View of Restoration Lake (video clip)

Maybe not the best place to be pole-axed by a stomach bug, but the wilds of western Mongolia are a beautiful place to recuperate.

Buying Sam's Del (video clip)

Preparing for sub-zero temperatures in Tavn Bogd, we buy traditional Kazakh 'dels'. Toasty.

Khovsgol, Northern Mongolia

On the shores of Lake Khovsgol we set out for a 4-day horse-trek. Sam was determined to put her fear of horses behind her. So it was a relief when her slow, stubborn and flatulent horse, aptly named Dobbin, got on just fine.
Similar to its Russian big brother, Baikal, this is a landscape of glacial waters surrounded by peaks and pines. With winter advancing, needles were nipped to vibrant yellow. Along with our guides, Bataar and Umbaar, and our Slovenian companion, Aleks, we braved the cold to camp by the lake. We were warmed in the evenings by a roaring fire, lively conversation, rounds of vodka and the odd sing-song. By our third night, though, we were to stay in our first nomadic family ger.
The ice was broken between guests and hosts when Sam unleashed ultra-spicy noodles on the Mongolian palate. It went down quite nicely with a spot of yak yoghurt. Huddled under a mound of blankets, we turned in early to sleep (a bit). The plod back saw yet more stops with Bataar's family and friends for 'chai' and yak-based snacks. We were now fully initiated into ger etiquette.On our long drive back to UB, we detoured via Mongolia's biggest monastery at Amarbaysgalant Khiid. Set deep in the hills, it might have been described as serene but for the exuberance of the pre-teen monks' game of football. That night, the weather suddenly turned and we woke up to a frosted Buddha...

Tour of a Ger (video clip)

Making ourselves at home in a nomadic family's ger.

Umbaar Singing (video clip)

Around the campfire by Khovsgol Lake our guide Umbaar sings a traditional Mongolian song.

Central Mongolia

We have completely fallen in love with The Land of the Blue Sky. Many thanks to Ju for bombarding our travel suggestions' box. Mongolia is a huge, utterly beautiful, unfenced wilderness. We hired a Russian 4 wheel drive minivan to get out of Ulaanbaatar and explore...

Only a few miles out of the city and we were enjoying breathtaking sights. Our first stop was in Genghis Khan's ancient capital Kharkhorin and the monastery of Erdene Zuu, where we felt privileged to witness a Buddhist chanting ceremony in full flow.

Our trip involved long days in the jeep and overnights in gers (also known as yurts). This one kept us safe and warm in the middle of wolf territory.

Testing hours of driving were broken up with the occasional photo stop. This one at Chuluut Gorge, where we somehow became a source of entertainment for a boisterous group of Mongolian tourists.

We gazed out as the landscape unfolded from grassland steppe to volcanic starkness, some of it pretty frightening.
At Terkhiin Tsagaan Nuur (Great White Lake) we finally stretched our legs. Hiking up the local peak to enjoy magnificent views of this eerie landscape.

Temperatures were plummeting and the nomadic families were busy preparing to move on. Time for us to hit the road too, this time for a long ride north.

Ulan-Ude, Russia

In a land not known for smiles, we were bowled over by the friendliness of the local Buryat people. Though the biggest face in town was rather more austere - the world's largest bust of Lenin - which loomed over the main square.

More lively than Lenin, lucky coincidence meant that we met up with our Olkhon friends Nir, Vania and Leon. Thanks to Vania's language ability we found our way by various 'mashrutka' or 'all-pile-in' minibuses to the centre of Russian Buddhism; The Ivoglinsky Datsan of Ulan-Ude.

This last taste of Russia felt unmistakably Asian, in perfect preparation for our next stop (barring the 10 hour border crossing): Mongolia.

Olkhon Island, Lake Baikal, Russia

We had been looking forward to pitching our new tent since we left the beaches of Greece exactly a month ago. We were off to explore this natural wonder in Eastern Siberia and we kept staring at our pocket map, amazed at just how far overland we had come.

Lake Baikal is the world's oldest (50 million years) and deepest (1,600 metres) lake, holding 20% of all freshwater supplies on earth. Olkhon is its biggest island and where we chose to concentrate our time. It reminded Phil of West Scotland for the first few days until we hit open steppe and wooden farmsteads. Forests, cliffs, grassy plains, rugged beaches, sandy beaches...and the purest icy waters for morning wake-up dips. Legend says that jumping into Lake Baikal will add 25 years to your life expectancy so we're well on our way to 200!

We trekked the 50km up to the northernmost tip of the island at a very leisurely pace, using our stove until it conked out and then building camp fires to cook up our limited supplies of oats and noodles. We had seen very few people until the end of our trip when we walked into a tiny village set into a steep valley at sunset and saw two brightly-coloured tents pitched slightly up and away from the pebbly beach. Leon, a banjo-playing cyclist from Bavaria owned one tent and the other belonged to Nir and Vania, two academics living in Manchester, from Israel and Bosnia-Herzogovina.

We immediately struck up lively conversations and spent the next two days swapping stories, walking the 6km round-trip to a local farm to buy odd-tasting dairy products that turned our stomachs, pooling our leftover food, hustling bread from the village and cooking together on our camp fire.

A hitching adventure resulted in us cracking open the emergency ration of minstrels after slogging 20 km with full packs without a whisper of a ride. Eventually a van filled with omul (trout-like fish and local speciality) took us out of the wilderness to the nearest village from where we caught a 7 hour bus, not without a breakdown on the way, back to civilisation for the next leg of our Trans-Siberian journey.

Camping by Lake Baikal (video clip)

On the shore of Lake Baikal, we christen our new tent... 'Tadpole'.

Yekaterinaberg, Russia

Famous for one thing, the murder of the Imperial Family in 1918, we had hoped there would be a little more to Yekaterinaberg. Fortunately, there was: we arrived on the city's 286th birthday celebrations. So our obligatory trip to the Church of the Romanov Saints was complimented by a wander around this working Russian city in carnival atmosphere.

More lively than the party was our host, Tatiana. Faced with a functional overnight in a grim Soviet-era hotel, Tatiana approached us on the street and charmed us into staying in her spare room. Communication was ebullient if strained, and privacy was simply not an option (she became very familiar with our underwear). But her goodwill was overwhelming and we'll remember Tatiana fondly.

I Like You! (video clip)

Our host Tatiana unusually restrained for the camera

Life Aboard The Trans-Siberia

Things we liked:

Samovar - Piping hot water on tap for endless tea and noodles
Picnics - We just love a picnic and this was a week-long one
Chess - Sneaking off to the buffet car for chess and the odd beer
Food stalls - Sam loved poking around these platform features to buy local snacks and fresh fruit
Reading - A week sweeping through the Russian landscape is the time to pick up a classic
Windows - Sticking your head out for blasts of fresh air

Things we disliked:
Tyrannical provodniks - The attendants with petty power over our tickets and loo locks
Constant pungent wafts of fish, eggs, beer and worse
Cabin mates who seemed to think that we were invisible

Slow Train Coming (video clip)

The eerie arrival on platform of the 2am 118 to Yekaterinaberg