My bed has never felt so comfortable. . . getting home from Mongolia was not easy. Our flight out of Choibalsan was delayed from 650pm until 7am the following day necessitating another night in a hotel in Choibalsan. 6 people, one room, lots of extra roll-away beds and not much sleeping. Awake at 430 am we arrived in Ulanbataar to find out that our flight to Beijing was now delayed from 11am until 8pm . . . that became 11pm . . . eventually 1145pm . . . you get the point. We spent the day shopping and seeing some sites in UB. We also had another great lunch at Hazaar Indian Restauraunt and got to catch up with our medical translator – enkhe. But then we spent too much time in the airport only to arrive in Beijing around 2am where we had to wait in lines/have our passport looked at atleast 5 times, all before getting to a smelly transit hotel. We finally got to sleep at 5am. 4pm in Beijing, we left for SF and when I finally got a glimpse of the Northern California coast line out of my window seat, well I smiled a tired little smile. After beaming at the immigration guy and letting him know how happy I was to be home, I walked outside and smelled some fresh air before getting on my last leg – southwest to Denver. The taxi driver asked why I had a down jacket on – Denver is having an Indian summer – and I told him I had just gotten back from Mongolia. His response: “that’s in the middle of nowhere!” Thankfully, Beau had been dropped off at home and was there waiting for me when I walked in the door.
And now, it is quiet. Too quiet. Somewhat lonely. I miss team Choibalsan and our grand adventure. But my bed is comfortable, really, really comfortable.
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