The Storm That Never Came
Mongolia
Turned out alright after all
Good news for Mongolians today. A terrible snow storm that has been threatening to bring the whole country to a standstill never appeared as forecast by experts. Good news for me too. Now the sun is out, planes are flying and I am currently sprawled across three Aeroflot seats at 37 000 ft looking forward to a couple of days of rest back home before heading off to The Central African Republic.
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The Perils of Filming in the Desert
Mongolia
Lets take a look over there!
Filming in the Gobi Desert is an unpredictable science as our cameraman Terry discovered to his misfortune today. What for him began as a serene day of filming the scavenger wildlife attracted by a nearby camel carcass, ended up as race against the clock to reach poor Terry as both he and his camouflage hide were battered for over 2 hours by gale force winds and swirling sand. Thankfully Terry was carrying his BBC satellite phone with him and he managed to get a message to our team a few hours drive away to come and rescue him. This in itself turned into a small expedition thanks to the sandstorm, which had created a lovely new dune directly across the path of the only thoroughfare we knew of through the mountains of sand. The resultant rescue mission has a certain comedic element to it.
Here is the last picture taken of our Tel before we left him in the morning with a packed lunch happily filming from his protective tent.
Photo Copyright: Karina Moreton
Watch here to see the scene we returned to in the late afternoon after we responded to his emergency call…
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Absolutely Amazing!
Mongolia
The Gobi - Is this place for real?
Today was a great day.
This morning I got up. Had breakfast. Brushed my teeth. Picked up my cameras, and then rode across a snowy Gobi Desert on a camel. Today just entered my top five best days of traveling.
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A Footprint in the Sand
Mongolia
Will they miss me when I'm gone ?
When it comes to places that inspire quiet introspection, the Gobi desert has got to be one of the best spots in the world to sit silently, soak up the majesty of Mother Nature and reflect upon life, the universe and nothing in particular. Living, as I am now within the shadow of giant tidal wave-like sand dunes, it’s hard to ignore the truth that the world, like the dune beside me, is in a continual state of change. Because I travel and photograph people for a living, I am often asked if I am concerned that so much indigenous culture is disappearing from our planet at this time in history. The truth is, I am not. Just as the waves of these spectacular dunes ebb and flow with time, for me, so it is with the journey of everything coexisting on our planet. Civilisations, species, environments – we’re all at the mercy of the forces that propel life. It’s easy to forget that the world was once populated by a magnificent race of giant reptiles whose residency spanned many million times that of our own but whose legacy now to the planet can only be found filed away in the fossil record and indeed within the very grains of sand beneath my feet.
I think that we as humans love to believe that we can stop things from changing. We seem to devote large amounts of time and energy trying to preserve things the way they are. I reckon I’m with the dune on this one.
When we are all long gone from the Earth and she is entertaining new guests at the table of life, I wonder if they will lament the loss of the human species. Probably not. Possibly a little, with the affection that we afford the dinosaurs, but definitely, I expect they’ll be raising a glass to the fantastic resilience of life and its continued prosperity.
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