Drive across the Gobi Desert

“I had the pleasure of spending a week driving across the Gobi Desert in a Range Rover with a merry band of explorers. [...] We began our journey in Dalanzadgad, just north of the border with China. Soon we were in land as remote as anywhere on earth. I got used to seeing eagles; I saw one swoop and catch a small animal. Every now and again, we would come across wild horses, 50 or 60 of them, roaming free. At the occasional water hole on our route, hundreds of cashmere goats would drink, alongside the camels. It was a chance for us to have a wash.”

“At the crack of dawn, we break camp. Our eight-vehicle convoy thunders across the ancient Gobi, dwarfed under the immense vault of sky. The vehicles are packed full of supplies and sports gear. We are self-sufficient — there are no flushing toilets, supermarkets, restaurants, hospitals or internet cafés where we're going. [...] The Gobi is special; you feel a sense of discovery, that you are the first to see it. We pass herds of bactrian camels, goats, windswept sheep, wild horses and hungry-looking vultures. We drive along dusty rutted roads, through boulder-strewn steppes and deep, sandy riverbeds.”