Gobi Desert

This week I am visiting the Gobi desert which is a vast, arid region in northern China and southern Mongolia. It is known for its dunes and mountains. The Gobi desert is a rain shadow desert, formed by the Tibetan Plateau blocking precipitation from the Indian Ocean reaching the Gobi territory. When I look around, I see the desert is vast and surrounded by Mongolian grasslands and Altai mountains. To the west, the Gobi desert is surrounded by the Taklamakan Desert. The Gobi desert is locked inside a land mass. It is an overall cold desert, with frost and occasionally snow occurring on its dunes. It can be cold because it is elevated far above sea level due to its proximity to the Himalayan Mountains. It is composed of sediment from erosion of the volcanic rocks such as granite, basalt and rhyolite as well as from ocean sediments.  Some animals that live here are the snow leopard and the wild Bactrian camel.