So let’s cut to the chase: yes, the grainy picture is of three Snow Leopards, the main target species of our trip… and our luck with the cats was definitely in, as we also had no fewer than three sightings of the wonderfully grumpy Pallas’s Cat.
Our first, chilly afternoon up in the Mongolian Altai mountains was spent, unsuccessfully, scanning the mountain side, looking for a grey shape amongst an entire mountain range full of grey shapes.
The next day, we headed back, up to around 3,000 metres, in the expectation of more of the same, to be greeted by grinning trackers and a telescope trained on the mountain opposite. And from then, ten hours flew by! We spent the whole day in the company of a trio of Snow Leopards: a mother and two almost full-grown cubs. Watched from the other side of the valley, they mostly did what cats do – they slept, with the occasional roll, stretch and yawn, plus plenty of tail flicking. And then, on occasion, they got up for a wander around. Watching one of the cubs walk down a sheer rock face, explore some caves, and then leap straight up the cliff to go back to sleep again was just mind-blowing.