The next day the road was better (only one wet river crossing) and we made it to Moron at around 12:00 hrs. Saraa from the tourist office brought us to a garage where we had the front brake pads changed. The rear ones were still better than our spare ones, so we left them alone. After one of our rare lunches in a restaurant we drive 18km out of town to a burial site with several deer stones (engraved bronze age pillars). While we were there several cars pulled up and were allowed to park next to one of the pillars. When we came closer we saw that is was a Shamaan ceremony. Two Shamaan in full dress played drums and sang. Two ladies (one pregnant) followed the instructions of one of the Shaman and sprinkled milk in the 4 wind directions. We respected their request of no photograph so we don’t have any pictures of this private ceremony.

Today we went the extra mile and continued from Moron over the new tarmac road (92km), north to Lake Khovsgol Nuur. It was later in the evening and raining when we arrived so we just tried to find a camping spot just outside of the lake town of Khatgal. Unfortunately so does half of Mongolia of a Saturday in July. The lake front was dotted with campsites on the slope with either wooded huts, Ger’s or tents. After persisting against the fatigue we found a lovely spot of our own, just several kilometres further. What makes this lake different from the others in Mongolia is that it has high hills around it, which are covered with trees. It is very similar to lake Baikal. We are close again to the Russian border.

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