Blogs from Siberia, Russia, Europe - page 32

Facts about Lake Baikal: Lake Baikal is in southern Siberia and is also known as the "Blue Eye of Siberia". It contains more water than all of the North American Great Lakes combined. At 1,642 meters (5,390 ft), Lake Baikal is the deepest lake in the world and the largest freshwater lake in the world by volume. Lake Baikal was formed as an ancient rift valley, having the typical long crescent shape with a surface area of (31,722 km2/12,248 sq mi), less than that of Lake Superior or Lake Victoria. Today we were heading to Olkhon Island, 500km from Irkutsk in Lake Baikal. We had heard great reviews of this island so were excited to go. First we had to figure out how to get there, after discovering we couldn't get there from Listvyanaka by boat ... read more

We arrived in Irkutsk in the evening and after we found our hostel we headed out to find food but to no avail, so we ended up purchasing some bread, ham and cheese and of course beers and headed back for an early night. After 3 days on a train doing nothing you'd think we were itching to get out there and see the sights but to be honest we couldn't be bothered so we parked up in a bar with some outside space so we could sit in the sun and drink our way through the day. Tony had read there was a bar called The Liverpool Bar here and was determined to find it, we did and it was pants inside, g had a wine which we reckon had been open for many months ... read more

Definitions: gol -mongolian for river, nuur -Mongolian for lake, aimag -a mongolian state or province, asalam aleykhem -Kazakh for peace be with you. The Bohmoron Gol drains several lakes high in the boundary ranges which seperate Russia from Mongolia. It then flows through a large, wide (50 km +), rocky valley rimmed with 4000 m + peaks before dumping heavily turbid water into broad, shallow Achit Nuur. Along this course, the river devides Uvs aimag to the northeast from Bayan-Olgii aimag, the western most political division in the country. In dividing the two aimags, the mighty Bohmoron also divides two distinctly different cultures. On the Uvs side, the virtually plantless, rocky plains are occupied by a mostly Kalkh Mongol population, who ethnically make up roughly 90 percent of all Mongolian citizens. Two days drive over high, ... read more

Day 153 Today we were woken early as we had arrived at Subaatar the Mongolian border crossing. The train sat stationary at the platform for approximately 2 hours before the officials came on-board to collect our passports and departure cards. The toilets would remain locked the whole time while the train was parked, it was going to be a long wait. After searching the cabins, our passports were returned and about an hour later we were allowed to get off the train. The whole process of leaving Mongolia took about 4 hours and then we had it all to do again for Russia. After travelling through what seemed like no man's land we passed a barbed wire fence and the train arrived at Naushki, the Russian border town at approximately 11am. The Russian officials checked the ... read more

Unlike the previous mornings, on our new locomotive home, we awoke after a pretty terrible nights sleep. There may have been a number of contributing factors. It was possible that the inevitable train-lag that we had been anticipating was upon us or perhaps it was our serious lack of physical exertion. It also could have been due to the air conditioning, over which we had no control over, pumping out what felt like sub zero temperatures all night. I stepped out of our cabin to check the kilometer sign posts at the other side of the train and bumped into Claus, one of our German neighbours. Claus doesn't speak English and my GCSE German has been in retirement now for over a decade(I should point out that I wasn't that great to begin with). However, we ... read more