It rained all night. It stopped around 8:00 in the morning, and I decided to pack up everything and continue. Before taking the bike there, I walked up the hill to check if the road conditions changed. Everything seemed to indicate that it was possible and that the ground was solid. I went down without problems. Before completing the first two kilometers, I saw a van parked on the side of the road.

A woman was waving at me.

She belonged to a group of four people stranded due to a faulty radiator. They asked me for help because they needed extra tools. I don’t carry many with me, nor a variety of them, but I tried to help them. While one of them was under the van trying to fix it, through signs and single words I found out that they had spent the night there.

After a while, they found the solution to their problem. What they needed was pliers to tighten a joint, but what I had was only useful for tightening screws. Finally, with the help of a screw and two nuts, we achieve the desired effect. Before leaving, they asked me if I thought they could continue and cross the hills I came from. Since I had seen many different types of vehicles the night before, I considered it should not be a problem.

It’s almost 10:00 in the morning, and I must continue my trip.

Slowly but steadily, I rode south. The rain was tapping on my heels and I didn’t have time to spare. Every once in a while it catches up to me, but luckily it’s only light rain. Just in case, I try not to stop too much. I have a bad feeling the storm will come at any moment. I reached a paved section of approximately fifty-five kilometers before returning to offroad.

A few meters after reaching the asphalt, I see a 4×4 parked on the side of the road. Again, someone’s waving at me. It’s a group of three men, who have also been stranded because of the radiator. They aren’t looking for a fix, just for someone to help them with water to refill it. Unfortunately, I only had left the equivalent of a glass of water, and I was heading to Lake Ugii hoping to get some somewhere.

They were also driving towards the lake to spend the weekend.

While they told me they were going fishing, they offered me one liter of raisin juice. They suggested I could set my luggage in the van while they waited for a local to bring it to them, as they offered to take it there for me. Because of the rain, it would have been nice to drive lighter. Luckily, I didn’t transfer my luggage to the van because, after a while, we understood the problem was bigger.

Someone appeared riding a motorcycle with a full ten-liter bottle of water. Unfortunately, when they poured it into the radiator it came out right away. We don’t know what the problem is. Sadly, they decided to turn around and be towed to the first city where they could get help to repair the vehicle. I had to continue alone. It’s a shame.

I was sincerely hoping to spend a quiet day with native people.

When I got to the offroad stretch I regretted coming this way. It was raining lightly and the ground seemed quite loose. For a few kilometers, I tried riding the least muddy path or going over the small grass patches I could find. The latter is not always comfortable and easy, and I had to return to “the road” several times. Sometimes, getting back to the track isn’t easy either as there is uneven ground between both areas.

I only have twenty kilometers left to the lake, but getting there is becoming tedious, slow, and dangerous. I am driving over small hills and encountering mud at the foot of each elevation change. In one, the motorcycle skidded and we both ended up on the ground. While I thought I couldn’t get her back on her feet, I tried to implement a new method: balancing on the footrest using my body as a counterweight.

Surprisingly, I get her up with some ease.

The last hill I topped was about seven kilometers away from my destination. In the distance, I could already see the lake. The road becomes flatter, but not easier. The ground is full of loose stones and the motorcycle’s frame collides with them. I can see how the regulator is losing diffusers, worrying me the most. It could make the bike completely unusable. Just two kilometers away, I began to see small settlements in the form of campsites distributed along the coast.

I picked one and headed straight for it. I arrived at the campsite around 2:00 in the afternoon and found the owner coming out of the small grocery store he had at the entrance. When I asked if I could spend the night there, he responded there was no problem because he had no other guests. The night costs 70,000 Tugriks without electricity, bathroom, or internet.

I don’t have much cash and I asked to pay by card. The dataphone is out of battery but the owner tells me I can do it the next day while he leaves it charging with one of the many car batteries distributed around the campsite. I bought some things at the store and settled into the yurt. A few minutes later, the owner appears with firewood and lights the fire. With the heat rising, I took out the tent to dry. In the same way, I made good use of the rain and left the tarp on the bike to wash just before the storm started at 4:30 p.m.

Around 8:00 p.m. I hear other guests settling two yurts to my right.

It rained all night and the weather forecast says it will start improving at noon. However, clouds won’t go away. I prepared the motorcycle and organized my bag again while I heard my neighbors leave the yurt and head toward the lake. Around 10:00 in the morning, I walked towards the lake to see it and found a group of three people sitting on the shore.

They started waving at me as soon as they saw me. They offered me a drink and a popular Mongolian saying I was told the day before came to my mind.

“If they kick you, run. If they offer it to you, take it.”

I spent about two hours with them on the shore before we returned to camp. It looks like the sky is clearing up and it hasn’t rained in the last 4 hours. I return to the shore with one of the women in the group to throw some stones into the lake. Back at the camp, I say goodbye to them but they insist I should stay and that today was not a good day to ride. They served me some instant noodles while they waited for three other friends to arrive.

Around midday, they took out the vodka and started drinking. Their friends arrived a couple of hours later. The first group I met, two brothers and a couple, is from Erdenet. The second, a master bricklayer and two students, is from Orhon. Being six against one, translating everything they wanted to tell me was difficult. I tried to focus on one conversation at a time, but everyone had something to say.

The newly arrived group brought equestrian offal that they boiled using the yurt stove. With so much vodka, the conversations and songs began to die down. I went to bed around 4:30 and called it a day.