Eagle Festival
(7 days)

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Detailed description

Mongolian dot Travel invites you to discover the natural and cultural wonders of Mongolia, one of the last remaining seldom-explored countries. Mongolia offers a rare glimpse into an ancient nomadic culture that has changed little over the centuries. For more than 2000 years, the Kazakhs have procedure and trained the massive Golden eagles to assist both in subsistence hunting and to capture foxes and wolves that threaten their livestock herds. Eagles are captured from their nest at an early age – always females, who are more active hunters and larger in size – and intensively trained for as long as a year. After several years with the hunting family, the eagles are then released back into the wild. West Mongolia is a spectacular region of permanently snow-capped mountains, glaciers, torrential rivers, salt-water and fresh water lakes and a variety of animals and plants. The Golden Eagle festival is an annual traditional festival held during the first week weekend in October.

Ulaanbaatar (September 30)

Our crew will greet you upon your arrival at the airport. We will transport you to a convenient, centrally located hotel. A city tour can be arranged depending on your arrival time. Ulaanbaatar is a fast-growing modern city with more than 1.3 million habitants. City sightseeing includes Bogd Khan’s Winter & Summer Palace, a series of beautiful traditional buildings in which the eighth Living Buddha and the last king lived. It is now a museum displaying fascinating artefacts and costumes associated with the last king as well as his collection of stuffed animals.

We will stop at the Gandantegchinlen Monastery. It is the largest and most important monastery of Mongolia. We will scroll through the different monasteries and see the magnificent statue of Migjid Janraisig, an 82-foot high statue gilded in gold and covered with silk cloth.

We will finish the city tour with Zaisan hill to have a view of the whole Ulaanbaatar. The city sightseeing tour takes about 4 – 5 hours.

(Hotel D)

Bayan-Olgii (October 1)

This journey will take you to a place that only a few people have visited. Mongolia’s western regions are a linguistic mash-up of Muslim and Mongolian customs. We will be flying to Olgii, the capital of Bayan Olgii province, today. Unlike the rest of Mongolia, which is ruled by Khalkh Mongolians, Bayan-Olgii has a Kazakh majority, almost all of whom are Muslims. Olgii also has its own small mosque.

(Hotel B, L, D)

Golden Eagle Festival (October 2, 3)

The Golden eagle festival has been the largest gathering of eagle hunters and their eagles in the world. Eagle hunters celebrate their heritage and compete to catch small animals such as foxes and hares with specially trained golden eagles, showing off the skills of both the birds and their trainers. (Nowadays hunting live animals is not practiced during festivals anymore, instead eagles chase fox skin dragged by its owner on horseback.). Prizes are awarded for speed, agility and accuracy. Festivities which incorporate an opening ceremony, impressive parade, cultural exhibitions, demonstrations and handcraft followed by sporting activities and competitions take place 3 km out towards the mountains. Dressed in full eagle hunting outfits and mounted on groomed decorated horses, the hunters compete for the different awards of best-looking eagle and owner, best eagle locating its owner from distance etc…Other sporting activities include camel racing, archery, “Kiz Kuar” century old woman chasing game, “Tinge Lu” the competition where horse riders snatch coins from ground and the highly entertaining traditional game “Kokbar”- goatskin tug war on horseback.

In the evening a traditional Kazakh folklore concert is held in Olgii theatre.

(Hotel B, L, D)

Kazakh family. (October 4)

Today we will visit Kazakh families in their traditional Ger bigger than Mongolian Gers and brightly decorated with hand-made rugs. We will enjoy a cup of tea, share with our hosts delicious Kazakh dishes such as Kuz “salted and smoked horse meat” Bisbarmak while chatting and deepening our knowledge of rich Kazakh culture and custom. Afternoon we will go trekking in a nearby mountain valley and riding on horseback together with hunters through the scenic landscape.

(Family stay B, L, D)

Ulaanbaatar (October 5)

You may depart anytime. Time to say final goodbye to the land of blue sky. Or extend your stay to nearby national parks such as Gorkhi Terelj National Park and Khustai National park.

(Hotel B, L, D)