1 destination · 19 things to do

Mongolia

Ulaanbaatar is the capital of Mongolia and the coldest national capital on earth, a high-altitude city of about one and a half million people where Buddhist monasteries, Soviet-era monuments and glass towers sit beside ger districts on the hillsides. This guide starts with Gandan Monastery, Sükhbaatar Square, the Chinggis Khaan National Museum, the Bogd Khan Palace Museum and the Zaisan Memorial viewpoint, then adds the day trips that make Mongolia unforgettable: the 40-metre Chinggis Khaan statue, Gorkhi-Terelj National Park and Turtle Rock, Hustai National Park and its wild Przewalski's horses, and a night with a nomadic family in a ger. It also covers a throat-singing and folk show, the Naadam festival, which is held only in July, and longer journeys to the Mini Gobi dunes, Kharkhorin, the Orkhon Valley, the Gobi and Lake Khuvsgul. Eight hotels run from a five-star on Olympic Street to a central hostel, and the guide is candid about winter, when temperatures fall far below freezing, some ger camps close and the reward is empty temples and snowy steppe.