Gobi Desert from , and those of the ranges from higher, though in a few cases they reach altitudes of . The elevations do not form continuous chains, but make up a congeries of short ridges and groups rising from a common base and intersected by a labyrinth of ravines, gullies, glens and basins. But the tablelands, built up of the horizontal red deposits of the Han-gai (Obruchev's Gobi formation) which are characteristic of the southern parts of eastern Mongolia, are absent here or occur only in one locality, near the Shara-muren river. They are greatly intersected by gullies or dry watercourses.
Ordos Desert in the south. The Ordos Desert is almost completely encircled by the Great Bend (Ordos Loop) of the Yellow River in the west, north, and east. Mountain ranges separate the Ordos from the Gobi Desert north and east of the Yellow River. The northern border serves as the southern border of the Muu-us Sandyland. The mountain chains separating the Ordos from the central Gobi in the north of the great bend of the Yellow River are: the Kara-naryn-ula, the Sheitenula, and the Yin Mountains, which link on to the south end of the Greater Khingan Mountains. In the south and