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Published: August 16th 2009
Back to our journey.
Our bus driver agreed to drive us to the edge of the village, from where we could proceed on foot through the forest and to the beach.
When he dropped us off on a hill and we turned around, we couldn't believe our eyes. To our right we saw a desert. To our left we saw far-away mountains of the mainland and the water. Between those was a pine forest, and more sand.
Still marveling at unexpected presence of the desert, we hoisted our backpacks and our bags with food and set off. (Our host advised us to buy the majority of food in Irkutsk, which we did but didn't need to as there are plenty of shops in Khuzhir selling all the food you might want).
We walked through sand, and then a forest, and then some more sand until we came out to the beach. Well, actually we were about 50 meters away from the lake and 20 meters away from the actual beach, but still on the sand and 10 meters away from the forest. We found a sweet spot between some pine trees and away from other tents. There
are lots of tents, and in the forest they are sometimes only few meters away from each other, while on the beach they are more widely spaced.
We dropped our backpacks, sat on the sand and stretched our tired limbs - walking in deep sand is a hard exercise! And then Mike jumps up and starts yelling MY JACKET MY JACKET!
After making sure that the jacket did not in fact come alive and started attacking us, I found out that it got left on the bus, along with Mike's wallet and passport in its pocket. After a phone call to the bus office, we found out that the driver was still in the vicinity and we could pick the jacket up in an hour or so. That meant on of us had to go to the village - a 40 minute walk past the forest, desert, up the hill and down the village's main road to the bus office. Mike's foot was unfortunately hurting, so it fell to me, and I didn't mind really - I set off walking cheerfully, looking at the scenery around me and listening to a Dean Koontz book on my Ipod. Turned
out I should have looked at the scenery more closely - I walked right into a muddy bog and didn't notice until I sank ankle-deep into black mud mixed with cow patties here and there. I panicked and tried to get out, but that only made me sink knee-deep. Now panicking in earnest, I pulled one leg out, but the force with which the mud was holding me made the rubber strap on my flip-flop rip out of its socket. My other flip-flop was left in the mud when I pulled my second leg out, so I had to reach, elbow-deep into the mud to fish it out. I hopped to the dry ground and surveyed the damage. My legs, hands, arms and even face were covered in black mud, and so were my flip-flops. one of which was torn. I decided not to go back to the camp, but make a loop back to the lake and wash off and repair my shoe. The first I did, the latter proved to be too difficult.
Still slightly in shock, I walked up to the nearest camp and saw a man carving something with a knife. I asked him to
lend me the knife, but he just took my flip-flop and repaired it for me. Thanking him, I walked off and, making a huge loop to avoid any bog-like grounds, I headed for the village.
The walk to and from the village was uneventful and provided a lot of information about shops and things to do. I got back to our camp almost two hours after I left, making Mike worried. I flopped on the ground and told him the story of my bog adventure, while he made fire. I cooked my first meal on an open fire - I made pasta with canned meat, and we were so hungry, we ate every last bit, and then sat listening to the sound of waves crashing, and looking at the stars, and generally enjoying being in this beautiful place together...
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Colleen
non-member comment
Great blog!
Sure glad you were able to get out of that mud bog, Julia!