Gobi Desert: Yolyn Am – a gorge that’s gorge!

I may have popped to the next-door continent briefly, but, as I’ve told you before, that doesn’t mean I’m finished quite yet with my tales from the Central Asian side. Accordingly, I continue them from the Gobi Desert; specifically, from Yolyn Am – the deep, narrow gorge in the Gurvan Saikhan Mountains in southern Mongolia – here.

At its narrowest point the width of the gorge is a mere few meters:

Then it widens, and at the very end the mountains drop away and it merges into the wide expanses of steppe:

Alas, we didn’t get to the very end. But how tricky it would have been I still don’t know: our guides told us the length of the gorge is four kilometers; however, the internet tells me – nine!

An amazing place. And, though the Gobi Desert is one of the driest places on the planet, it still has, in places, fast flowing streams of water!

Snow used to cover this area the whole year, but recently, come September – it’s all melted. It seems there’s no escaping global warming – even in the Gobi Desert (…

A wonderful afternoon’s walk. However, next time we really must go the full length of the gorge – no matter how long it is!

Eek. This deserves a placard with ‘He also wanted to walk the full length of the gorge’!

Whereas this little guy entertained no such ambitions:

Assorted evening scenes:

Yaks and horses – and camels! – grazing together:

Night falls. Time to wrap up…

Real quickly, the blackest of nights fell – so pitch black that our drivers lost their way! Lots of roads – all going in different directions! No mobile coverage, no navigator. Eek. We could have shouted for help – not that it’d have done us any good out here in the middle of nowhere. After several tense minutes… we made it onto the right road and were out of there. Phew! That was a close one!

All the pics from Mongolia and the Gobi Desert are here.