Experience Mongolia like never before with expertly curated tours from a family-owned company dedicated to culture, nature, and local communities.
The Ultimate Mongolia Tour is our 12-day Mongolia tour through the best of the Gobi Desert and Central Mongolia, with your own driver and English-speaking guide. This 12-day Mongolia itinerary runs from the White Stupa cliffs and Khongor dunes to the Flaming Cliffs, then north to Khorgo Volcano, the Tsenkher hot springs, Tuvkhun Monastery and the wild horses of Khustai. No time for a 2 week Mongolia tour? This route fits the highlights into 12 days, with a night at a herding family’s ger and a nomadic culture show to finish. Planning ahead? Read our Gobi Desert travel guide or see all our private Mongolia tours.
Arrive at Chinggis Khaan International Airport, where your guide will warmly welcome you. Transfer to your hotel in Ulaanbaatar and enjoy a relaxing evening. Depending on your arrival time, you may explore the city on your own or rest after your flight.
Overnight: Hotel in Ulaanbaatar (not included)
After hotel pickup, your driver and guide head south as Ulaanbaatar gives way to open steppe. At Baga Gazriin Chuluu, wander among granite rocks, hidden caves and the ruins of an old Buddhist temple. Then continue into the Middle Gobi to Tsagaan Suvarga, the “White Stupa”, a cliff of colorful layered limestone with views across the desert. Walk along the edge as the evening light softens, then settle into your ger camp.
Drive: 450 km, 4 to 5 hours
Activities: Baga Gazriin Chuluu (1 hour), Tsagaan Suvarga (1 hour)
Overnight: Ger camp
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Head deeper into the South Gobi, where the desert rises into the Gurvan Saikhan mountains. In Yol Valley, follow the trail into a narrow, rocky gorge and scan the cliffs for ibex and bearded vultures; snow leopards live here too, though sightings are very rare. Explore on foot or on horseback, then drive on to a nearby herding family, where you share dinner and spend the night in their ger.
Drive: 280 km, 3 to 4 hours
Activities: Yol Valley hike or horse ride (1 to 2 hours), wildlife spotting
Overnight: Nomad family ger
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Say goodbye to your hosts and wind through the Gurvan Saikhan mountains on a scenic 30 km stretch before the Khongor dunes appear on the horizon, Mongolia’s largest, rising up to 300 m. Ride a camel across the sand, climb the ridge for huge views over the Gobi and, if the weather allows, race down on a sand sled. Stay up on the dunes for the sunset, then head back to your ger camp for dinner.
Drive: 200 km, 2 to 3 hours
Activities: Camel ride, dune climb and photos, sunset at Khongor, sand sledding (weather permitting)
Overnight: Ger camp
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Cross the open Gobi to Bayanzag, the Flaming Cliffs, where Roy Chapman Andrews found the first dinosaur eggs in the 1920s. Walk among the red sandstone formations and picture the explorers digging here a century ago. Then follow quiet desert roads north to the Ongii River and the ruins of Barlim and Khutagt monasteries, once busy Buddhist centers. End the day at your ger camp under a sky full of stars.
Drive: 300 km, 4 to 5 hours
Activities: Bayanzag Flaming Cliffs, Ongi Monastery ruins
Overnight: Ger camp
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Leave the Gobi behind and watch the land change as you head north: sand and gravel give way to rolling green steppe, grazing horses and the first white gers of Central Mongolia. By evening you reach Kharkhorin, the site of Karakorum, the 13th-century capital of the Mongol Empire. Settle in for dinner under wide Central Mongolian skies and rest up for the volcano country ahead.
Drive: 240 km, about 4 hours
Activities: Scenic drive into Central Mongolia
Overnight: Ger camp (luxury hotel on the Exclusive package)
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Drive west through the Chuluut River valley, where the river has carved a deep basalt gorge through the steppe. Then climb to the rim of Khorgo, a dormant volcano, and look down into its crater and out over the black lava fields. Below lies Terkhiin Tsagaan Nuur, the “Great White Lake”. Walk the quiet shore, take photos as the light fades, and spend the night at a lakeside ger camp.
Drive: 290 km, about 3 hours
Activities: Chuluut River valley, Khorgo Volcano hike (1 to 2 hours, weather permitting), Terkhiin Tsagaan Lake
Overnight: Lakeside ger camp
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
After a lakeside breakfast, drive back east through the green Khangai foothills to the Tsenkher valley, where forested slopes close in around the natural hot springs. After a week of dunes, cliffs and volcanoes, this is your day to slow down. Soak in the warm mineral water as the evening air cools, take a walk in the forest, and enjoy a comfortable night at a premium ger camp.
Drive: 197 km, about 2 hours
Activities: Tsenkher hot springs soak
Overnight: Premium ger camp
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Climb into the forested hills of the Orkhon Valley to Tuvkhun Monastery, a hilltop hermitage where the scholar-monk Zanabazar once lived and worked*. Hike up through the larch trees (Exclusive package guests ride up on horseback) and take in the view over the valley. Afterward, visit a nearby herding family, share lunch in their ger and see their daily life up close, then drive on to Kharkhorin for the night.
Drive: 250 km, 2 to 3 hours
Activities: Tuvkhun Monastery hike, about 2.8 km (Exclusive package: 1-hour round-trip horse ride), nomad family visit and lunch
Overnight: Ger camp in Kharkhorin
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Start the morning at Erdene Zuu Monastery, built in 1585 from the stones of old Karakorum and ringed by a wall of 108 white stupas. Then head east across the steppe, with a photo stop at the sand dunes of Elsen Tasarkhai, the “Mini Gobi”. By late afternoon you reach Khustai National Park, where wild Przewalski’s horses, the takhi, come down from the hills to graze as the evening cools. Then drive 40 km on to a nomadic culture camp for the night.
Drive: 300 km, about 3 hours
Activities: Erdene Zuu Monastery, Elsen Tasarkhai photo stop, Przewalski’s horses at Khustai
Overnight: Ger camp
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
Wake up at the nomadic culture camp and spend the morning inside nomadic life: watch a ger go up, try fresh dairy products and see how herders move with their animals. Then the music starts, with folk songs, horse-head fiddle, throat singing and dance, and on some days a mini Naadam of archery, wrestling and horsemanship. After lunch, drive back to Ulaanbaatar for drop-off at your hotel.
Drive: 80 km, 1 to 2 hours depending on city traffic
Activities: Nomadic culture program and traditional performance, hotel drop-off
Overnight: Hotel in Ulaanbaatar (not included)
Meals: Breakfast, Lunch
Enjoy a relaxed morning before your private transfer to Chinggis Khaan International Airport. Your guide and chauffeur will assist with check-in and luggage as you prepare for your journey home.
Thank you for choosing Nomad Trail Mongolia—we hope your adventure has been unforgettable, and we warmly look forward to welcoming you back.
