Mongolia Monday Travel Log 1

I’m travelling in Mongolia for eight weeks to do fieldwork and research. Each week I’ll post an update of what I’ve been up to.

Note: I’ll be in the field for the next two “Mongolia Mondays”, so there won’t be a live update. Look for a mega-update on September 3rd!

Week 1

After a long flight from Vancouver to Beijing and a 17-hour layover in the Beijing Airport, I finally arrived in Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. This week we’re gearing up to head out to the field in the Gobi Desert. We’re heading to a remote area called Guriliin Tsav, alongside a research team from Italy supported by National Geographic. Our work will be to find new dinosaur sites, collect geochemical samples, and map the areas using drones.

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For the first couple days here, we’re sitting in the newly-renovated research space at the Institute of Palaeontology and Geology. Phil is working away on some Velociraptor skulls, Eva is working on a Late Cretaceous plant paper, and I’m updating photos. Our host, Chinzorig, is running around organizing everything for our fieldwork on Wednesday August 15th.

Bonus 3D pdf of a Velociraptor skull. Do not reproduce without permission.

Fighting Velociraptor Skull (Works only with Adobe Acrobat)