A well in the Gobi

Photo: Miroslav Bobek, Zoo Praha

I watched the ruts in the snow and after a couple of hundred yards I saw a pick-up with four rangers standing by drawing water. It made me feel happy. They were drawing water from “our” well.

It was an unimaginable struggle to build it... Over the past twenty-three years a number of attempts had been made to find water in Takhin Tal, the base from which we released the Przewalski’s horses back into the wild. All of them unsuccessful. They even drilled three times, once to a depth of 120 metres. Without a result. We realised that there would be problems – but we didn’t expect it would be quite so nerve-wracking.

To put it succinctly:

We are looking for water in the Gobi, 1300 km from Ulan Bator as the crow flies.

The first geophysical survey conducted by Mongolian experts: it will be necessary to drill to a depth of 190 metres, about two kilometres from the base and the acclimatisation corrals for the horses at Takhin Tal. Even if there really was water there, how much would it cost to pipe it here in pipes laid at least three metres below the surface?

The opinion of Czech geologists: the survey was poorly done; there should be water closer to the surface and closer to the base. They fly off to Mongolia and conduct their own research. Optimism is fading. It will actually be necessary to drill very deep, albeit closer to the base. Apart from the risk that there may not be any water, if it is found it may be mineralised. In other words, unusable.
The Mongolian winter is approaching rapidly, as is the date by which we have to use up a significant portion of the funds.

Drilling begins. Twenty metres. Fifty. The first water is at 80 metres. It ends at a hundred and forty metres. A tense wait, as to whether the spring will be copious and good quality water.

Success! There is enough water and it is excellent! Our longstanding dream has come true, write our Mongolian friends.

A few months later, when I was standing in the freezing Gobi by the well from which the rangers had just drawn water, I thought of all the effort that is hidden behind this pipe sticking out of the snow ... The efforts of Hanka Geroldová and Ganbaatar, who led the project for the Czech and Mongolian sides respectively, and many other people, of whom I must mention at the very least the geophysicist Viktor Valter.

Upon returning to the base Ganbaatar poured me a tea brewed from “our” water and, somewhat stirred, he said that building this well was the most important work of his life. Nothing will beat it. And at that point I fully realised how great it is to have your own well.