September 26, 2001 – Aboard the Trans Mongolian Railway

Bounded by Lake Baikal to the north and the Great Wall to the south is the Mongolian Plateau and Gobi Desert. This was the homeland of the brilliant, tough, well-drilled horsemen who, for over 500 years from the 13th century, plundered and occupied lands and cities from the Yellow River to the Danube. The capital of Mongolia, Ulan Bator, is a contradiction - a metropolis amid endless grass steppes, with donkeys and motorbikes, concrete apartment blocks and traditional Gers. We arrived in Ulan Bator at about three in the afternoon.