what's going on guys it is part two of the Mongolia series we're headed to the
far west of the country today! let's go! ah back on Mongolia is bumpy roads well
if you can even call the Merlin's at first they leave you beaming for the
chance to dig deeper into the remote countryside then after eight hours of
bruising and smashing along you'll want to cry of course weeks after your
journey's done you'll be editing the footage thinking about how amazing
Mongolia looks and be begging for the bruises that come along with a UAV-452
journey here today's video is about the struggles and misadventures of adventure
travel photography and about how well they often flat out kind of suck well
you're in the moment they're almost always worth it for the images and the
stories that come out of it so I was a really really really long
drive to get out here but we are in the Far West of Mongolia our guide says that
just on the other side of these mountains it's actually China in fact
there's like a border outpost just there and to be in this area as a tourist you
need special permission so we had brought like a special permit from the
buns are with us we just checked in and now we're allowed to be here it's
already nighttime it's just poured rain so I think we're just going to take it
easy this evening and then head out exploring in the morning
after what kind of felt like a wasted day driving yesterday we caught some
sleep and gone after some images in the morning the location was okay and though
I wouldn't call anything I made here a banger it was productive
this is Mongolia trips obviously about adventure but adventures obviously about
what you make it and this morning and it seems kind of funky we got up this
morning went to go take pictures it was so-so and then one of the vans broke
down so we've been sitting here for like three hours but instead of being bored
we like tick one of the tripods made it into a monopod and play baseball with it
oh there we go and then after as we were just hanging out here a camel caravan
like an actual one not a tourist when an actual camel camel caravan came cruising
through here
so even though we've been stuck it's just been an awesome morning and I think
you're really on adventure trips you really have to just make the best of
whatever is happening and a lot of times the absolute most fun happens when
things go wrong so things have been going right this morning but it's been
so much fun
so we packed up the vans and hit the road for what we were told was going to
be a pretty simple four-hour journey easy right
no the day's kind of going a bit the same we're having more car trouble it's
the same van it just looks like the fans not working so we're overheating a lot
but as usual we're making the most of it and what a spot to break down we're in
like this Canyon along the river it's sunny it's warm the Argentinian on the
trip is allowed to be on the trip because he brought Monta yeah that's the
only reason he lets me stay around him and so life is good even when cars are
broken down sweet sweet Monte
eventually all jacked up on Monta we pushed on our guy - go let us know that
it was only a fairly pain-free two and a half more hours easy peasy got in like
15 minutes more down the road and it's broken down again it's the same van it
sounds like they're having some sort of fuel pump or fuel filter issue but every
time we try to climb a hill it just doesn't make it and look at where we're
stopped it's like a cliff right here down to the river it's kind of a good
thing there's not a whole lot of traffic or else this would be a sketchy pass
this was the last breakdown of the days at least from a non-emotional standpoint
other than a flat tire which I didn't film we pushed on
sure we were five hours late but with views like this who cares and as the Sun
set we crested a hill with an epic view towards the Russian border so excited to
have made it to sunset alive we hopped out of the vans before the wheels could
even stop spinning and snapped off an image or two then we bumped along
another two hours to our final destination right it's we've arrived in
our camp it's at least seven hours late we're seven hours late so yeah we're
gonna get some sleep crash here and I'll see you in the
morning
it is morning yeah we didn't get up for sunrise I at least I didn't get up for
sunrise I know Greg did get up for sunrise and shot some footage said it
was an amazing morning in this beautiful morning but man I was wiped last night
after the drive so yeah slept in and we're here at our
ger camp right here the girls are all over the place and funny story last
night or actually this morning at sunrise I did get up I got up to use the
toilet right here I went to the bathroom too much information I know but as I was
here there was like five hundred goats like this guy who's probably gonna smash
me come here buddy come say hi to the camera
wanna say hi the camera oh you like head scratches anyway as I was out here doing
my business there was at least two he's a jealous one there was at least 200 of
these goats just staring at me from doing my business it was like it was
like having an audience it was like having an audience it's okay bud now all
the ships are coming over because they think they're getting head scratches and
I don't want to start a fight hey bud you unhand scratches
do you want hen scratches doings head scratches
who wants head scratches head scratches for everyone it scratches for the goats
head injuries for us
the wildness of the road that took us up to our next destination would leave us
with at least a couple new bumps on the top of our heads from being occasionally
tossed into the roofs of the vans our guide tells us that we're headed up to
see a couple glaciers and a peak called friendship mountain because it borders
on both China and Russia it's just a day trip we're told we'll return to the go
covered ger camp tonight
that was without a shadow of a tell the bumpiest ride ever and I actually feel
like I've done full exercise today but check this out these mountains behind us
are unreal we're in the lead car though and we kind of want to film the others
coming up the hill so oh yeah I might actually take my long lens out and see
if we can get some shots of these guys coming up because it was gnarly
we made it to the top we made it to the top we made it to the top and it is it
is epic I said before we were just gonna come up for the day but we packed
sleeping bags and there is no way they're dragging me off of this before
sunset and sunrise so we're gonna talk to the guide and we're definitely gonna
find a place up here to camp for the night because look at that it's just
massive glacier coming down here with these incredible Peaks it's just an
insane Vista there's also some buddhist prayer flags up that way there were some
touristy camels and stuff that way as well
there's Greg doing some b-roll over here and what do you think Greg pretty
average this is very average you know average yeah something better yeah might
make a nice panorama though yeah yeah we should just go home one of the things I
love most about Mongolia is the freedom we want to camp here so we do and what a
place to relax catch some moments of peace and stare out at this
so we're all sitting up here or three to a tent and it's been really nice all day
we've just been sitting up you're enjoying it but it looks like some
weather is about to come in we got about three hours until sunset so hopefully
this weather blows through yeah and then we get sunset or blows through and we
get stars or blows through and we get sunrise basically what I'm trying to say
is I hope that this weather blows through and I hope it doesn't blow us
off this mountain
okay the rain passed the storm passed probably only lasts about 30 minutes and
the sun's actually setting right on top of the glacier what looks awesome I'll
show you the kind of time-lapse II thing we got going on up there of that and
yeah since the Sun setting directly behind the glacier it doesn't really
mean there's gonna be a lot of light on it so what we're doing now is we're
hiking down probably to the toe ish of the glacier to to try to figure out a
shot for tomorrow morning for sunrise because it's sunrise the light should
come from back that way if the conditions are good and like light up
all these peaks so yeah location scouting but man that looks so awesome
right now
come down to the bottom pretty close to the lateral moraine where you get a
straight-on view of both the glaciers and it was really kind of the obvious
thing to shoot straight into this light but I don't think the composition is
that great there but over on the glacier to the left which had no light on it
there's a perfect s-curve that kind of leads straight through and into these
peaks at the top and right now it's not great because there's no light hitting
it but I think for the morning that's the composition I want so I'm going to
show you the image right now with it backlit and I think this will come out
cool in the morning if we get light so I might snap off a couple more long lens
compositions here and then I'll see you sunrise in the end the images came out
way better than I hoped the backlight kind of reflected off the clouds to
softly bring out the details of the glacial ice in the mountains there's
drama here without it being in your face I'm not just okay with these images
there's some of my favorite thus far in 2019
fellows how much sleep did you get last night
oh don't like an hour maybe so the camping adventure was I would call it a
fail just we just got hammered by thunder showers and hail all night but
it was still fun and looking back yet you know the past couple days the video
is kind of about how this adventure has been a misadventure and maybe a little
bit of a disaster but I was just kind of thinking about the photos that were made
over the past two days and I actually think there was a lot there was a lot of
photos considering everything that went wrong so we're having fun even if we got
absolutely demolished by weather last night and yeah I guess we're onto the
next step in this adventure so part three of the Mongolian Western Mongolian
adventure or slash misadventure series coming up we'll see you later peace
you