more images of the Golden Eagle Festival in Mongolia

The first part can be found here

https://www.williamchua.com/blog/golden-eagle-festival-2015-in-mongolia/

all images taken with D4s with 300mm f2.8

With the exception of the first image, which was taken with the nikon  14-24mm  f2.8

before the festival, we were hosted by a kazakh family for 2 days

We stayed in the Ger and experienced the daily routine and activities of the family

In this image, the brothers were trying to bring down the horse, to change its horse shoe

Naturally, the horse struggled a fair bit before it was brought down

Will upload more images of this unique experience once I have edited them.

The girl in the middle is one of the youngest participant of this year’s festival

This is Ashol Pan, the winner of last year’s Golden Eagle Festival. She was only 13 last year

Ashol Pan arriving at the festival

Ashol Pan with her childlike innocence

arrival of more eagle hunters

eagles are being released from the top of the mountain, and the hunters are to use a bait to guide the eagles back to their arms

Another fascinating competition was ‘tenge Ily’; grabbing an object from the ground while riding on a horse. Each horse rider had to grab 3 yellow objects as fast as possible

“kukhbar” competition (traditional horse back riding game to fight over the goat skin)