London-Frankfurt-Beijing-Ulaanbaatar-Gobi Desert

James Bull, Joe Sharpe and Ben Wolstenholme left for the Gobi Desert to make broadcast history on Tuesday 30th November 1999. On arrival at camp, they sent back the following account of their journey:

London

Left our London studio at 10.30am and made our way by taxi to Heathrow. Met Toby at Terminal 2, who gave us our tickets and itinerary. Sat down to our last company coffee for 2 weeks. And so we said our good-byes and checked in...we were on our way to Frankfurt.

Frankfurt

Slight mis-hap at Frankfurt when we discover we need a Chinese transit visa along with our connecting tickets to pass through Beijing, apparently a requirement just recently introduced. After a series of frantic phone calls and discussions with airport staff, we are actually turned away from the flight.

Seeing things going rapidly down the pan in front of our eyes at our first port of call, we talk to several people in Berlin via Toby in London, and plan a solution. We would stay overnight in Frankfurt, catch an early morning train to the nearest Chinese embassy; 2 hours away in Bonn. Here we would meet a representative from our Mongolian travel company, Juulchin, who would give us our connecting tickets and escort us to the embassy.

The day unfolded basically as planned, although our visa applications found the hands of the clerk at 11.55am. The desk closed at midday. After a very close call we caught a train back to Frankfurt in good time for our flight, 24 hours later than planned.

Beijing

Having missed our connecting flight to Ulaanbaatar the day we were in Bonn, we had to rearrange a flight from Beijing for Friday morning, the 3rd of December. This meant we had all of Thursday and an overnight stay to explore the city. At the airport we booked a hotel, and despite being advised against it, asked for a South-facing room so that we could get a spot-beam and test the satellite equipment.

Our taxi ride from the airport was our first taste of a truly different culture; the people, shops, arcitecture, graphics, and thousands of bicycles.

The hotel was situated in the heart of the city, a few minutes walk from Tiananmen Square and the Imperial Palace Museum (pics: museum, street 1, street 2, QTVR: museum). After the powerful impact of the square and museum, we took a couple of rickshaws (bicycle taxis) to a nearby shopping centre. Here we bought a spare battery for one of the cameras, and some extra tape stock.

Back at our South-facing room, we got a connection to the IOR (Indian Ocean Region Satellite) from the hotel window (movie), collected emails and sent a "Hello" movie back home ("Hello" movie).

The following morning we met our moment of truth as we took the satellite equipment and solar powered batteries (which look basically like small bombs) through Chinese customs. Fortunately we got through with no questions asked and boarded our flight to Ulaanbaatar, still pinching ourselves that we'd made it this far after the problems in Frankfurt.

Ulaanbaatar

The views from the window of the plane on the approach to Ulaanbaatar (pic), Mongolia's capital city, were the most spectacular yet; vast snowy planes, mountain ranges (pic) and the city itself.

We were told on landing that the outside temperature was -11 degrees. The landscape was nothing like we expected, and we were all overwhelmed by it. It was bitterly cold but very dry; the fine layer of snow on the ground blew about like sand in the wind.

We met our guide, Ari, who took us to meet two of Juulchin's managers for lunch, where we discussed the expedition and what we were trying to achieve. We left Ulaanbaatar soon after lunch in two Mercedes jeeps.

We were told the drive South to camp was about 10 hours; 600km across broken roads, tracks and offroad desert. (pics: road, James, Joe, Chuka (driver), offroad)

The offroad section of the journey took place in complete darkness, and our drivers were having trouble locating the camp. We stopped at about ten Nomad "Gers" (the traditional Mongolian dwelling) to wake locals and ask the way, but still ended up driving in circles.

Finally, at 5am, we stopped and slept in the jeeps until sunrise (pic) at about 7. From there we were about 45 minutes from camp on the North edge of the Gobi Desert. We arrived safely after a broken nights sleep, and unpacked ready for the day ahead (pic).