mean reliance on other markers. "It's best to follow the telephone lines," our driver says. "They always go someplace"--in our case, straight into a big gold mine where giant earth-digging machines belch fumes and wildcatters pan in acrid ditches. (Mining is Mongolia's most valuable industry, though most Mongolians work in agriculture. Pollution is a problem around Ulan Bator, especially from the burning of soft coal in power plants...
...cattle have died of cold and starvation in Mongolia's fourth-successive winter of disastrous weather
...Time: What about Mongolia stands out in your memory? Stewart: The size of it, the scale of it. It's like what the American West once was. There are no roads, no fences, no ditches, no houses. It's just an elemental landscape, a stripped landscape, a landscape of shape and form and size and sweep. That's what lingers with me, the romance...