The Wildest Frontier: Mongolia has come to London’s West End, but you can’t beat the original: vast plains, an ancient way of life… and yak patties

If you really want to get away from it all, Genghis Khan’s birthplace offers the wildest frontiers that will satisfy any self-respecting modern pioneer.

Mongolia’s ruthless 13th-century conqueror, who built one of the largest empires in history, is immortalized in a statue at a museum near the capital Ulaanbaatar. At 40 meters high and made of silver, it is a fitting tribute to the larger-than-life statesmen.

The exact location of his grave has never been found (bring it on, Indiana Jones) and one of the many legends circulating says that Khan, known to the Mongols as Genghis, promised: “I will return be” – exactly like Arnie Schwarzenegger. Terminator.

But when he returns, he will find a much more peaceful land than one would expect after centuries of conflict.

This sparsely populated landlocked country, sandwiched between Russia and China, has a larger land mass than France, Italy, Germany and Britain combined – with a long history of conquest and conquest.

During Khan’s reign, his reach spread throughout Russia. But Mongolia’s other neighbor, China, dominated the country in the 17th and 18th centuries.

It became a satellite state of the Soviet Union in the 1920s and only regained its independence in 1990, after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Soviet bloc. Although the Russian language is now becoming popular, its influence remains to this day. But I came to Mongolia to see a revival of a 1998 play, The Mongol Khan, about his much earlier story, ahead of its West End premiere.

This epic production with dance, music and a cast of 70 is set some 2,000 years ago during the Hunnu Empire and opened at the London Colosseum on Friday. It tells the fictional story of a brutal power struggle between two brothers, both fighting for succession in the empire of the ruler Archug Khan.

But in addition to theatrical entertainment, Mongolia has much more real history to offer.

Buddhist altars are still the centerpiece of most Mongolian homes, although Stalinist purges in 1937 led to the destruction of hundreds of Buddhist temples.

At one of the oldest surviving temples, the 16th-century winged-roof Erdene Zuu Monastery in the ancient Mongolian capital of Karakorum, you can witness a ceremony performed by the resident monks.

And while the cities are modern, discovering the real Mongolia is about entering one of the world’s greatest wildernesses: the vast grassy plains, also known as steppes in Russian.

Thrills and thrills: Maureen visits the “spectacular” Red Waterfall (pictured) in the Orkhon Valley Cultural Landscape in Central Mongolia

And in the remote steppes, where hardy nomads make up a third of Mongolia’s 3.3 million people, life has changed little in thousands of years.

These shepherds and women live in round, wooden frame tents known as gers – or yurts as we may know them.

I will glamp in beautiful remote areas of the country. Sheep, yaks and a few snooty camels graze nearby.

The yaks live up to their lazy Yakkety-Yak name when I approach a herd. For those of us wild enough to climb this ubiquitous furry and horned animal (and top supplier of milk and yogurt), one is saddled.

Maureen discovers that yaks (pictured) “definitely live up to their talkative Yakkety-Yak name”

The concept of fast food here means killing and preparing dinner on a stove fueled by wood or dried cow dung, as we discover when we are invited to a goat festival in one of the gers.

Visitors are greeted through the hobbit-sized doors, but it is helpful to bring a small gift such as candy for the children.

We enjoy local beer and vodka and at the end a woman from our group is invited to become the second wife of an excited young Mongolian man.

In the Gers, the scent of wild sage is omnipresent – ​​if only this heady fragrance could be bottled to be sold alongside Mongolia’s prized cashmere. However, the latter’s softness can easily compete with yak and camel wool – woven from the animals’ delicate neck hair.

Mongols lead a simple life with part-time nomads from the cities living in Gers in the summer and tending the herds, which are tended by full-time nomadic neighbors during the harsh winters. Everyone looks out for each other. As our guide Bayana, a 55-year-old grandmother, explains, shepherds standing watch from the hills with binoculars call for help when a visitor’s SUV needs help getting out of a ditch or river.

In Mongolia’s capital, Maureen attends the opening ceremony of the Naadam Festival, an annual celebration of the nation and three major Mongolian sports in July: wrestling, horse racing and archery.

“Mongolian nomads prefer to travel on horseback and spend so much time in the saddle that they almost resemble the half-human, half-horse centaurs of Greek mythology,” writes Maureen. Pictured: Spectators at the Nadaamfees horse racing event

While in Mongolia, Maureen attends the preview of The Mongol Khan, a revival of a 1998 play, ahead of its West End premiere.

Mongolian nomads prefer to travel on horseback and spend so much time in the saddle that they almost resemble the half-human, half-horse centaurs of Greek mythology – although today motorcycles are sometimes used to round up herds of sheep and goats.

Their horses are small and stocky, a relief to a rusty rider like me as I head for the spectacular Red Waterfall in the Orkhon Valley cultural landscape of central Mongolia. Our other means of transport is a Toyota Land Cruiser driven by retired Army Colonel Major Chinbat.

A Himalayan Vulture and a Black Vulture, side by side on a patch of grass just a meter away from us, watch our progress across the country with great interest.

The hottest ticket in Mongolia’s capital is the opening ceremony of the Naadam Festival, an annual celebration every July in the country of the three main Mongolian sports: wrestling, horse racing (with riders aged six and over) and archery. It is an incredibly beautiful and moving sight.

Although British citizens do not need a visa to visit Mongolia, there are no direct flights. Instead, you change in Frankfurt, Beijing or Istanbul, so for many it is still an undiscovered secret.

My week-long trip is not long enough to explore the legendary Gobi Desert, far south of Mongolia, where explorers first discovered dinosaur eggs and bears and snow leopards living in astonishingly diverse terrain.

On the way back to the airport, I take a break and meet a nomadic couple selling a local delicacy in their padger: yak patties. The man rolls out the dough and the woman cuts the beef-like meat into cubes. I sit back and realize that Mongolia has served up an exciting feast.