Ulaanbaatar

Why Ulaanbaatar works

Ulaanbaatar holds the title of the world's coldest national capital, its winters dropping past -30°C, but the city's cultural layering — nomadic, Buddhist, Soviet and rapidly modernising — makes it far more than a gateway to the steppe. Gandantegchinlen Monastery, Mongolia's largest functioning Buddhist monastery, survived the Soviet-era purges of religion that destroyed hundreds of other temples nationwide, and its main hall houses a 26-metre gilded statue of Avalokiteshvara, rebuilt after the original was melted down for munitions. The Zaisan Memorial, a Soviet-built hilltop monument overlooking the city, offers Ulaanbaatar's best panoramic view and a circular mural depicting Soviet-Mongolian friendship, worth the climb regardless of the politics behind it. Sükhbaatar Square, the city's central plaza, is dominated by a mounted statue of independence hero Damdin Sükhbaatar and the Government Palace's imposing Genghis Khan monument. The Chinggis Khaan National Museum houses the country's most significant collection tracing Mongol history from the empire's founding through the 20th century. Ulaanbaatar's ger districts — informal settlements of traditional felt tents on the city's hillside outskirts — house a large share of the urban population and reflect Mongolia's rapid, still-unfinished transition from nomadic to urban life. Most visitors treat Ulaanbaatar as a one-to-two night bookend before heading into the countryside for gers, horses and open steppe.

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