By Nico & Marijke
From Zamyn-Üüd to Saynshand.
Had breakfast in Trudy & Dirk’s room in the morning. The restaurant in the hotel was under renovation. After breakfast, Dirk continued with maintenance on the Model-T. He couldn’t get the right pressure on a tire, he couldn’t get any air in it. A new band went around it.
In the meantime, the sand from the windscreen of the Land Rover was washed off after a sandstorm raged for two days. The Land Rover was filled with our luggage. Everyone, even a hotel employee, helped carry everything down from the fourth floor. The activities surrounding both cars attracted a lot of attention. Everyone wanted to have their picture taken with the T-Ford. When everything was packed and the T-Ford had been serviced, we started with the “sticker moment”. Our names were carefully stuck on the Landrover by Dirk, after we had chosen a nice spot. Stickers of 2 sponsors were also stuck on it. The “key moment” was also officially performed. Dirk gave us the keys to the Landrover. All photo and film moments.
And then the moment had come for the caravan to leave. We waited for each other outside the parking lot gates. A police car stopped in front of us and five officers jumped out of the car and ran towards us. To my amazement, they all wanted to have their picture taken with the Model-T.
We also had a lot of attention during the ride.
The road to Sajnshand wound through the Gobi Desert. Gobi means “very big and dry”. And that was indeed the case. The desert landscape stretches all the way to the horizon: exceptionally beautiful and intriguing. Then flat again, then sand dunes and hills again. The desert is more varied than I thought. Along the way we saw different animal species: black kites, herds of cattle, camels, horses, sheep, Mongolian gazelles. Even a group of Elm trees should not be missing from the landscape. At one of the breaks we stopped at two gers, where there was a camel with two young ones.
We arrived in Sajnshand around 5 p.m. The Model-T went under a green tarpaulin. The Land Rover was locked in such a way that the alarm would no longer go off at night. While enjoying our meal we discussed today’s many new impressions.