Introducing interactive map of Irkusk city. Just go to Irkutsk section of our website.
If you travel to Irkutsk, this is the main thing you'll need.
Only best recommended and most important places.
Old blog about Lake Baikal that hasn't been updated for many years.
November 21, 2010
November 20, 2010
Gold on the Bottom Myth?
During the Russian Revolution and subsequent Russian Civil War huge quantities of the former Tsar’s fortune went missing across Russia. More than 1,600 tonnes of gold was allegedly in the possession of White leader Admiral Kolchak, and legend has it that the gold was lost as his men tried to transport it across a frozen Lake Baikal.
The more widely accepted version of events is that the gold was being transported across the frozen lake in a train (after all, 1,600 tonnes is a lot to carry!). This isn’t quite as fanciful an idea as it sounds – the ice on Baikal is very thick during the winter and it was quite common for temporary rail lines to be laid across the ice, particularly during times of war. However, occasionally, the ice would collapse under the weight of a train, leading to disaster, and it appears that this may be what happened to one of Kolchak’s trains.
Read more about this on Siberian Light
The more widely accepted version of events is that the gold was being transported across the frozen lake in a train (after all, 1,600 tonnes is a lot to carry!). This isn’t quite as fanciful an idea as it sounds – the ice on Baikal is very thick during the winter and it was quite common for temporary rail lines to be laid across the ice, particularly during times of war. However, occasionally, the ice would collapse under the weight of a train, leading to disaster, and it appears that this may be what happened to one of Kolchak’s trains.
Read more about this on Siberian Light
November 15, 2010
Professional Photography of Lake Baikal
Visit our new project and find out where you can find the best photos of lake Baikal and surrounding areas. Also featuring photos of Nepal and North India.
Order suvenirs and other products.
Baikal Club International Photography
Order suvenirs and other products.
Baikal Club International Photography
November 12, 2010
Ride Trans Siberian
New Project from Russian Rail Ways and Google Maps. On this video you can see lake Baikal part of trans siberian.
Take the full Trans Siberian here.
Take the full Trans Siberian here.
Republic of Buryatia
Republic of Buryatia: "(Friday, 22 October 2010) I just got back from downtown, where we (Irkutsk State University Choir) performed at ВТБ Bank’s 20th birthday pa..."
Won't you take me tooooo, Chinggis Towwwwwn!
Полтора Года: Won't you take me tooooo, Chinggis Towwwwwn!: "The overnight train from Irkutsk to Ulan-Ude was of course fine, except for the minimal amount of sleep, which was to be exp..."
November 11, 2010
November 9, 2010
Irkutsk to Beijing
We left Irkutsk with some friends from the hostel. The trip to the border with Russia is empty. That is the right word. Especially when you come closer to Mongolia the landscape is getting more empty, no trees, only some hills, grass, sheep and some occasional huts and buildings here and there. Fascinating was that our wagon was the last one on the train, so we could look out from the back of the wagon on the tracks.
At the Russian border town (forgot the name) the russian train personnel leaves the train and disappears. At first we thought we could only leave the train for some minutes, but soon it became apparent that we would stay on this station for quite some time. A locomotive began to shunt the wagons of our train from irkutsk from one track to other tracks. The motive for shunting was unclear for us but the mongolian driver was having fun and used his horn to cheer us up quite often. Shunting took 3 hours. The only wagon left on the track was our wagon, the wagon with all the bloody tourists. There were only 4 locals in it, the rest came from Europe and one guy from India.
When discovering the vicinity of the station, there was a little cafe with very unfriendly, very russian personnel. They sold cola and old potato fried bread. Bwahh! Outside however, there was an old woman with a pram. In the pram, there was no kid, but a big cooking pot filled with stew. Very nice! (there are relatively clean toilets (payed) on the platform in the direction of where the train came from).
With topped up stomachs, we went back to the station and found a relic locomotive from the better times of the USSR with a broadly smiling mongolian driver on it. I was the first to glance into the cockpit, he noticed and invited me into his 'cubicle'. NO RUSSIAN, NO ENGLISH, ONLY MONGOLIAN, were the only words he said. Did not matter at all, because sitting in the driver seat, pushing all the buttons was a childrens dream come true. The guy had loads of fun as well.
Luckily the weather was perfect, because before we knew, 7 hours of waiting abruptly ended when a parade of unfriendly russian border patrol women! came out of a building and commandeered everybody back to the train. Back in the train they took away our passports and started taking apart the wagon. I did not expect to discover so many hidden panels.
An hour later we were on our way to the mongolian border town. First we passed the russian fence with machine guns on it, very friendly guys. As we were in the only wagon behind the locomotive, the still smiling driver could see us hang out of the windows. While driving on a very curvy track at 50 km/h he started hanging out of the window as well, waving his arms, faced backwards that is...
In Mongolia the whole passport thing started again but only took an hour or so. At this station it is important to keep your wagon in sight, because it will be shunted to another passenger train that arrives from ulaan bataar. Funny thing happened when they started shunting. The border patrol had our passports, then the wagon started moving. Some guys panicked completely. Oh my passport, help, my passport is still not here! But after a few hundred meters the train stopped and was driven back to the passenger train.
Very early in the morning you are woken up by the provodnitzas, still some 50 km away from ulaan bataar. The landscape has completely changed again. No grass anymore, only dust and stones, the sheep are still there, but what they eat, I have no clue. The sun was coming up, everything had a golden lining. In Irkutsk we booked beds in a hostel called Golden Gobi. Arriving on the platform still sleep drunken, a kind women from this hostel welcomed us in well spoken english, something that would amaze us some more times in the coming days. We were driven to the hostel in a minibus that had no strait axles anymore and not a single panel that still had its original shape. Cars are strange in mongolia. Lots of people in UB have 4x4s that would be considered top class luxury SUVs in the states or europe. Even in the countryside, the nomads are driving new passenger cars imported from japan through the steppe. There is no real business to earn money with in Mongolia, apart from herds and tourists...
In the hostel a small breakfast with bread, marmalade and tea was served. The start in this hostel was good, but later it seemed the family was particularly fond of its guests when you booked something with their tour guides. If you did not, like us, they did not like you. Showers were ok though, not always warm, but after 4 days living in a tent between sheep, goats and camels, that doesn't matter anymore.
Next day we discovered UB and had our 'orientating' lesson with the organization that would let us travel among nomad families in the inland, Ger-to-Ger. In the evening we discovered the best, probably the only, good western kitchen restaurant in UB, called Veranda. It is close to the central square. Although you might think that we are cultural barbarians eating steaks instead of local dishes, this was actually a good idea. We didn't know that by that time though.
Next day very early we left the hostel to take a bus to Sansar, a small village (actually, 5 huts along a road) 300 km west of UB. At the bus station our bus was already loading people and lots of luggage, no animals though. After leaving UB, where the roads are particularly bad, the road became of western quality. Actually, it was a road build with development money. After 100 km though it abruptly stopped. The bus left the road and continued off road. I have never seen anything like it. Sometimes it could go 40 km/h but most of the time it was navigating big humps and pits/ditches. After 20 km, the road continued as if there was no discontinuation in between.
At Sansar we were met by a local who brought us to our first family where we would spend a day and a night. The first family was a bit distant. My brother made a lot of effort to communicate through the small dictionary we got at ger-to-ger. The father was drunken most of the time, but he managed to put us on camels for a walk to the other side of the valley. Oh and btw, the landscape is breathtaking in this area. Sometimes it looks like what you would imagine on Mars. Mountains are rolling through the landscape. Herds of horses are galloping through the open grassland and everywhere you can discover little white spots, the gers where the nomads live.
After the ride on camels, our bottoms would hurt for another two days, we got our first meal. Dried sheep/goat meat (mutton) with home made pasta, cooked on a stove, heated by camel excrement. Very tasty actually, but as you get it three times a day, you have had enough after 4 days. Not something for people with a sensitive stomach. Some families also make their own yoghurt. I come from a country where they make excellent yoghurt, but this was so fresh! It was prickly on your tongue.
The next day we walked with camels to our next family, where we rode horses onto a mountain and back. Again, the view is beyond imaginable. This family was much nicer. The mom and dad where actually working together in a manner I am used to. Nothing traditional wife and husband thing. In the evening it started raining and storming. Amazing enough, you don't notice any of that in the Ger, until you have to pee. I nearly lost my clothes while trying. This was actually the first rain in the year, we're talking mid May. Our next family was so happy because of the rain, that they did not have time to show us around. They were all way too drunk. Straight walking was impossible for them. Instead we rode horses with grandpa, who trained horses for the yearly horse racing festival in mongolia, the most important thing that happens in a mongolian year. He brought us to a place where you can see five different climates in a stretch of 4 km. Green, rounded hills, then the kind of grass you expect in your garden, then water with living creatures in it like frogs, then dunes that could come from the sahara and last but not least, very sharp and bare, red mountains. The strangest thing.
Although it was a big adventure, it was so nice to drive back to UB with the prospect to have a shower and eat steaks in the Veranda again! After eating we decided to go out and find a club with the head of Stalin in it, a relic of the communist period. Other tourists in the hostel told us that they also searched for it, but couldn't find it. We thought they were amateurs, so we got into a taxi and asked the driver to bring us there. He put us at the side of the road at a stretch of buildings that didn't look particularly attractive. But the buildings weren't the biggest problem, the drunken people were. Mongolian guys get drunk, not the girls, and when they do, some of them get aggressive. They don't look for foreigners in particular, but if your are in reach they will hit you. Don't make too much eye contact!
We didn't find the club, but were drawn into a basement full of mirrors and dancing locals. The guy at the door, 2 by 2 by 2 meters, brought us to a empty space of little bars tables and stools and gave us a beer. Within no time, the empty spots were taken by mongolian girls only. I guess they don't get to see blond people very often. I started reasoning, if these girls are the girlfriends of some guys, who are also here and they are drunk, then we might have a problem. I wasn't finished thinking and the whole mirrored wall came down on one side of the basement. Two guys had started a fight. The bouncer took the guys and threw them out like you see in a cartoon. Music was out, everyone back to their places. After 10 minutes the mess was gone and the music started again. This was apparently a normal thing in UB. We didn't feel very comfortable though and left the premises. On the way back in the cab, we almost got caught up in a traffic accident. Mongolian drivers put their foot down if you are walking on a zebra. The trick is to cross the road lane by lane. Traffic lights are for amateurs.
Early in the morning we left UB with the diesel train to Beijing. At first I thought it was a steam train because of the smoke, but that was just because the engine was still cold. The first stretch the train is rolling through a hilly landscape trying to get up the mountain with lots of black smoke, the track is making almost circles in the process. After a few hours we stopped at a little city that marks the beginning of the gobi desert. Climate change. From 9 C in the morning to 35 in the shadow in a few hours. Then the crossing started. Clouds of dust would come into the wagon regularly, even when all the windows were closed. The dust is so fine, you can see it as mist and taste it. Your hair is getting sticky, you can do all kinds of strange things with it. The ventilator in the compartment is a welcome treat (although no net of steel is build around it, so let your long hair not get caught up in it). In the evening we reached the border with China, where the platform is occupied by soldiers standing exactly 5 meters apart. Some piece of mozart is blasting through the night to welcome us in china. After passport checks, the train is shunted backwards into a big shed. The whole train fits in it. Every wagon is decoupled and lifted with everybody in it. The bogies are changed from wide gauge to standard gauge and then rolled back to the station, where you can buy your last supply of chengiss khan vodka.
After waking up, the first thing you notice is that the track is so smooth. Look out of the window and you see that everything, EVERYTHING, is brand new. The diesel locomotive seems out of place here, high speed tracks are normal. Left and right of the tracks you can see russian build nuclear powerplants in numbers that shock. If the Chinese are building a building, they build 20 flats at the same time, not one. Another regular sight is that of oxen pulling a plow with a farmer behind it. So much about the difference between rich and poor.
After arriving in Beijing, the first thing you have to do is navigate the big square in front of the station. It is packed with people, so tight, that it is almost impossible to walk. At the street side of the square there is a taxi stand. Our guide said that it is easy to get a taxi in Beijing and they are cheap. It couldn't be more wrong. There was a row of people of at least 300 waiting for cabs that weren't there. We circumnavigated the row and got an offer from a taxi driver. He would bring us to the hotel for only 140 euros. We told him to rip off some other tourists and he suddenly could say dirty words at us in english. Very strange.
Although the temperature was close to 35C and humidity at 100% we decided to walk with our bags to the hostel, some 6 km. (one tip: don't pack too much. choose your clothes in layers. put everything you think you need on your bed and then leave half of it at home. although you are going to the end of the world, it doesn't mean there is nothing to buy there. as things are mostly incredibly cheap in russia, mongolia or china, just buy it there if you need it) On the way to the hotel we got an offer from a lady in a three wheeled motorcycle cab. We negotiated a price and were happy tourists. Arrived at the hotel, I gave her the money and she asked where the rest was. The rest? This was what we negotiated right? No the price was for only one person. :-) Very funny. Stupid tourists. Anyway, in Amsterdam we would have paid 5 times more. The Beijing Jade international youth hostel, 15 minute bike ride from the forbidden city, was perfect. Personnel was inflexible, but room and breakfast was ok.
In Beijing do one thing: rent a bike and travel by bike. The bike roads are separated from the normal roads, traffic is reasonably safe and if you have some experience, driving a bike is not a problem. The bike is fast, you see a lot of things and you can decide what to do. Beijing has excellent food markets on the street, you can visit the silk market for clothes that costs 20x more in europe or usa and buy tea in one of the specialized tea shops. The forbidden city is a must and around it you can find a lot of nice little street restaurants. We ate a sichuan hot pot at such a terrace. Two blond guys completely red in the face from the peppers. They laughed at us, but the food was good!
By Douwe Braakman.
At the Russian border town (forgot the name) the russian train personnel leaves the train and disappears. At first we thought we could only leave the train for some minutes, but soon it became apparent that we would stay on this station for quite some time. A locomotive began to shunt the wagons of our train from irkutsk from one track to other tracks. The motive for shunting was unclear for us but the mongolian driver was having fun and used his horn to cheer us up quite often. Shunting took 3 hours. The only wagon left on the track was our wagon, the wagon with all the bloody tourists. There were only 4 locals in it, the rest came from Europe and one guy from India.
When discovering the vicinity of the station, there was a little cafe with very unfriendly, very russian personnel. They sold cola and old potato fried bread. Bwahh! Outside however, there was an old woman with a pram. In the pram, there was no kid, but a big cooking pot filled with stew. Very nice! (there are relatively clean toilets (payed) on the platform in the direction of where the train came from).
With topped up stomachs, we went back to the station and found a relic locomotive from the better times of the USSR with a broadly smiling mongolian driver on it. I was the first to glance into the cockpit, he noticed and invited me into his 'cubicle'. NO RUSSIAN, NO ENGLISH, ONLY MONGOLIAN, were the only words he said. Did not matter at all, because sitting in the driver seat, pushing all the buttons was a childrens dream come true. The guy had loads of fun as well.
Luckily the weather was perfect, because before we knew, 7 hours of waiting abruptly ended when a parade of unfriendly russian border patrol women! came out of a building and commandeered everybody back to the train. Back in the train they took away our passports and started taking apart the wagon. I did not expect to discover so many hidden panels.
An hour later we were on our way to the mongolian border town. First we passed the russian fence with machine guns on it, very friendly guys. As we were in the only wagon behind the locomotive, the still smiling driver could see us hang out of the windows. While driving on a very curvy track at 50 km/h he started hanging out of the window as well, waving his arms, faced backwards that is...
In Mongolia the whole passport thing started again but only took an hour or so. At this station it is important to keep your wagon in sight, because it will be shunted to another passenger train that arrives from ulaan bataar. Funny thing happened when they started shunting. The border patrol had our passports, then the wagon started moving. Some guys panicked completely. Oh my passport, help, my passport is still not here! But after a few hundred meters the train stopped and was driven back to the passenger train.
Very early in the morning you are woken up by the provodnitzas, still some 50 km away from ulaan bataar. The landscape has completely changed again. No grass anymore, only dust and stones, the sheep are still there, but what they eat, I have no clue. The sun was coming up, everything had a golden lining. In Irkutsk we booked beds in a hostel called Golden Gobi. Arriving on the platform still sleep drunken, a kind women from this hostel welcomed us in well spoken english, something that would amaze us some more times in the coming days. We were driven to the hostel in a minibus that had no strait axles anymore and not a single panel that still had its original shape. Cars are strange in mongolia. Lots of people in UB have 4x4s that would be considered top class luxury SUVs in the states or europe. Even in the countryside, the nomads are driving new passenger cars imported from japan through the steppe. There is no real business to earn money with in Mongolia, apart from herds and tourists...
In the hostel a small breakfast with bread, marmalade and tea was served. The start in this hostel was good, but later it seemed the family was particularly fond of its guests when you booked something with their tour guides. If you did not, like us, they did not like you. Showers were ok though, not always warm, but after 4 days living in a tent between sheep, goats and camels, that doesn't matter anymore.
Next day we discovered UB and had our 'orientating' lesson with the organization that would let us travel among nomad families in the inland, Ger-to-Ger. In the evening we discovered the best, probably the only, good western kitchen restaurant in UB, called Veranda. It is close to the central square. Although you might think that we are cultural barbarians eating steaks instead of local dishes, this was actually a good idea. We didn't know that by that time though.
Next day very early we left the hostel to take a bus to Sansar, a small village (actually, 5 huts along a road) 300 km west of UB. At the bus station our bus was already loading people and lots of luggage, no animals though. After leaving UB, where the roads are particularly bad, the road became of western quality. Actually, it was a road build with development money. After 100 km though it abruptly stopped. The bus left the road and continued off road. I have never seen anything like it. Sometimes it could go 40 km/h but most of the time it was navigating big humps and pits/ditches. After 20 km, the road continued as if there was no discontinuation in between.
At Sansar we were met by a local who brought us to our first family where we would spend a day and a night. The first family was a bit distant. My brother made a lot of effort to communicate through the small dictionary we got at ger-to-ger. The father was drunken most of the time, but he managed to put us on camels for a walk to the other side of the valley. Oh and btw, the landscape is breathtaking in this area. Sometimes it looks like what you would imagine on Mars. Mountains are rolling through the landscape. Herds of horses are galloping through the open grassland and everywhere you can discover little white spots, the gers where the nomads live.
After the ride on camels, our bottoms would hurt for another two days, we got our first meal. Dried sheep/goat meat (mutton) with home made pasta, cooked on a stove, heated by camel excrement. Very tasty actually, but as you get it three times a day, you have had enough after 4 days. Not something for people with a sensitive stomach. Some families also make their own yoghurt. I come from a country where they make excellent yoghurt, but this was so fresh! It was prickly on your tongue.
The next day we walked with camels to our next family, where we rode horses onto a mountain and back. Again, the view is beyond imaginable. This family was much nicer. The mom and dad where actually working together in a manner I am used to. Nothing traditional wife and husband thing. In the evening it started raining and storming. Amazing enough, you don't notice any of that in the Ger, until you have to pee. I nearly lost my clothes while trying. This was actually the first rain in the year, we're talking mid May. Our next family was so happy because of the rain, that they did not have time to show us around. They were all way too drunk. Straight walking was impossible for them. Instead we rode horses with grandpa, who trained horses for the yearly horse racing festival in mongolia, the most important thing that happens in a mongolian year. He brought us to a place where you can see five different climates in a stretch of 4 km. Green, rounded hills, then the kind of grass you expect in your garden, then water with living creatures in it like frogs, then dunes that could come from the sahara and last but not least, very sharp and bare, red mountains. The strangest thing.
Although it was a big adventure, it was so nice to drive back to UB with the prospect to have a shower and eat steaks in the Veranda again! After eating we decided to go out and find a club with the head of Stalin in it, a relic of the communist period. Other tourists in the hostel told us that they also searched for it, but couldn't find it. We thought they were amateurs, so we got into a taxi and asked the driver to bring us there. He put us at the side of the road at a stretch of buildings that didn't look particularly attractive. But the buildings weren't the biggest problem, the drunken people were. Mongolian guys get drunk, not the girls, and when they do, some of them get aggressive. They don't look for foreigners in particular, but if your are in reach they will hit you. Don't make too much eye contact!
We didn't find the club, but were drawn into a basement full of mirrors and dancing locals. The guy at the door, 2 by 2 by 2 meters, brought us to a empty space of little bars tables and stools and gave us a beer. Within no time, the empty spots were taken by mongolian girls only. I guess they don't get to see blond people very often. I started reasoning, if these girls are the girlfriends of some guys, who are also here and they are drunk, then we might have a problem. I wasn't finished thinking and the whole mirrored wall came down on one side of the basement. Two guys had started a fight. The bouncer took the guys and threw them out like you see in a cartoon. Music was out, everyone back to their places. After 10 minutes the mess was gone and the music started again. This was apparently a normal thing in UB. We didn't feel very comfortable though and left the premises. On the way back in the cab, we almost got caught up in a traffic accident. Mongolian drivers put their foot down if you are walking on a zebra. The trick is to cross the road lane by lane. Traffic lights are for amateurs.
Early in the morning we left UB with the diesel train to Beijing. At first I thought it was a steam train because of the smoke, but that was just because the engine was still cold. The first stretch the train is rolling through a hilly landscape trying to get up the mountain with lots of black smoke, the track is making almost circles in the process. After a few hours we stopped at a little city that marks the beginning of the gobi desert. Climate change. From 9 C in the morning to 35 in the shadow in a few hours. Then the crossing started. Clouds of dust would come into the wagon regularly, even when all the windows were closed. The dust is so fine, you can see it as mist and taste it. Your hair is getting sticky, you can do all kinds of strange things with it. The ventilator in the compartment is a welcome treat (although no net of steel is build around it, so let your long hair not get caught up in it). In the evening we reached the border with China, where the platform is occupied by soldiers standing exactly 5 meters apart. Some piece of mozart is blasting through the night to welcome us in china. After passport checks, the train is shunted backwards into a big shed. The whole train fits in it. Every wagon is decoupled and lifted with everybody in it. The bogies are changed from wide gauge to standard gauge and then rolled back to the station, where you can buy your last supply of chengiss khan vodka.
After waking up, the first thing you notice is that the track is so smooth. Look out of the window and you see that everything, EVERYTHING, is brand new. The diesel locomotive seems out of place here, high speed tracks are normal. Left and right of the tracks you can see russian build nuclear powerplants in numbers that shock. If the Chinese are building a building, they build 20 flats at the same time, not one. Another regular sight is that of oxen pulling a plow with a farmer behind it. So much about the difference between rich and poor.
After arriving in Beijing, the first thing you have to do is navigate the big square in front of the station. It is packed with people, so tight, that it is almost impossible to walk. At the street side of the square there is a taxi stand. Our guide said that it is easy to get a taxi in Beijing and they are cheap. It couldn't be more wrong. There was a row of people of at least 300 waiting for cabs that weren't there. We circumnavigated the row and got an offer from a taxi driver. He would bring us to the hotel for only 140 euros. We told him to rip off some other tourists and he suddenly could say dirty words at us in english. Very strange.
Although the temperature was close to 35C and humidity at 100% we decided to walk with our bags to the hostel, some 6 km. (one tip: don't pack too much. choose your clothes in layers. put everything you think you need on your bed and then leave half of it at home. although you are going to the end of the world, it doesn't mean there is nothing to buy there. as things are mostly incredibly cheap in russia, mongolia or china, just buy it there if you need it) On the way to the hotel we got an offer from a lady in a three wheeled motorcycle cab. We negotiated a price and were happy tourists. Arrived at the hotel, I gave her the money and she asked where the rest was. The rest? This was what we negotiated right? No the price was for only one person. :-) Very funny. Stupid tourists. Anyway, in Amsterdam we would have paid 5 times more. The Beijing Jade international youth hostel, 15 minute bike ride from the forbidden city, was perfect. Personnel was inflexible, but room and breakfast was ok.
In Beijing do one thing: rent a bike and travel by bike. The bike roads are separated from the normal roads, traffic is reasonably safe and if you have some experience, driving a bike is not a problem. The bike is fast, you see a lot of things and you can decide what to do. Beijing has excellent food markets on the street, you can visit the silk market for clothes that costs 20x more in europe or usa and buy tea in one of the specialized tea shops. The forbidden city is a must and around it you can find a lot of nice little street restaurants. We ate a sichuan hot pot at such a terrace. Two blond guys completely red in the face from the peppers. They laughed at us, but the food was good!
By Douwe Braakman.
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