Irkutsk and Lake Baikal- Russia

I am writing this entry in Vancouver months after the events from scrabbled notes and broken memory. The exact reason I wanted to blog, although the notes and pictures help the memories are still not as fresh as if I had written in the moment.

Our last stop in Russia was Irkutsk, 5185km from Moscow, which our lying cheating guide book claims is 'deservedly' one of the most popular stops on the entire railway. Maybe there are two 'Irkutsk' or maybe the Russian Government implemented a program to remove any joy or charm from Irkutsk that was started just after the writer of the guide left and finished- successfully- just as we arrived. Oh lonely planet, why do you always get it wrong?

This is not a town I would choose to stop in again but for two reasons.
First was the beautiful Elena. Elena runs a home stay in Irkutsk where we stayed in her spare room and her mother cooked for us. It was great to spend time with people that were not travelers like us, I think we got a good insight into Russian life with many long conversations comparing Elena's life under a communistic government and how it has changed for her 14 year old daughter. One thing that sticks in my mind from our conversations was Elena's comment in regards to her teenagers’ years: "I always knew I was not free" Another reminder for me that we as citizens of England, Australia and Europe are very lucky; we can travel anywhere, work anywhere and live anywhere. Currently I and Davina are planning our next steps around the world, we are not sure where to go but we could simply throw a dart at a map of the world and go where it lands (assuming it’s a country and that England/USA have not invaded it in the last few months.) Elena is like a lot of single mums who work hard to provide a home for their children but with large personal sacrifice. She dreams of coming to England and living the life of an English Lady.
We enjoyed a little get together with Elena and some of her friends and a little vodka, of course.

The one and possibly only thing that caught my attention in Irkutsk was a local
fascination with England. There was a British club that had pictures of
iconic British figures and a London pub. Of course we had to eat here.
There were no burgers, slot machines or girls drinking pints of Stella.
No very London.


The second and LAST reason Irkutsk deserves to be on anyone’s itinerary is it’s the closest stop to Lake Baikal, the 'Pearl of Siberia'.

Lake Baikal is the world’s deeps lake at 1637m and holds a massive 5th
of the worlds unfrozen fresh water. In the height of winter a layer of
ice covers the entire surface so thick you can drive across it (but
experience proved you cant drive a train across, silly Russians) and
it's so clean you can peer down through the ice like a window seeing
upto 40m down.
Visiting Lake Baikal numbed the pain of stopping at Irkutsk.
We court a min-van from Irkutsk to Listvyanka 60km away, on the lake
side. I luckily fell asleep almost instantly missing the sprawling and
ugly outskirts of the city and awoke as we were whizzing up and down
very steep hills in the middle of a pine forest. As pleasing as the
view was, both the wake up call and the ride were not.
Sat opposite us was a rather large woman. A women of such proportions
that two tickets would have been more appropriate. She suddenly felt
the need to look forward, this want required her to heave her
gargantuan bulk around 180 degrees. So at one split second all
her weight and the force required to move it was focused on my knee
by way of her knee as she pivoted, rudely and suddenly waking me up.
To rube salt into wounded knee she did not speak to the driver or
even request the next stop, rather pause, forward facing for a second
before spinning back into her seat where she stayed for the next 20mins.
A fully loaded min-van does not feel the safest mode of transport at
the best of times but it is Russia and winter so there is ice and snow
on the road with only thin tracks of Tarmac showing through the ice.
What happens if the driver misses as we race up and down these scenic
but steep hills and clips the ice sending us over the edge no doubt
turning us into a fireball of min-van, fat middle aged women, fake fur
and me. That is not the way I want to go.

Thank goodness we arrived safely and alive to tell the tale.
And it is as beautiful and peaceful as expected.
We find our guest house and are greeted by the owner who, with no
English, shows us around and how everything works including the taps,
just incase taps are different in England. We are in a traditional
Siberian wooden house, warm, cozy and brightly painted. There is a
small kitchen and dinning room and three bed rooms but we are the only
ones staying as it is off season. Later as we explore, it seems like
we are the only ones staying in the entire village.
The cottage decor is a bizarre mishmash of very dated styles. A bit
like the home of an old woman that did decorate regularly but stopped
40 years ago. There is even patterned wallpaper with glitter on it.
We loved it.
I can't believe we had three nights in Irkutsk but only one here. If I
was to do this again I would get off the train at Irkutsk and get
straight on a bus to the lake. Maybe even closing my eyes as we travel through Irkutsk so I don’t even have to look upon its ugliness.

We dump our stuff and go exploring. The house is in a small valley and
about 160m from the lake side. Due to the snow and increased layers of
clothing even short distances like this take an age to cover.
The shore line is very interesting. Ice forms on anything that gets
splashed or washed over. So as the waves lap over the rocks layer
upon layer of ice forms. All the plants have an ice shell. Individual
strands of tall grass have ice crust like they are on display in a
museum.
The sun starts to set and the temperature drops.

We have to brave the cold to get an evening meal. The closest restaurant
offers a menu in English. I have the fish that is only found in this
lake. On our way back I have my hood pulled down to just above my eyes
and my scarf to just below them. The only exposed part was my eyes. It
was ok until the slight breeze hit my unprotected eyes, my goodness did
it sting.

First thing in the morning I have to get some cash out.
It's our last real day in Russia as our train leaves at 5.25am
tomorrow and we want to leave with as little rubles as possible. It’s
a perfectly clear morning allowing me to see all the way across the
lake to the mountains on the other side. It's also perfectly quite, the
waves lapping the pebble beach making the only sounds.


For my 20th birthday I was kindly given an aerobatic plane ride. This
was 30 mins in a small 2 seater plane with a rather large pilot that
spun and twisted us through the air. Loop-da-loop, corkscrews and
dives. I was sat next to him with my own set of controls and at one
point he said 'over to you'. I had control of the plane; I could go
up and down, left or right. It was an extraordinary thought that I had
control. A very similar experience yesterday. After about 2km the
instructor put the break on and motioned for me to take his place. I
put both feet on the break, wait for him to sit down and then jump off
the break on to the foot plates and we are off at what feels like a
million miles an hour pulled along by 7 very strong and very excited
dogs.
I had control of the sledge. I could go left or right....well, if the
dogs also wanted to go that way. It was not long before I fell off.

Our treat for Russia other than Russia it's self is a 10km dog sledge
ride.
I have joyous images of dogs bounding through the flat wide tundra
pulling a sledge where I romantically sip mulled wine with Davina.
Try controlling a sledge over what must be a world class mountain bike
course while being pulled by seven very excited dogs that have only
two speeds: still and not still.
We chose a 10km ride expecting that we would do the riding. In very
limited and broken English one of the staff explains that the
instructor will start then we will swap. He will sit in the sledge with
me standing on the back steering. Most important thing is not to let
go. The dogs won't stop.
There are 35 dogs in total and they know some of them are about to run and
they all want in. They bark as if selection is done on noise created.
They are brought from their individual kennels clipped to a secure
rope and harnessed up. This all happens very quickly.
Davina is off first and you can barely hold my team back.
Off we go.
First thing that struck me was the peace. As soon as we left the other
dogs calm down and now the wind rushing past my ears is all that
could be heard.
Next thing that stuck me was the floor as we left it and then
reconnected with it again rather abruptly dashing my romanticized images
of a smooth ride. It was bumpy. Like really bumpy.
And the dogs were fast, I assume we were the first run of the day.
After about 2km we stop and swap places. You stand on two skis like
platforms and in-between there is a pedal which acts as a break by
shoving nails into the snow.
I fall off almost instantly tipping the sledge over and the instructor out.
We cling on, tip the sledge back up, standing on the break and
then off again. I find it very hard to negotiate the ruff terrain
falling off at least 5 times which must have pissed the dogs off no end.
We complete the course. As we pulled into the compound a team is
waiting to receive the dogs and very quickly de-harness them and return
them to their houses. I am very grateful it was over. It was amazing
and thrilling but scary.

It's surprisingly warm and the sun is out so we enjoy a walk along the
lake before catching the bus back to Irkutsk.
The lake was stunning. If only we had more time there.
Finally being out of cities made me want to be remote. Away from lots
of people and noise.

I have a sore knee, sledging or fat women...