A day in Ulan Bator
Summary
Not a big fan of Ulan Bator – busy, polluted and at times felt a bit menacing / unsafe. Chances are that if you’re visiting Ulan Bator it is for access to the wilderness of Mongolia or maybe as a stop on the Trans-Siberian Railway, in which case if you have a spare few hours its worth checking out the views from the Zaisan Memorial or the wrestling at the Wrestling Palace. No more time needed
For details on a 3 day trip just outside of Ulan Bator see this travel entry for Hiking, horse-riding and staying in yurts in Gorkhi-Terelj National Park
For tips on the overall trans-Siberian Railway experience, including which stops to take, see the travel entry The Trans-Siberian Railway from Omsk to Beijing
highlights
#1 Views across the city from the Zaisan Memorial
#2 Visiting the Wrestling Palace to see some competitive wrestling
Experiences nearby
The below map shows experiences nearby with a colour that reflect the Overall Score of those experiences
Other Random (and a bit gash) City Visits around the World
Score Detail
Background - how many times have you asked someone what a travel experience was like and the response was "amazing" or "awesome"? That response is nice to know, but it makes it hard to differentiate that experience compared to others. That is exactly what these scores are trying to do - differentiate the experience by giving a score out of 10 based on 6 categories and then giving an overall experience score
This overall experience score is calculated by: take the highest of the "Culture" or "Nature" score (1-10) + "Fun factor" (1-10) + "Avoiding the crowds" (1-10) + highest of the "Unique" or "World Famous score" (1-10). Then convert into a score out of 100
Extra detail - the logic being that I find all of the 6 individual scores important, but I don't want to mark an experience down just because it doesn't cover both "Culture" and "Nature", or because it isn't both "World Famous" and "Unique". Take the examples of Safari in The Serengeti and walking through Rome - they both appeal at opposite ends of the nature / culture spectrum, and you can have a fantastic time without needing to appeal to both sides. So, their overall scores aren't penalized for their lack of one or the other, and I've done the same for "World Famous" vs "Unique". But . . . I do think that the "Fun factor" of an experience is important, irrelevant of other factors, and so is "Avoiding the Crowds" (or where there are crowds that add to the experience). So, both of these scores are standalone