We have been exploring some of the remotest country in southern Mongolia for almost a week. A convoy of bright orange Land Rovers snaking across the steppes and roaring over dunes, mapping a territory that in places has never before been visited by outsiders. Now our vehicles are scrabbling over loose boulders into a rugged gulley that has been scoured into the flanks of Gurvansaikhan by flash floods. Even after just a few days in this desolation the stunted trees of what is known as ‘Three Beauties Mountain’ come as a surprise: anything larger than a shrub is a rare sight in the Gobi.

The valley is uninhabited and appears apparently forgotten. Occasionally though we come across sacred cairns, built over centuries, with a single stone from each pilgrim who has passed this way. We know that to come here and not add rocks to the cairns is considered bad karma but it is completely impractical to keep stopping the convoy. The Land Rover team drivers – about as tough and unsentimental a crowd as you can come across – have learned that at least you must appease the spirits by keeping these cairns on your right side as you pass. They already have tales of strange things that have happened when such traditions were ignored. But today nobody notices at first when we inadvertently pass one of these cairns on the wrong side.

A few minutes later we park the vehicles to set out trekking farther up the canyon with handheld GPSs. The sky has been completely clear all morning, with never even a jet-trail to mar the deep blue. Yet within minutes we are being pelted by hailstones as big as marbles. In the painful dash back to the vehicles one of the guides sprains his ankle to such an extent that it will be blue and swollen for days. My new Raybans get knocked off my head and, although I rush back to look for them, they seem to have disappeared among the boulders. Some would say that the spirits of Three Beauties Mountain have shown their annoyance at our lack of respect.

The Mongolian nomads live at the whim of one of the harshest climates on earth. They move with the seasons and roll with the punches of the wilderness. They are more than aware of the dangers involved in provoking the mountain spirits.

When we arrive later at their isolated Gobi camp Myagmarjav and his wife Toivin are characteristically quick to invite us into their tent. Gers are perhaps the most perfectly adapted dwellings on earth. In the Gobi it is a great advantage to live in a shelter that uses only a minimum of wood. Covered in canvas and thoroughly insulated with felt, the entire structure is reusable and can be dismantled in less than an hour. As tradition dictates, I step over the threshold with my right foot first and remember not to walk into the sacred area between the ger’s two supporting posts. The nomads place a lot of importance in signs and omens. Even an inadvertent sigh as you step into a home can be misconstrued as a manifestation of discontent that may bring bad luck upon the hosts.

And, as I soon learn, the young couple’s lives are already sufficiently hard without adding to their problems. Their latest trial came recently when their seven year-old son was killed by a car. It seemed a particularly harsh trick of fate in an area where vehicles are so rare.

By pure coincidence I have arrived on the first day after the customary 49-day mourning period. Learning this I ask my translator to apologise for our unexpected arrival and begin to make my retreat, but the couple reassure us that they are happy to talk and I sit where directed on a small couch beside the family shrine. The wailing lament of a Buddhist funeral chant warbles out of a battery-powered cassette player. This chant will continue without ceasing for another 315 days, until the anniversary of their little son’s death.

Toivin fulfils the duties of a hostess by passing me a bowl of soured camel’s cream. I take a small spoonful of the bitter paste followed by a token sniff at the neck of the ceremonial snuff bottle that her husband offers me.

Like almost all the inhabitants of this remote region the couple live from livestock herding. In the winter they move their camp down to the plains where they and their animals struggle to survive the long months at temperatures as low as –40°C. In the summer they lead their flocks into foothills of the mountains, away from searing lowland temperatures that push the mercury as high as +40°C. A particularly scorching summer can drive them high up onto the passes, to the territory of the snow leopards. Myagmarjav tells me that he has seen these most elusive of big cats almost every year and that their camp was visited by a pack of wolves just a few days before my visit.

A bad winter – known and feared here as the dzud – can be truly devastating. The terrible series of dzud in the first three years of this millennium cost Mongolia as a whole an estimated US$330 million. In 2002 Myagmarjav lost most of his 500 sheep and goats.

“The animals just froze where they stood, with their backs to the wind,” he says.

Even after such a winter the nomads can only pray that the rich spring grasses might fatten the surviving animals and that a gentle summer in the highlands will further strengthen them. Long tradition and years of careful study has taught the people where to find the particular autumn grasses that will add the crucial layer of fat that will be needed before the animals can face another winter. The nomads live according to rules that were already considered ancient long before the time of Genghis Khan.

Chinggis Khan (as he is more usually known here) remains a national hero even today. His name is emblazoned on everything from the international airport to the local beer and a particularly potent brand of vodka. The Mongolian people are proud of their country’s legacy as a land of adventurers and fearsome warriors.

But many of Myagmarjav’s neighbours have already moved to Ulaanbaatar looking for an easier life. I ask if he is not tempted to follow this latest (probably the last) migration of the Gobi nomads.

“Look around you,” he says as we step back outside the ger. “We live in one of the most beautiful places imaginable. This is the land of our spirits and our forefathers. Why would we want to live anywhere else?”

Breakout 1 – Ulaanbaatar

Flying into Ulaanbaatar it is easy to appreciate that you are arriving in a nation of nomads. For hours before arriving in the Mongolian capital the steppes seem to stretch out interminably and almost featureless.

Perhaps nowhere else in the world can you arrive in a capital city with such an overwhelming impression that you are already deep in the wilderness. But as Ulaanbaatar spreads itself along the horizon, and you begin to make out the features of the outskirts, you get the feeling that the city is, in itself, an immense and sprawling nomad camp. Ulaanbaatar is one of the fastest growing cities in the world. Almost half the country’s 2.7 million people already live in the capital and The World Bank estimates that the city has grown by more than 50% in the last eight years.

Much of the central business district is starkly functional ‘Eastern Blok blocks’ but scratch the surface of the city and you will see that it is purely Mongolian. Even in the most humble ‘ger ghettos’ on the city’s outskirts the Mongolian tradition of hospitality to strangers is evident everywhere.

Breakout 2 – Trans-Mongolia Express

The Trans-Mongolia Express links Ulaanbaatar with Moscow and Beijing. The entire journey covers 10,000kms and seven time zones and can be done in about 2 weeks. But the Mongolia section is an adventure in itself and few can resist stopping to explore Ulaanbaatar or the Gobi Desert. The railway line itself takes you through some of the wildest, least populated steppelands in Central Asia. Between Sükhbaatar (on the Russian border) and Zamyn-Üüd (on the Chinese border) you pass some of the most intimidatingly bleak landscapes you will ever encounter, including the spectacular Lake Baikal. The lake is more than 400 miles long and in the old days sleighs were used to shuttle passengers across to a connecting line on the other side. More  Trans-Sib details here