Irkutsk, Listvyanka and Lake Baikal
Trip Start
May 02, 2007
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Trip End
Ongoing
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Irkutsk,
Russia
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Our first mission of the day was to buy onward tickets for our next destination, Ulan Bator, in Mongolia. We bought them for October 20, giving us five days to explore the area. With that out of the way, we ran around town trying to find out how to get on the Cirkumbaikal Train - an old, scenic train that skirts the shores of the colossal lake. After getting the run around for a couple of hours, we found out that the reduced off-season schedule didn't fit in with our plans, so we scrapped that idea and instead had an agent book us two nights accommodation each in Listvyanka - a small village an hour and a half south of Irkutsk, and which sits on the shores of Baikal - and also in Kuzhir - the biggest settlement on Olkhon Island in Lake Baikal. With our bus leaving at 7 PM that evening for Listvyanka, we had a little time to check out Irkutsk. On first glance it is just another Siberian city with crazy traffic, smoky, polluted air, and dilapidated buildings.
01.Train station in Irkutsk
But after digging a little deeper we found its charm. The people seemed quite friendly and more relaxed than in any of our other stops. There are some nice green areas to find some peace and the embankment along the Angara River is a scenic spot to rest. There are also some attractive wooden houses spread throughout the city. We met on Aussie couple on the streets who were heading up to Kuzhir as well, and we made some loose plans to hook up with them there. We also discovered that we were all on the same train and they were just a couple of carriages down from us. After our brief explorations and some shopping around we made our way to the bus station for our ride to Listvyanka. The agent who booked our accommodations said the flat was near the Baikal Museum, so we had the driver drop us off there. We were a little surprised to find out that the museum is right at the edge of the town limits and a good three to four kilometers from the main area. Listvyanka lacks streetlights, so when we arrived it was pitch black. Being the good boy/girl scouts we are we were well prepared with our headlamps. We set off up the hill to find our flat and soon realized how crappy the directions they gave us were, especially for finding in the dark! We wandered around trying to find the building and when it wasn't apparent where it was, we found some workers doing some late night work at the museum. They didn't speak English but we managed to explain to them what we were looking for. One of them told us it was the fourth building up the street, so we walked back up but discovered that after the third building the road ended and a small forest separated us and more buildings in the distance.
02.Lenin
We were getting very frustrated. It was dark and cold, and we were carrying our big packs. We knew we couldn't just keep walking around not knowing where we were, so we made the decision to make the trek into the main town (what we were going to do when we got there we hadn't figured that out yet). We walked along the dark road huffing and puffing, each breath crystallizing in the frosty air, with only the small patch of light from our headlamps leading the way. The only sounds were from the unseen lake on our right lapping at the shore and dozens of dogs barking from their respective yards. For the hour or so walk, we cursed the travel agent up and down and swore that once we got back into Irkutsk we would march into their office and demand our money back. A large hotel in the distance with a spotlight on the roof was our landmark and we aimed straight for it. The reception was friendly enough and helped us out by calling the phone number provided by the agent. She made contact with the flat owner, who told us to stay put and she would come pick us up. Fifteen minutes later we were in a tiny old Lada, cruising back down the way we just came. Her name was Olga, and she looked every bit an Olga you could expect. She was extremely friendly and had a very limited English vocabulary. She was quite funny, always referring to herself in the third person: "Olga house", "Olga go work", "Olga stay sister". She ran around her flat showing us all the amenities and made us tea and fed us cookies. Our accommodation was a two bedroom apartment up on a hill, with some views over the lake.
03.Tsar Alexander III
Olga explained that this is where she lived and that she would be staying with her sister for the two nights we were there. We said "dasvidanya" as she stepped out of the apartment, and we got some much needed sleep (but not before I found some Russian league hockey on TV - it wasn't the NHL but it did temporarily satisfy my longing for the sport!).The next morning we looked out the window to find it was snowing. It didn't last long, and soon turned to freezing rain, so we suited up accordingly and hit the road along the lake again for the long walk. In the daylight it was apparent where we went wrong the previous night in trying to find the place. There were steps and a wooden path that led through the trees back to the street where the museum was. The lake is so big here that it looks like the ocean, with nothing between us and the horizon to break our view. The area here is mountainous (not Rockies mountainous, just very small ones) and Listvyanka is spread out in a couple of valleys between these mountains. We spent a few hours just wandering down the dirt tracks between the ramshackle wooden houses and crooked fences. The "streets" were empty except for the occasional car and some wild dogs that would bark at us but stay a safe distance away. At the end of our explorations we climbed a hill to have a closer look at a decaying cemetery, spread out in an unorganized manner. Looking at the dates of the deceased proved again how young men in Russia die. Most of the buried weren't much older than 40 or 50 years old. We were satisfied with our time in Listvyanka so we began the walk back to our flat, stopping once for lunch in a nice lakeside restaurant where we sampled the Baikal fish "omul".
The next morning, Olga returned in a huff. She had promised to drive us back to Irkutsk but explained that she had to work, so instead she whisked us off to the bus station where we were just in time to catch the bus back.
