Monday, August 15, 2005
Siberia
We arrived in Irkutsk around 07.00 on a very bright and very cold morning - noticeably much colder than Ulan Baator. I had been looking forward to our stopover here as we had one night in Irkutsk itself - once dubbed the Paris of the east - and then one night at the 'unique' Lake Baikal, one of the natural wonders of the world. I guess I should really have learnt by this stage not to launch in anywhere with any type of expectations, as you only end up disappointed...................
So firstly Irkutsk. It was a miracle we got out of there before being overtaken with the urge to slash our wrists. The main pastime during the day is drinking in the streets and, for the girls, dressing like ladies of the night. The main pastime during the night is, er, the same. In between this everyone finds time to smoke and be rude to tourists - and probably eachother, for that matter. Things hadn't got off to a great start when I had a disagreement with the local rep over how much money he was getting. Still, we won that contest so it could have been worse. Then the hotel was, quite frankly, pony. And this was all before the sightseeing we had to do.......which last approximately 40 minutes. Not because we cut it short, but because that was how long the sum total of the sights - a crooked house, a closed church and a polluted river. Not all disaster though, as we found somewhere that did very good Borsch, and were then entertained by a brass brand. Still, I was comforting myself with the fact that we still had Lake Baikal and a home stay to look forward to.
Lake Baikal - the largest lake on earth, holding 23,000km cubed of water (that's one fifth of world's freshwater, fact fans) which is more than all of America's great lakes put together. It's 636km long, which is the distance between Moscow and St. Petersburg. The water's so clear you can see 40 yards through it. And 80% of it's flora and fauna isn't found anywhere else in the world. It was just a shame that the village we stayed in doubled up as a municipal tip. As for the home stay, well, the less said about that the better. I see why Siberians drink a lot of Vodka.
So firstly Irkutsk. It was a miracle we got out of there before being overtaken with the urge to slash our wrists. The main pastime during the day is drinking in the streets and, for the girls, dressing like ladies of the night. The main pastime during the night is, er, the same. In between this everyone finds time to smoke and be rude to tourists - and probably eachother, for that matter. Things hadn't got off to a great start when I had a disagreement with the local rep over how much money he was getting. Still, we won that contest so it could have been worse. Then the hotel was, quite frankly, pony. And this was all before the sightseeing we had to do.......which last approximately 40 minutes. Not because we cut it short, but because that was how long the sum total of the sights - a crooked house, a closed church and a polluted river. Not all disaster though, as we found somewhere that did very good Borsch, and were then entertained by a brass brand. Still, I was comforting myself with the fact that we still had Lake Baikal and a home stay to look forward to.
Lake Baikal - the largest lake on earth, holding 23,000km cubed of water (that's one fifth of world's freshwater, fact fans) which is more than all of America's great lakes put together. It's 636km long, which is the distance between Moscow and St. Petersburg. The water's so clear you can see 40 yards through it. And 80% of it's flora and fauna isn't found anywhere else in the world. It was just a shame that the village we stayed in doubled up as a municipal tip. As for the home stay, well, the less said about that the better. I see why Siberians drink a lot of Vodka.
Into Irkutsk; with three dice
So back on the train, heading towards Russia. What with so many stories of friendly natives, great food and knockout service, we just couldn't wait to roll in. But before that, we had two nights on the train, across Siberia. We were reunited with our train spotter friends who were in the cabin on one side of us, and on the other side were aforementioned Val and Michael. Val wasted no time in informing us of all of her opinion on, well, everything. This included her views on environmental protection after some random punter had chucked a load of cardboard out of the window. To be fair to the guy, he was merely adhering to the local customs. I doubt very much there's much money made from landfill sites in Siberia, as everything is just deposited across the countryside.
We were leaving Mongolia in the late afternoon, and the first expected excitement for this leg of the trip was crossing the border into Russia. When applying for visas for Russia one has to stipulate the date of entry. This should, of course, be quite straightforward but owing to the fact that I'd calculated that we would be approaching the border somewhere around midnight, it was with a little trepidation that we pulled out of Ulan Baator. And the word 'calculate' shouldn't be taken lightly either - my estimation was based on 'reversing' an eastbound timetable, translating the Moscow time departure time into local time, allowing for crossing a couple of time zones en route, and finally adding a bit extra on to allow for getting from the last town on the timetable to the border itself. Simple really. Anyway, the upshot of all that was that I'd decided we'd be entering Russia after midnight.
As it turned out I needn't have worried as the border crossing took a matter of ten hours to negotiate. We did indeed approach it close to midnight, but we spent two hours getting through the Mongolian border post. Then we had a nice six hour stretch sitting marooned in no-man's land, so by the time we actually crossed through the Russian border post it was comfortably the next morning. And all through this time you're not allowed to leave the carriage and, rather less than conveniently, the toilets are locked. Now for us who had planned ahead and stopped taking fluids on some eight hours in advance, this wasn't too much of a problem. Though it was for two Australians who were having a hernia trying to keep their legs crossed. Shame. And it was all too much for Val too, who's writing to the European Court of Human Rights about it, or something.
So after such excitement the rest of the journey was fairly low key. A few games of cribbage with Guy the 'railway enthusiast', the trading of wine for cheese with the other train spotters, and Michael introducing me to the world of Sudoku. Little did I know that this was the craze sweeping the nation back home. And after attempting a couple, I can safely say I'll be leaving that bandwagon to Wylie and co.
We were leaving Mongolia in the late afternoon, and the first expected excitement for this leg of the trip was crossing the border into Russia. When applying for visas for Russia one has to stipulate the date of entry. This should, of course, be quite straightforward but owing to the fact that I'd calculated that we would be approaching the border somewhere around midnight, it was with a little trepidation that we pulled out of Ulan Baator. And the word 'calculate' shouldn't be taken lightly either - my estimation was based on 'reversing' an eastbound timetable, translating the Moscow time departure time into local time, allowing for crossing a couple of time zones en route, and finally adding a bit extra on to allow for getting from the last town on the timetable to the border itself. Simple really. Anyway, the upshot of all that was that I'd decided we'd be entering Russia after midnight.
As it turned out I needn't have worried as the border crossing took a matter of ten hours to negotiate. We did indeed approach it close to midnight, but we spent two hours getting through the Mongolian border post. Then we had a nice six hour stretch sitting marooned in no-man's land, so by the time we actually crossed through the Russian border post it was comfortably the next morning. And all through this time you're not allowed to leave the carriage and, rather less than conveniently, the toilets are locked. Now for us who had planned ahead and stopped taking fluids on some eight hours in advance, this wasn't too much of a problem. Though it was for two Australians who were having a hernia trying to keep their legs crossed. Shame. And it was all too much for Val too, who's writing to the European Court of Human Rights about it, or something.
So after such excitement the rest of the journey was fairly low key. A few games of cribbage with Guy the 'railway enthusiast', the trading of wine for cheese with the other train spotters, and Michael introducing me to the world of Sudoku. Little did I know that this was the craze sweeping the nation back home. And after attempting a couple, I can safely say I'll be leaving that bandwagon to Wylie and co.
