From Khuvsgul Lake we went south and to Murun again. There we found some friendly Mongolians who filled up our gas bottle, which was not that easy in the beginning, but when the guys saw that we had a lot of adapters for our bottle, they got curious and in the end, together we managed to fill the bottle up and had quite some fun doing that.

From Murun, we took another offroad track to a lake. The track was absolutely Mongolian, but we felt pretty used to it at that point and so it all went quite easily. At the shore of the lake there were billions of insects…

…and so we parked a bit away from the shore on a small hill where the wind was a bit stronger and there were fewer insects.

It was a beautiful lake, but we stayed only one night.

When we continued, we came across a regional Naadam and took a look around. I liked this game in which the players flicked pieces with their fingers to hit some targets.

Every player had a nice leather bag especially for his slide and stones.

There were plenty of opportunities for snacks, mostly served from small shops like this one.

The kids were playing some lottery games.

And the older people shot bows, which Racki and I felt to be very interesting and nice, so we said again that if we came across a nice bow and arrows, we should maybe get them.

Of course there were beautiful horses.

And the traditional wrestling.

The atmosphere between Racki and me was a bit tense. I’d say for no proper reason, but just because… of reasons. As can happen sometimes…

When we took a small corner just a couple of kilometers before our destination for the day, we came across some very drunken Mongolians who had somehow managed to crash their mini transporter against a pole at the side of the track and then crashed in reverse up a stone pile. We got our recovery stuff out, some sober Mongolians joined the party, and together we got the mini transporter back on the track again. The drunken guys were very happy and able to continue their drive.

Since we’d entered Russia, I had the impression that I was hearing and sometimes feeling a clonk sound when driving Rosinante, especially on little bumps, rocks, or corrugated tracks. At one moment that sound got more intense, and we stopped to have a look.

From previous sound diagnostics, we had learned to first remove Rosinante’s underbody armor because that useful but sometimes very annoying thing had misled our diagnoses quite a few times. While removing it, the thread of one of the screws fixating the body armor broke again. But that could not have been the source of the sound we were looking for.

Again, I tried to find the reason for that sound lying under Rosinante, and then I found it! It was the inner end of the driver’s side front CV shaft that had play—the part that was sticking into Rosinante’s front differential. I was not amused, and having this tension already between Racki and me, the first minutes after finding this on a very small track in Mongolia were not easy for me. We already knew how demanding the tracks were and how difficult it could be to find spare parts and have things repaired, based on experiences from friends who had visited Mongolia in the past.

And a damaged and maybe soon broken front differential—meaning no 4x4 and no low gear in Mongolia—sounded not good to me at all.

But just a couple of hundred meters away from where we found the source of the sound, we found a nice camp spot by a river, and Racki and I calmed down and started a constructive dialogue about what our options would be.

Meanwhile, the yaks enjoyed the refreshing water of the river and calmed down as well.

Racki and I contacted all the mechanic friends we had, and I started a topic on Reddit (you can read it here, but be warned, it contains some spoilers for future developments on that topic). After that and some more research, we got various opinions about the issue ranging from “I would not drive like this, could destroy the front differential” to “I’ve seen worse on a brand new Hilux” As always with car topics…

We decided that we would try our luck with the mechanics of the nearby village.

The people at the first garage were absolutely not motivated to deal with us and the translator app to have a look at our issue. The guys at the second garage were motivated and had a look, but lacked the right tool to investigate further. We needed a 36mm socket to proceed with our diagnosis. But one of the Mongolians told us via translator that we could go to his home and check if he had the right tool.

This guy was absolutely lovely. At his home, he had an old small truck with lots of used and some broken tools, and he had the right socket. So we decided that we would try our luck and check the issue with the help of that nice man.

We removed the CV shaft and found that the play was definitely at the inner part sticking into the differential. So we decided to detach it from the wheel to not stress it further and have it checked in a proper garage. In this photo you see the result of our work, and at that moment we felt very good about our decision. But oh boy, this will change soon…

The whole family of our new friend was super nice, and they showed us their beautiful Mongolian house. They gave us snacks and a very Mongolian drink that had been boiling all day on the stove: Mongolian tea with milk and vodka.

The father was very proud of the prizes and medals he got in horse races.

A friend or uncle, pretty drunk, joined us as well. It was super nice, and we felt very grateful that this man had helped us and that his family was so welcoming.

We decided to change our plans, take another potentially less demanding route to the volcano we wanted to visit, and then continue our way to Ulaanbaatar (the capital of Mongolia) to have Rosinante fixed. And if there were a nice garage on the way, we would maybe check Rosinante’s issue with them.

On the way, we came across these magnificent vultures.

There were quite a lot of them.

And we found these nice feathers.

And we met these guys, maybe searching for front differential topics for their cars, maybe TikTok, maybe Pornhub… Especially the fellow on the left impressed me with his elaborate technique for resting his head while eating and using his phone.

We made it in time to our meeting with Zdenko, our very good friend, whom we have met so often while traveling already. He was just walking through Japan with a self-built small trailer which he was pulling while walking.

He decided to take a detour and visit us in Mongolia and it was awesome to see him again!

After we picked Zdenko up, we continued our trip to Khuvsgul Lake which was not that far anymore. Zdenko and I were sitting in the front of Rosinante and Racki in the back. So I tried my best to make Rosinante not jump and tilt around, which was not that easy.

Our first night we spent close to the southern villages of Khuvsgul Lake: Zdenko in a tent and Racki and I in Rosinante.

The next morning, we continued north on the east side of the lake. This lake was huge! We had to take an offroad track (of course) which was first stony and then got more and more muddy.

On our way, we met a German tourist with his German-speaking guide and asked them about the track conditions ahead. They were pretty positive about it and showed us on the map the points from which the tracks on the western and eastern sides of the lake would get really nasty.

We continued and passed some impressive yaks. The track got more and more muddy and we followed some big trucks that were going in the same direction as us. I had learned that following the locals can be very beneficial, and especially heavier and bigger vehicles can be very helpful in finding the easiest track for fat-ass Rosinante.

In the end, we made it to a magnificent camp spot, but the way there was not so easy. The two trucks showed us a good way through a couple of muddy sections and several river crossings. In the last river crossing, one of the trucks broke some of its leaf springs, but the driver was confident that he would make it further and back to town.

So we left them behind and continued our offroad trip through some more nasty, muddy parts. After a couple of hours already, I was feeling like arriving would be nice, and at the same time, I really wanted to get to a very nice camp spot to make offroading worth it.

But it continued to be not so easy. It took us quite some time to scout on foot, investigate satellite photos, etc., to find a track that would lead to the shore of the huge lake. But these last three kilometers were quite swampy and we had to scout and push through several times to not get Rosinante’s fat ass stuck somewhere in the middle of nowhere.

After some more pushing, and especially one pretty crazy push through the last swampy part, we had made it!

And the spot was amazing!

We had a new bird friend who was living right next to us and hunting just a couple of meters in front of us.

The weather was quite fresh but super nice in the sun, and even the rainy hours felt refreshing and nice.

When we did a hike around the cove where we had parked, a young reindeer just approached us, coming out of the woods. She was absolutely trusting and friendly, and we loved her!

So she joined our gang and we gave her the name Clicky because her joints were sometimes making very distinct clicking sounds when she was walking.

Clicky was very photogenic!

And the water of the lake was amazing!

We met some dead friends and of course…

…the horse gangs, who were the most fearful of all. Zdenko loved seeing and taking photos of all the animals and the nice views.

We spent several days at this nice spot and had a good time.

And then came the day of going back… I had some thoughts about how we could make it back through the swampy parts…

So we scouted our options and thought about it. In the end, I said that putting on the snow chains wouldn’t take much time and would be a kind of insurance that we would make it.

I started Rosinante and let her warm up all the way because we knew we would need all the power she had. And we really needed all her power! It was crazy, and I really have to say that it would have been nice to have a drone video of this! When the tricky part started, I pushed Rosinante in her second low gear to about 3000 rpm, and soon it became clear that these snow chains were absolutely necessary. When we were losing momentum as she started jumping through this swampy meadow, I pushed her up into the red and she was really milling through this swamp! Dirt, grass, and water were flying all over Rosinante, and in the end, after some drifts and pushing more, we made it!

We went back along the track we came from days ago and met some more friends. Zdenko was driving Rosinante as well and had a good time trying offroading in a car for the first time.

After lunch and getting groceries and water, we went up the western shore, which had much better roads. At a shamanic place and small camp, we met some reindeer herders and shamans. They told us that in a couple of days there would be a shamanic festival, and Racki and I decided to attend it.

The reindeer were super cute and friendly. And their horns were warm and pulsating.

In the end, the western coast turned out to be fully packed with yurt camps. It was not possible to find a nice wild camp spot, so we continued and continued. The very nice asphalt road turned into a construction site. We had to take a detour close to the water of the lake and through a muddy forest… It was Mongolian!

In the end, after all the camps and really bad tracks, we made it to an awesome camp spot!

And had one of our signature meals: wraps with Pampe (self-made spread).

One day, we did a super nice hike! From the top, we could see the size of this lake. Some key facts about it: it sits at 1,645 meters above sea level, stretching 136 kilometers long and reaching 262 meters deep; it holds 70% of Mongolia’s fresh water and 0.4% of all fresh water on Earth; it’s two to seven million years old, formed by tectonic activity, and it completely freezes over from late November through May with ice up to 1.5 meters thick!

The locals drive cars and trucks on it in winter! And some ended up at the bottom. In this photo, in the top left, you can see a huge ice floe floating on this magnificent lake!

We loved it!

And look at this water! Our camp spot was just on the right side of the photo at the shore.

The surrounding mountains looked astonishing!

On our way back, we caught some rain, but we were happy about this hike!

And the weather continued to look awesome!

For our last days, Zdenko surprised us with a night in one of the many, many yurt camps. So Racki and I got our own yurt! It was very interesting, and of course, I kept practicing playing guitar every day.

The yurt had a wood stove to heat it up and a couple of nice details.

Our host was a very interesting, friendly, talkative, and honest Mongolian lady. More about her in the next post. Merel and Leon joined us as well and slept in their ambulance, and together we went for dinner in one of the nearby restaurants. Our host was translating and helping us a lot, so we learned a lot of interesting things about Mongolia.

In the restaurant, we came very close to our bird friends, but we preferred the living ones.

And after nine days, Zdenko had to leave and head back to Ulaanbaatar. We loved the time with him, the inspiration and stories we exchanged, and we are absolutely sure that we will meet again!