seb's infos and roadbook on mongolia

Information - MONGOLIA

roads i've cycled so far:
- the gobi, road from erhenhot (china) or zamyn udd (mongolian side) to ulan baatar (ub) +/-700km
- a loop in mongolia from ub – erdenet – bulgan – moron – tosonsengel – tsetserleg – ub+/-2000km
see roadbook below for details

road conditions:
although some parts of the road tend to be asphalted, it is not wrong to say that the roads are mainly dirt roads with all the different possible qualities of dirt roads. in many placees some work is in progress but mongolian road builders are extremely slow (at least compared to china) asphalt is mainly around ub and towards russia (suhbaatar)
see road book for details.

visas:
i got my visa in beijing. it cost me 300 yuan for the visa its self (30 euros) plus 200 yuan (20 euros) for next day service (if you don't want to wait a week) plus 5 yuan for bank fee (you pay in a different place, all explained in the embassy) for the embassy address i forgot! see lonely planet! the embassy opens in the morning for visas (monday to friday).
in ub i extended my visa for another month (61 $, payment in dollars) without any problem despite the fact that i didn't register in the first 7 days of my arrival (this rule seems to be over even if you still pay 1250 t to get registered). cyclers entering from the west of mongolia did not extend their visa for the time they were on the road till ub and did everything in ub after over staying their visa over a month, but it would be a good idea to phone the foreign affair minister from olgi in that case (sorry, i don't know the phone number). to extend your visa, go south on the main street from the south west corner of sukhbaatar square in ub. just before "peace" bridge a road turns right making a bend. then you can't miss the big white building on your right.

money/cost:
at the boarder (mongolian side) 1$ = 1187.7 tougrik (t)
in most of the country you'll have 1$ for 1200 t
in ub you can pay guest houses and tours etc. in dollars
in ub there is plenty of atm machines (post office for ex. near sukhbaatar square)
banks change dollars and euros but best rate was available on the 2nd floor of the "flower corner" (peace avenue and toiruu intersection, near french embassy)
life in mongolia is cheap. a meal costs around 1200 to 1500 t (goulash)
accomodation in ub is around 4-6 $ (gh including free breakfast or free coffee, depending where)

bike/shop:
in ub there are some spare parts on the black market but the cheap spare parts are chinese
some tour agencies may be helpful if you really need something (seven summit in front of the post office) but at a high price. so globally don't expect much! out of ub there is nothing!

accomodation:
in ub i stayed in gobi gh situated in the court yard in front the post office (sukhbaatar square). it was 5$ per night with free coffee/tea. it is not the cheapest of ub but it have a kitchen and hot shower, internet (slow) in summer. it is on the 3rd floor but you can park your bike next to the door and it's safe. many other gh possible in ub, up to you!

map:
i cycled the gobi with just a photocopy of a chinese map that included this part of mongolia. but then in ub you can find really good maps.
the "mongolian net work map" was really accurate and the distances were most of the time good. it is enough for cycling on main road/track according to me. if you want to get out of the main road you can also find some good 1/500000 russian maps at a map shop situated on the west part of peace avenue behind serge gh. every sheet is 5000t to 7000t. i bought some for my trip but honestly they are not worth the money for this road nor for the gobi, but if you plan to get in remote areas they'll be useful for water finding.

internet facilities:
ub is packed with cyber cafes open 24h a days. in the post office one works quite well for 600t an hours. taking the street heading south, opposite the state department store, there is one on the right hand side (state dep. store in your back) that has better pcs for 800t. out of ub it will be possible to find internet in main cities (moron, erdenet, tsetserleg....)

weather:
i had mainly good weather (autumn - mid sept. to mid november) but some few days of snow. the main concern is the cold and it may be very coldy at this season with terrible blizzards and wind (coming from north / north west)
after september you must have winter gear to cycle there and if you plan to go in winter, be ready for really cold weather even in the gobi. the north of mongolia (moron) is terribly cold even in october (it is cooler than tibet in december) so keep this in mind....

gobi traverse:
a really nice road of about 700km with 500 km of it unpaved, except the section from choyr to ub. it took me around 10 days to complete it. on the way north i got some strong head winds on the last section, fortunately it was paved road. the water was less a problem than i expected and the road - even if not always good - was not as bad as i've been told, and pushing is very seldom needed, except for some short sand patches.

about the boarder!!!
you're not allowed to cycle the 6 km of no-man-land between china and mongolia. here how it worked for me:
- on the way in (to ub): the military threw me in a bus that cost me nothing except 5 yuan for a kind of toll gate. but the driver wanted to through me out of the bus after the chinese boarder. but thanks to mongolian people inside the bus who fought for me i was able to continue till mongolia without paying.
- on the way out (from ub) the military (again) threw me in a jeep for free till the mongolian boarder, where the driver threw me - for free too - out of the jeep. and then i had to take another jeep till china that cost me 30 yuan. no hassle at the boarder its self but it would be a very bad idea to over stay your visa (85$ fine for the first day....)

ROAD BOOKS - information:

distances
the distances are always in kilometers, according to my speedometer (TOPKEA at the moment) witch is maybe generous of about 2% compared to the kilometer-markers. When possible there is the KMM of the road BUT, those kilometer are not always right either and depending the road, the distance of the speedometer differes (sometime 2% difference, sometime 4%, sometimes -2%....). i never tryed to make the speedometer and KMM distance look the same, i simply wrote down what i saw on both of them. for the speedometer i most of the time took the approximate distance, so it can explain some differences to (for ex 2.3 get 2 or 2.5 exept if i feel it s importante to be precise). the best to limitated the difference is to use the information location from location. Some time some small detour (lunch away from rd, water....) are not off the calcul so this can also add to the difference in the end. Keep in mind than it's just indication! although i did my best to make it as accurated as possible some mistakes may have occured (writing in the rain, re-typing....). I'm in advance extremely sorry for this!

altitudes
the watch altitude (sunto vector watch) depends on the pressure, so the difference with reality can be important depending the weather. Generally speaking it's not too bad and will give a good information. For the GPS, some time it take ages before the "right" altitude appears, and i m not always patient enough!

GPS
I wrote down what seemed to me the most important points, but not all the rd due to battery saving as i really seldom go to hotels.

camping
on some rd i indicated my camp, not that i think that they are the best place (far from this!) but 1. it may give an idea of the speed (note that i'm quite a slow and lazy cycler) and 2. it helps me to make the rd book!!!

road condition
this is not totaly objective! some time in bad days the rd doesn't look good even if it s asphalt!
so here to give you an idea about my classification:
- asphalt: the best
- good rd: no breaking in down hills
- ok rd: acceptable, you ride without thinking to much of it
- so/so rd: you break in downhill and can't ride without looking at the rd all the time, and your ass notices it!
- bad rd: means what it means!
- very bad rd: you push your bike...
- corrugated: you'll learn quickly what it means if you don't know yet: stony, gravel, sandy, muddy....

general
note that i don't write every thing and than things that would have been important to you at a time were not for me at the same place, sorry for this. most of all keep in mind that rd condition change as PSB rules, and that that information is just information.

PSB
when i see a PSB in the region i most of the times mention it, this means that if you stay in the city and are not suppose to be there, there is chance that the PSB visits you in the eve or even in the day. open barrier" means that there was a CP but nobody cared about me passing it. military CP are generally speaking safe.

abbreviations
EL = electricity line, power line
RW = rail way
TOR = turn off right
TOL = turn off left
X = cross rd
BFB = basic food and beverage
All = hotel, restaurant, shop
@ = internet
CM = chinese pass marker
KMM = kilometers marker
KMS = kilometers speedometer
RRS = road repair station (good water place and some times even more...)
LP = lowest point
Rest = restaurant
ST = straight
CP = check post
R = right
L = left
PSB = "petit salaud en bleu" = problems = police = public security bureau
Rd = road
TS = truck stop

Ub - ub tour via erdenet – bulgan – moron – tosontsengel - tsetserleg

An almost 2000km trip that took me a month cycling.
the first part till bulgan is on paved road, the rest except some kilometers at the end is dirt road.
on your way west you'll get head wind, but as it's a loop, it's fair with you on the way back to ub :)
i did the loop in this sens as i was hurried by the winter, and the north of mongolia is extremely cold, even in october!