Travel: a horseback trek into the mountains and forests of northern Mongolia is less of a holiday than a challenge

AS DUSK fell, we sat in a chilly tepee near Mongolia's northern border with Siberia and wondered if Ganbaa was on our case. As shamans are normally identified in their teens, a 52-year-old grandfather inducted five years ago is a very late call up to the spirit profession.

Would he be able to deliver tonight? He certainly wasn't making any promises. We wolfed our carbonara, rustled up in minutes on an open fire by Montag, our faithful cook, passed round the vodka bottle and hunkered down to wait.

The Tsaatan - Reindeer People - originated in Tuva in Siberia but the ongoing closure of the frontier with Russia has isolated roughly 300 nomads and a couple of hundred village dwellers on the Mongolian side. They live deep in the Taiga, remote mountains and dense forests distant physically and climatically from the picture-postcard grasslands around the capital, Ulan Baatar, many hundreds of miles to the south. Ganbaa's extended family settlement consists of half a dozen teepees, moved to favourable pastures about 20 times a year, and 200 domesticated reindeer, members of the world's most southerly indigenous herds.

Two weeks after the longest day, there was snow on the surrounding hills and ice on the tents. Outside, our tough little horses picked at the blueberry bushes that carpet the valley. Like Rupert Issacson, author of The Horse Boy, and all other visitors, we'd ridden over the mountains into reindeer country, our mounts struggling through the bogs while we shivered in the nippy Siberian wind. Issacson made the journey to seek help for his severely autistic son and his account, published in 2009, gave a welcome commercial boost to shamanism, a religion that relies on the intervention of the spirits for good fortune in healing and hunting.

Partly as a result of his success, we were a gang of six competent horsewomen doing a recce for the niche adventure company Wild Frontiers. On arrival, we'd been warmly welcomed with fresh bread and curds and invited to mount the reindeer, sacred beasts that are used for transport and dairy products, but not for meat. Now our leader, Richard Dunwoody, ex-champion steeplechase jockey turned global adventurer, was getting restless as Ganbaa threatened to turn in for the night.

Hope was fading when a messenger appeared with instructions for Dunwoody to place 100,000 tugrigs (50), a bottle of vodka, cigarettes and chocolate on the shelf in front of the television, its all-singing, all-dancing programming silenced for once in honour of the occasion.

One by one, we filed into the ger (yurt) in near total darkness and took our seats for the show. There was a rustling of garments, revealed by flash photography as Ganbaa's womenfolk dressed him in sky blue robes and a black barred face mask. Suddenly all was quiet, then the insistent drum beat began, triggering a trance marked by small cries and whimpers that ended in a climactic yelp and a collapse finely judged to miss the television. Ordered to leave immediately, we were soon joined in our tepee by Ganbaa on a mission to share out the vodka and chocolate - though not the 50. Decent of him, I suppose. We'd never have known it was a spirit no show if he hadn't fessed up.Unblessed, our journey resumed the next morning with a return across the mountains, sun soaked this time and taken over by swarms of giant horse flies that carpeted our horses' hindquarters with malevolent intent. In the afternoon, we raced along the banks of an unmarked lake in our eagerness to be first into the hot trickle in our base camp in the Darhat Valley. This huge open plain is conventional nomad country, the white gers, each with its satellite dish, widely spaced to allow plenty of room for mixed flocks of sheep, yak, horses and goats to graze.

After the bogs, the bonus; a day of galloping across open grassland for hours. Mongolian horses are regularly tested in the summer naadam races, point to point contests across the steppe for distances of up to 32km. Small, shaggy and often bony, they look inadequate for such feats of stamina, but that day's speedy 35-mile ride left us convinced far beyond reasonable doubt.

Camping that evening at the base of the Jigleg Pass, our next challenge, we awoke to find two of our horses missing. Our back-up team surveyed the endless plain without dismay. In nomad country, there are always horses to rent: after a token search, the owner of the original pair headed off to round them up and take them home while another man appeared out of nowhere with two replacement greys.

In our first half-hour in the saddle on the way to the Reindeer People, Tushig, our English-speaking Mongolian escort, had lost face by falling off twice and losing his horse once. Now he was determined to present a more macho face by talking up the Jitleg, seemingly a place of hairline paths above daunting precipices that we would be fortunate to negotiate without disaster. As we headed towards it through forest glades carpeted with wild flowers between picturesque wooden chalets, we delayed this uncertain future with an impromptu game of cricket while Montag headed off into the middle of nowhere to stock up on food.

Would he return with bloodied joints of lamb, portions of fat-tailed sheep or a live goat to slaughter for a boodog, Mongolia's prized party dish? As its preparation requires skinning, disembowelling, filling with hot rocks and roasting over an open fire for three hours while blow-torching any remaining hair, we were rooting for sheep meat and, on this occasion, we got lucky, enjoying prime roast lamb for our last supper before the pass. When we tackled it the next day, the mountain flattened into a boulevard as wide as the M25. Now it was Tushig's turn to look sheepish - clearly we were not the only rookies on this ride.

From the top, we had our first view of Lake Hovsgold, Mongolia's celebrated 'dark blue pearl'. Once again, we urged our horses into a gallop, heading towards the cool blue horizon for an evening dip. Well, the more intrepid riders did. Then again, someone has to put up the tents. The grassy banks and sandy beaches on Hovsgold's western shore are as good as campsites get, especially with an incomparable view of turquoise water stretching towards distant misty hills. Montag prepared celebratory buzz, steamed dumplings prepared from hand-made dough and stuffed with lamb, while we toasted each other with the remaining vodka. The next day, we headed home with a shared sense of mission accomplished. Northern Mongolia will always be an adventure rather than a holiday. And all the more exciting for it. n

Minty Clinch travelled with Wild Frontiers ([phone], www.wildfrontiers.co.uk). Mountains, Lakes and Shamans Horse Trek with Richard Dunwoody, 12-25 June, 2,895 (land only). Flights with Aeroflot, via Moscow ([phone], www.aeroflot.co.uk), Korean Air, via Seoul ([phone], www.koreanair.com).

UK Citizens need a visa, single entry, 40. See the form on the Mongolian Consular Services website(www.embassyofmongolia.co.uk). For further information see www.mongoliantourism.gov.mn.

• The Horse Boy: A Father's Miraculous Journey to Heal his son, by Rupert Isaacson, Little Brown 7.99