The Orkhon Valley is the wide, grassy basin in which Karakorum sits, and it is itself a UNESCO World Heritage cultural landscape. To visit the monastery and ignore the valley is to miss the point. The rolling steppe stretches to every horizon, cut by the silver thread of the Orkhon River, punctuated by the white dots of ger camps. Nomadic families have grazed their horses, cattle, and yaks here across the full sweep of recorded history.
A hundred kilometres to the south, the Orkhon River drops over a basalt cliff to form Ulaan Tsutgalan, a striking red-rock waterfall that makes a fine destination for a day-trip by jeep or horseback. The riding in this valley is excellent — horses are readily available from ger camps, and even an inexperienced rider can manage a few hours across open grassland with a local guide. If you have time for only one night in a ger outside Ulaanbaatar, spend it here.