High passes

The soums are laid out in orderly rows of dirt streets & house yards marked by wooden fences. Some yards have wooden houses while others have gers. The high mountain passes are marked at the top by shrines, always with blue silk blowing in the wind.

This large important shrine had a prayer wheel, which you turn clockwise & you also walk round the shrine clockwise, adding rocks, cows heads or other items to the pile.

The Mongolian countryside with wildflowers, trees, pine forests & wide rivers was a surprise for me too Francie. I guess I had an image of steppes & not much else in mind, before I began travelling. The country looks like a parkland because of the constant grazing by millions of sheep, goats, cattle, yak & horses.  There were many lovely surprises to discover in the landscape & warmth of the people.