Wooden architecture and smoked fish
Trip Start
Aug 11, 2006
1
17
27
Trip End
Nov 19, 2006
Talsty and Listvyanka,
Russia
Monday, October 16, 2006
So, my lakeside adventure began with a hostel outing. Yup, the whole hostel got together for a day out. Really not too big a deal though, there were only three of us - myself (well, duh), a hideously annoying Dutch man called Kers (was stuck with him on the island too, thank God there were more people around!), and a lovely Belgain man called David, who proudly informed me that Lake Baikal covers more surface area than his whole country!
After a super early morning trip to the train station to buy tickets (because I wasn't allowed to buy a ticket for 4 days in advance the evening before, only up to 2 days in advance
01 - Evenki hut at Taltsy
. Stupid Russian beaurocracy), we somehow managed to get the 9am bus. Mum, you should be proud! The boys were a bit pathetic, it was such an effort to get anything done. Halfway to Listvyanka is somewhere called the Taltsy Wooden Architecture Museum - there's a big dam in Irkutsk, and when it was built, the lake roze by 6m. Lots of old villages were flooded, so they moved bits of them here first. It was a freezing cold morning, one of those days when the ground looks silver from the frost, with hundreds of tiny birds everywhere. The buildings are all hidden in the forest, so it was really pretty, but oh my god, it was cold! There's two native groups of people that lived near the lake - the Evenkis, whose houses were like teepees, and the Buryats, who lived in Wooden houses shaped like the Mongolian gers (more about them later!!). They had some traditional siberian houses too, which were fun to poke around. There were farmhouses, a school, a church - all quite similar in style to what I'd seen in Tomsk, but not quite so dilapidated. The church could have been picked up and moved from Kizhi - an island close to Petrozavodsk, where I studied a couple of years ago. It has two massive wooden churches in the same style, but it's thousands of kilometers away!
The next bus was supposed to go past two hours later, but in true Russian style, it never turned up! We waited, and waited, and waited, and then waited a bit more. I even finished off Crime and Punishment (it's only taken 3 years), while my fingers are shrieking at me from the cold. Marshrutkas passed, but not enough space for all of us (to be honest, I was ready to ditch Kers, he never stopped complaining). We eventually managed to get a bus to the next village, and then hop in a marshrutka to jostle the rest of the way to Listvyanka
02 - Old buildings and the Angara river
.Listvyanka wasn't at all what I was expecting - the Lonely Planet said it was the big Baikal tourist spot, so I think I was expecting a mini Ramsgate, all arcades, fish and chip shops, fairground rides and sunburnt children. Nuh uh! Think more valleys filled with tiny wooden houses on the verge of collapse. The only alludance to it's tourist status were a souvenir shop, a couple of people hawking boat rides, and a monstrosity of a hotel on the lake front - it looked like a multicoloured wedding cake, I don't know what possessed them to build it! Maybe the boredom has sent them all insane...
Anyway, the lake! Imagine, if you will, a banana that curves to the left at the bottom. That's about the shape of Lake Baikal. Listvayanka is at the bottom, close to the curve (Olhkon Island is about half way up on the same side), so it's impossible to see the far end. The lake is almost 700km long, so you wouldn't be able see the far end even if there wasn't a big bend in it I think. As it is, the other side, a 'mere' 80 km away, looks so far away that the cliffs look like clouds instead of land. We walked a little way out of the village (past more tumble down houses and a couple of free roaming cows) up to the cliffs. I was so beautiful, I could have spent all day just looking. I felt so small and insignificant, and quite alone as well. It made me think of being at the Lake District with Hayley last year, and learning how to skim stones in Oulu with Davey - I wish I could have shared this with them!
