Having failed in Russia’s Tuvan republic to find a tribe that has been skiing for 8,000 years, Andreas Hofer crosses back into Mongolia. Recent research suggests the first skiers came not from Scandinavia, but the Altai mountains, in Russia, Mongolia and China. And reports have emerged that the Turkic-speaking Tuvan people still use home-made skis for hunting and herding 8,000 years on. Theoretically this makes it possible to ski with the oldest skiing race… on stone age skis. I add the word theoretically because the logistics of visiting the cradle of skiing are daunting. Having gathered two 4x4s to transport myself, a local guide, ski guide, driver, two mechanics and a mountain of camping gear from Mongolia’s capital Ulaanbaatar to the Russian border, I was promptly forced…Continue Reading