Inner Mongolia September 13-15, 2019

I have been wanting to go to Inner Mongolia for a while now. I just haven't been able to figure out a good way to get there. The high speed trains don't go to the locations I want to visit.

I was excited when I found out that a tour group would take us there. Little did I know that the tour group had only been in business for 1 year and were a bit inexperienced. They changed the pickup location and changed the itinerary many times, which made things a bit stressful. They were less expensive that some of the other tours and were very nice people, but they needed to be a bit more organized.

On the first day, we traveled to the Xilamuren grassland. Xilamuren means, "Yellow River" in Mongolia. When we got there, there were yurts, goats, and horses everywhere.

Staying in a yurt was fun and cozy. The dome structure made it echo when we talked.

The food there was very traditional and hard for all of us to stomach. All we were able to eat was rice, chicken, and soup. The had a goat eating ritual that was kind of interesting.

Connor has been working really hard to perfect his use of chopsticks and he got really good at it while we were in Mongolia. They didn't even have spoons.

We rode horses to a tent in the grassland and got served warm milk tea. Connor and I rode a full size horse and Camilla and Carly rode small horses.

The next day, we headed to the Kubuqui desert. Natural landscapes, such as the sand sea, sand hills, and lakes are preserved there.

Many dinosaurs also inhabited this area of Inner Mongolia.

We took a 40 minute cable car ride up to the desert park.

We went Jeep Riding,

Camel riding,

and sand surfing.

The kids loved these milk tablets. People snack on them throughout the day. I still don't know exactly what they are, but they remind me of Tums.

Riding the camels was unforgettable.

Connor said, "This is the coolest thing ever!!"

When we were in line to get on the camels, a fat black lady from our group fell off as the camel stood up. It was like a scene from America's Funniest Videos and I could not stop laughing about it. Thankfully, she did not get offended by my laughing.

When we got to the zipline, they said that all riders need to be at least 35 kg. to ride. When we weighed Carly, she was only 34. I knew that she would throw a fit so the group helped me sneak her on. Connor freaked out when we got to the top. I encouraged him to go anyway and it was so funny that I took a video. They were giving him instructions in Chinese and we were all translating for him.

On our last day, we visited the Museum of Inner Mongolia. We saw some interesting breeds of dinosaurs, traditional clothes, and some religious figures. Apparently, there is a deity named Tara.

One thing that I think this tour group did well was setup for our group to eat at some of the best Hot Pot restaurants in Mongolia. Our family has grown to really love hot pot and we are always looking to try new means, soups, and sauces.

We met a lot of interesting people from all over the world in our group. They all thought I was fascinating because I brought all of my kids to China on my own. I thought the group from Denmark was interesting because they loved to drink, laugh, and dance. There was a group of Malaysian girls that giggled and goofed off the whole time. There was a couple from Fiji who played their loud music all of the time. There was also a group of really sweet Chinese girls who helped translate Chinese for us.