Richard AmmonMongolia is a landlocked country in East-Central Asia. It borders Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest city, is home to about 38% of the population. Mongolia’s political system is a parliamentary republic. At 1,564,116 square kilometres, Mongolia is the nineteenth largest, and the most sparsely populated independent country in the world with a population of around 2.9 million people.
Ulan Bator The city was founded in 1639 as a Buddhist monastery center and, in the 20th century, grew into a major manufacturing center defined by its broad boulevards and squares and Socialist Classicist-style buildings.
Most of the photos here were taken on a weeklong jeep trip across the steppes to Great White Lake several hundred miles west of Ulan Bator. A steppe is a grassland plain without trees –and without roads, in this case. About 30 percent of all households in Mongolia live from breeding lifestock – horses, goats or sheep.. Most herders in Mongolia follow a pattern of nomadic or semi-nomadic pastoralism.
