Photos of Dundgovi (Middle Gobi) Province, Mongolia

Dundgovi (= Middle Gobi) aimag is, despite its name, actually in the northern part of the Gobi desert, about 240 kilometres south of Ulaanbaatar. It is mostly a barren gravel plain with patches of peculiar rock formations. The area is 74,690 km², and it has a total population of almost 48,000 people.

The capital town is Mandalgovi, a small town of about 10,000 and was founded in 1942. It has a few hotels, a museum, and a monastery, Dashgimpeliin Khiid, which opened in 1991; all monasteries had been destroyed during the purges in 1936. A hill just north of the town, Mandaliin Khar Ovoo, has a monument depicting a large Morin Khuur, the national instrument of Mongolia with its carved horse head, on the summit. There are some Soviet-style statues here, too, like the two workers in typical happy communist poses, their fingers suffering from an advanced case of concrete cancer. There is a bizarre concrete replica of a sculpture commemorating the first Mongolian cosmonaut, Jügderdemidiin Gürragchaa. In March 1978, he spent almost eight days in space as part of the Soviet Intercosmos programme. The original statue is in Choir, Govisümber Province, in the east-central part of the country. On the east side of town is a large ger district.