A Budget Ride Through Mongolia
The Train to Nowhere
The train jolted forward with a groan, and I pressed my face to the grimy window, the Gobi Desert unfurling like an endless scroll of sand and sky. I’d hopped aboard in Ulaanbaatar on a budget travel whim, my ticket costing a handful of tugriks—barely a few dollars—and my hopes pinned on something wild and unscripted. Where does a journey take you when the destination doesn’t matter? I scribbled in my notebook, the wheels clacking a steady beat beneath me, dust swirling outside. My compartment mate, Enkh, a herder with a gap-toothed grin and a wool cap pulled low, offered me a tin cup of salty milk tea. I sipped, grimacing at the taste—sharp and strange—but he chuckled, slapping his knee, and I couldn’t help but smile back.
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I’d landed in Mongolia a few days earlier, the capital a sprawl of concrete and yurts, horns blaring, markets thick with the smell of grilled meat and diesel. I’d found the train station by chance, a squat building buzzing with travelers, and bought the cheapest ticket I could, no clue where it’d take me—just out, into the vastness. The carriage was old, its seats patched with tape, the air stale with sweat and coal smoke, but it felt right, like a vessel for adventure travel on a shoestring. Enkh spoke broken English, pointing at the map, tracing a line through the Gobi with a calloused finger. “Good ride,” he said, and I nodded, trusting him more than I trusted myself.
We stopped at nowhere stations—dusty platforms where nomads waited, their faces wrapped in scarves against the wind. I leaned out at one, trading a granola bar from my pack for a loaf of dense bread, still warm from some unseen oven. Enkh tore off a piece, handing it back, and we ate in silence, the train lurching onward, dunes rising and falling like waves frozen in time. Nights were spent on a hard bunk, the mattress thin, the sway of the carriage rocking me into fitful sleep. I woke once to a sunrise over the desert—gold bleeding into the sand, a stark beauty that stole my breath—and scribbled it down, ink smudging as my hand shook with the train’s motion.
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At a longer stop, Enkh dragged me off the train to meet his cousin, a wiry man with a herd of horses grazing nearby. “Ride?” he asked, and before I could protest, I was hoisted onto a shaggy mare, her breath hot against my hands. We galloped—or tried to—across the sand, the wind whipping my face, until I lost my grip and tumbled into a dune, sand exploding around me. Enkh’s cousin roared with laughter, and I joined him, sprawled there, the absurdity of it washing over me. Back on the train, Enkh clapped my shoulder, his grin wide. “Good fall,” he said, and I laughed again, the ache in my ribs a badge of the moment.
The days blurred—sand, sky, the clack of wheels—but each stop brought something new: a nomad offering dried curds, a child chasing a stray dog, the wind carving patterns in the dunes. I sketched what I could, my pencil dulling, pages filling with jagged lines and hurried notes. The train was my home, its rhythm a lullaby through Mongolia’s wild heart, and I let it carry me, no rush, no end in sight.
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Stepping off at the end—some dusty outpost I couldn’t name—I felt dusty, alive, transformed. Mongolia had been a feeling, not a place—a raw, boundless adventure stitched from sand and strangers. I slung my pack over my shoulder, Enkh’s tea still bitter on my tongue, and knew I’d chase this freedom again.
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