Lake Baikal Serenity

We finally arrived in Irkutsk where we were met by our local guide in order to head directly to Lake Baikal. According to our handy "The Lonely Planet: Trans-Mongolian Express" guidebook, Lake Baikal is located in Eastern Siberia and is the biggest and deepest freshwater lake in the world. As we arrive, it's late at night so we can barely appreciate the vastness of the lake as we drove by. We would be spending the night one of the most charming and coziest all wooden Bed & Breakfast homes I’ve ever seen. There was a full meal waiting for us as we arrived which included a fairly oily vegetable soup, potato salad, cheese, and cookies. It was delicious, but the oily soup left some of the group feeling not so great the next day.

The night brought us the nicest sleep we would have on the entire trip, well deserved after the fast pace of the journey through Moscow and St. Petersburg and the number of nights on the not overly comfortable train bunks. But I couldn't wait to wake up the next morning. Crawling out to our balcony we laid witness to a beautiful valley that spilled out into a the pristine Lake Baikal at the end of it. Being the city dweller we all were, you can’t help but appreciate the calming silence with the exception of two dogs having a barking war from opposite ends of the valley. It was the kind of day you just never really wanted to get started, but breakfast was waiting.

Following breakfast we decided to go exploring the local communities. Wandering down towards the lake were a number of old charming homes in a wide variety of colours with highly decorative shutters. It wasn’t uncommon to see goats grazing in somebody's front yard or cows wandering around the hillside. As we arrive seaside we can see the lake spreading out forever. We had heard that the lake water is completely drinkable without any further filtration due to a species of sponge in the lake that is able to clean the water. We witnessed many people dunking buckets at the end of a long rope into the water to take back for their home water.

Our local guide the day before recommended a hilltop lookout the next valley over so we ventured out on a 5km hike to find it. It was a nice hike and we came across many quirky sites along the way (stuffed bear, Mongolian mannequin, pink castle) that turned the day into a free-for-all for taking goofy photos. We struggled a bit with finding the path up to the hilltop but Jeff’s intuition and a little luck managed to get us there. We were given an option of hiking up or taking a ski-lift, but after the 5km hike we opted for the latter. Wandering down a path we found the lookout which was surrounded by scraps of cloth tied down to trees, poles, and handrails. We weren’t sure of the significance of this other than people marking their presence at the spot. We had been mocking Johainah’s wearing of a pink turtleneck on a warm day like today so Jeff had the idea of removing the turtleneck from the sweater so we could leave our mark as well. Joh being the good sport she was donated the piece of her sweater and we all signed and tied to an empty spot on the pole. We may have gotten a little carried away afterwards as we went onto to modify her sweater further by ripping the sleeves off as well. Made for a great picture though as we posed her next to another stuffed bear at the ski-lift going down. Good times.

The afternoon our group split between those that wanted to go further sight-seeing in the towns and those that wanted to get some chill time on the patio back at the B&B with some Russian beer. It was a great afternoon for both groups. The night before we had made arrangements to head to a Banya after dinner. A Banya is basically a Russian steam sauna that consists of three rooms: an entrance room, a washing room, and a steam room. We arrived in the entrance room to remove our outer clothing into our swimsuits and have some warm tea. We then moved into the washing room which was already fairly hot and consisted of a shower and some benches. We spent a great deal of time in here as the steam room itself was incredibly hot and could only be tolerated for about 3-5 mins before you needed to come out. They had these dried birch branches with leaves soaking in water which we were able to smack against each other. Actually felt kind of good, more like a back scratch and helped cool you down. It’s actually common following a stretch in the steam room that people would either run outside and take a dip in the lake or else roll around in the snow. There was no snow and the lake was ½ km away so neither would be included in our Banya experience.

The next day we would be heading back to Irkutsk but first we’d be hitting a Wood Museum which was along our route back. When they dammed the Angara for hydroelectric power they saved some of the old wooden buildings and made a fascinating open air architectural museum which was a re-creation of the typical houses and villages from the early Evenks (similar to the North American Indians) through to the Buryats from Mongolia and the Russians during the 1800’s - 1900’s.

We’d only have a number of hours in Irkutsk before heading out on our next leg of the Trans-Mongolian so it would turn into an opportunity to catch up on email and stock up on supplies. I had grown very fond of the Russian string-cheese so being our last day in Russia we ventured out on a task to find some as well as some vodka for Greg to make the long stretches of time through customs at the Mongolian border a little more tolerable.

Next stop .. Mongolia!