The last few days I have been getting a lot of love for a Mongolia post I posted almost a year ago. This made me revisit my Mongolia pictures and I realised there where still a lot of gems left there. So here it is, some nature porn. Endless Mongolia, full of pictures of Mongolia.
When we tell people where we’ve been and what we’ve done, we sort of forget about Mongolia. We mention it and people are intrigued but that’s it. To us, Mongolia was kind. It’s like a little blanket you wrap around. It’s comfortable, it’s insanely pretty and it makes you feel at home.
It’s been almost a year since we were in Mongolia. There are a few things I will never forget.
- I saw my first falling star in Mongolia
- We saved a man’s life. He was sleeping in a ger that caught on fire. I was shouting at him to get out and Nick got help to put out the fire.
- Because of the enormous growth of the Mongolian economy (due to the recent finding of rare metals), there is a small group of insanely rich people. The rest of the people aren’t. There is no middle class.
- This translates into: there are ger camps next to skyscrapers
- Nick held a gigantic Golden Eagle in Mongolia
- We hired a driver to take us to a ger camp and he didn’t speak a single word of English, except for ‘yes’. He kept repeating it, then laughing hysterically the entire drive. Funniest laugh I have ever heard.
Mongolia is beautiful, it’s a little quirky and it has amazingly friendly and inviting people, even though you will not say so at first sight. We loved it there, even though we were only there for ten days. We are surely going back for an in-depth visit soon. What about you? Have you visited Mongolia? If not, you should. Really.
It’s not often we stumble upon a travel related website that truly inspires us. 12hrs is the fantastic project of photographer Søren Jepsen and writer Anna Peuckert and this is what they have to say about 12hrs:
We love to travel. We also love design, and music, and fashion. And we were missing a website full of travel tips for people like us. Somewhere between the backpackers and the luxury hotels. With tips that aren’t about money, but about great discoveries from all around the world.
To keep it simple, we organized them in itineraries. 12 hours per trip. Sweet and short. With the best to see, do, eat, dance we could fit in one short stay. We ignored a lot of the usual recommendations, because we trust you that you will find the obvious tourist highlights yourself. You can follow our schedule, or you can just pick a few selected tips and ignore the rest. We won’t judge you. Let’s go on a trip together!
We love it because it’s true, there is no other place to get this kind of travel tips. We’re looking forward to their Portland guide as it’s one of the destinations on our bucketlist and we will definitely check out the Vancouver guide when we get to that side of the world.
Their website is great. Check it out and get inspired for your next trip.
all pictures are property of 12hrs
Bangkok is one of the most inspiring cities I’ve ever been too. Although we were only there for a month, I feel like we got to know the city. I truly loved it. Since we were both raised in small(-ish) Dutch cities that have nothing on a huge city like Bangkok, we were continuously in awe as we were wandering around.
There is so much going on in Bangkok, new cafes and shops are opening every day, and each one is even better than the last one. Because we are running our company while traveling, we are always looking for places that have an inspiring interior, fast wifi, tasty food, good drinks and a crowd that’s not spilling beer over our laptops.
Bangkok can be quite overwhelming at times. It’s so ginormous and busy and hot (oh god it’s so hot). If you are looking to escape the heat, have good coffee, work, or drink a beer or two (not all of them serve beer), these are the places to go. And there are so many more places like this, go out and explore!
If you find anything similar, let us know one way or another so we can visit them when we get to Bangkok sometime in the future!
Krabi’s morning market is all a market should be. Fresh fish, fresh meat, vegetables, fruit, fresh noodles. And breakfast. Krabi’s morning market made us want to get into a kitchen and cook. Everything is so fresh and it looks so great. Nick has been missing having a kitchen to cook and I’m really missing his cooking. I’ve eaten so many different things at so many different places but his cooking is still the best.
To be honest, the smell of fish didn’t work that well on my stomach at eight in the morning, but the fish were so fresh and good-looking that they were quickly forgiven. We had breakfast at Krabi’s morning market three days in a row and just wandered around a little (it’s not that big) looking at all the fresh wares. I think most of the Thai do their daily shopping here, I would if I lived here.
There is something magical about the landscape of Mongolia. It calls for you to come and explore. The landscape constantly transforms, leaving you breathless from the moment you wake up until the moment you crawl back into your gertent.
This is a collection of the skulls I found while exploring. Click here for more incredible pictures of the landscape of Mongolia.
I love to visit unusual and weird museums. It can surprise and even shock you in ways a regular museum never could. It’s often in a drafty, dusty old building that smells like a proper museum, with high ceilings, filled with curiosities and devices you’ve never seen or even knew about. It doesn’t have fancy audio tours, just a scruffy leaflet printed on cheap paper, and that’s the way it should be.
There is just something about a quirky and weird museum that gets me super excited. Ever since I was young I’ve always wanted my own collection of curiosities. So far I’ve collected one mummified mouse. It’s in an air tight box and I’m too afraid to open it.
St. Petersburg has a lot of museums. The most well-known is the Hermitage of course. We could have gone there, but instead we went to the Zoological Museum. If you like taxidermy, animals or weird things, this is the place for you. It’s one of the ten largest natural history museums in the world. The crazy collection consists of over 17 million species, although only 500 thousand species are displayed. The rest of the animals are kept in a huge storage facility.
Being in a Russian museum can be slightly overwhelming. Hell, being in Russia can be slightly overwhelming. Russians are not known for their friendly and helpful nature. Upon entering the museum all English signs disappear and you are left alone in a ginormous museum with no idea what to do, where to go or how to get out.
I’m not sure what happened when they were preparing the animals. Maybe the taxidermist drank too much vodka but most animals have a weird grin on their face. Most fish look shocked and a lot of the bigger animals (deers, bears) look very angry. There was a little Bambi like deer that looked like it was about to fuck me up.
What is your favorite weird museum?
On a Friday-night we found ourselves in a former bicycle factory with no idea what was going on. Somehow we found ourselves at one of the opening parties of Beijing Design Week. China has an amazing amount of talented designers and they gathered in the Dashilar hutong to show what they create.
We have already shown you one of our favorite pieces. Designers Aida Studio strung and lit 1,664 of Beijings famous ceramic yoghurt jars to compose Milkywave. It is an impressive chandelier that looped through a two-story stairway.
Most part of Beijing Design Week was situated in the Dashilar Hutong of Beijing. In addition to design aficionados, the hutong inhabitants also stopped by for a visit, making for mixed crowd. Most shops and showrooms were situated inside of ancient courtyard houses. It gave us a little glimpse of real hutong life. One of those courtyard houses had been taken over by GCDKDesign.
Sometimes you find people who are extremely good at what they do, and Mumo is one of them. We fell in love with his furniture. He loves working with wood and makes some of the best looking tables we have ever seen. His furniture was being displayed by designers platform Jue. We wish we could tell you more but the Jue-website is in Chinese.
Creative platform Nuandao was responsible for a whole street of quirky and crafty designers. Nuandao has created a platform where young designers of all sorts can easily sell their work. There was also a skateboard brand, showing some decks.
We left Beijing Design Week feeling inspired and amazed by the creative talents China has to offer.
Walking around the abandoned buildings of Listvyanka was one of the highlights of our time in Russia. The smell of freshly smoked Omul was in the air and in the background was beautiful Lake Baikal. The atmosphere was peaceful, and you could see nature in the process of claiming back the earth.
I’ve been trying to find the right words to tell you about this incredible beautiful country called Mongolia but there are no words to describe the magnificence of Mongolia. Being in the Mongolia countryside is a humbling and calming experience. I advise you to go here. Now. Check this out for some more pictures we took of Mongolia.
