From Siberia to Mongolia

I was dreading the border crossing from Russia to Mongolia. I was told that it could take around 11 hours, or about a third of the total train trip of 34 hours. I had also heard and read all the horror stories of overzealous customs officials and scammers on both sides. So I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was. Yeah, it took hours, but the officials on both sides barely gave our paperwork or bags a second glance. I should have bought that icon in Moscow!

I expected the Russian border station in Naushki to be busy. I figured there would be police, customs officials, vendors, tourists, etc. But the platform was completely empty, which scared me even more. Notice anything else missing? Oh, yeah -- the train.



It was a little disconcerting when they pulled it away, especially since they had taken all our passports and tickets.

I also made a new friend. Look familiar?



So far the hardest part of this trip is that I miss my dog!

For about two hours nothing happened. Nothing. Then we figured out why. They were waiting to get the dead body off the train.

No, really.



Russian policemen are pushing a cart with a dead man on it. His feet are towards camera and a cloth is covering his body. I took this as surreptitously as possible -- this was the Russian border after all! And we certainly didn't ask any questions! So we had no idea what happened.

I only had one other person in my compartment, a Finnish girl named Heidi. She was polite and friendly and courteous, the very opposite of the Fun Couple. Here I am properly enjoying my very own cabin, with Heidi, and a fun British couple, Paul and Rachel. We're drinking vodka as we celebrate our arrival into Mongolia.



We arrived in Ulaanbaatar a little after 6 a.m. This is the main road, Peace Ave. Notice all the signs in English. To the right, just off camera, is a cosmetic surgery center.



And to the left, a five-minute walk up a hill leads to a Buddhist temple. Mongolia is the first Buddhist country I've visited.



Mongolia was also the world's second Communist country, after Russia. At the other end of town is Sukhbataar Square. Here, in 1921, the communist general after which the square is named declared Mongolia's independence from China. It has a decidely Stalinesque look and scale to it.

That's a statue of Sukhbataar on horseback in the center. In the center of the building is a statue of Chinggis Khaan, more commonly known in the west by the mistranslated version of his name, Genghis Khan.



More on him in a future post. He deserves his own.

Clarification: Lake Baikal

It's been brought to my attention that my Lake Baikal post is a bit cryptic. So I'll elaborate a bit.

The "travel mistake" was thinking I could figure out what to do and where to go once I arrived in Irkutsk. But it's not that easy here. It is Siberia, after all. There are tourists here, and it definitely appears as though the infrastructure is improving, it's not an easy place in which to improvise. I should have planned better.

As for Victor, my host at the home stay in Listvyanka, I was tempted to write a post just about him. As I walked back and forth down the town's one road I'd see him working: carrying lumber, painting, etc. Later he showed me the stencil he was working on for the sign that would say "Rooms for Rent" in both Russian and English. aIt seemed clear he was hoping to turn his house into a hostel or guesthouse.

Because I speak almost no Russian and he speaks nothing but, conversing over evening tea was a bit difficult. He chattered on and on even though I made it clear I didn't understand a word he was saying. I realized that I was perhaps the only person he had interacted with all day, and was probably just happy to have someone to talk to. I mentioned how I took time to look at and admire his icons. But I noticed there were no pictures anywhere.

I was relieved when he pulled out a stack of photographs, to help pass the time, if nothing else. There were a number of pictures which I figured out were of him helping to build the church on the hill in Port Baikal, which he seemed quite proud of. There were pictures of the lake in winter, which were gorgeous.

But there were photos of people as well. There were pictures of a precious young girl, maybe 10 years old, including one of her smiling under a Christmas tree in a McDonald's t-shirt. And there were pictures of a regal, statuesque woman, usually in a white fur coat and hat. She reminded me of Julie Christie in "Dr. Zhivago," and, really, is there a higher compliment for a woman?!

But as I went through I noticed something. I started going through the pictures again, even though he indicated that I had seen them all. All of the pictures had time stamps. None of them had been taken in the last ten years.

I don't know what happened to the woman and child, who I assumed were his wife and daughter. Even if we shared a common language I don't know how I would have asked. All I can guess is that about 10 years ago something very bad happened.

The next morning when he offered me tea again. I think he had been waiting for me to come downstairs. I felt really guilty declining, but I really did have to get to the bus station.

I gave his name and address to the folks at the hostel in Irkutsk. Hopefully they'll send people his way.

Travel mistake: Lake Baikal

I was really looking forward to exploring the area around Lake Baikal, but I blew it. I expected to be able to do what I've always done, show up someplace new, get the lay of the land, then book a tour or make plans. Can't do that here.

I spent a couple dreary, rainy days wandering around Listvyanka, the little fishing village an hour north from Irkutsk. But I didn't see much. This is the southern end of the lake, with the mouth of the Angara River to the right and the Old Trans-Siberian Railway curling around the Port Baikal in the distance.



I went to the pretty unimpressive Baikal Museum. They do have a sort of scale model of the lake. You can see that it is quite deep for most of its length.



Another fun fact I learned is that it is estimated that if all the other sources of fresh water on earth dried up Lake Baikal could provide drinking water for the entire planet for 40 years!

They also have tanks with local wildlife, including two nerpas, freshwater seals. They're in a tiny little tank, maybe 40 feet long, and they just swim back and forth. It's hard to get a decent picture of them because they're always moving and flash photography isn't allowed. They look rather like overinflated balloons.



And they look very, very sad...



Although it's obvious Listvyanka is starting to understand it's potential as a tourist town, there isn't much in the way of accomodation, so I did my first homestay. This is where you simply stay as a guest in someone's house, and it's quite common in Russia, in part because there are so few hostels.

Usually the hosts speak only Russian and the guests speak none, so I was prepared for awkward conversations with lots of hand gestures. My host, Victor, is turning his house into a proper guest house. There was the smell of fresh paint, and a brand-new indoor toilet!

He speaks no English. None. But he was very sweet, and very lonely, I think. So when I came home after wandering around in the rain all day, all I wanted to do was go to my room, for reasons that will soon be obvious. But he wanted me to join him for tea.

I think I was the first guest he's shared tea with, since he had to find a box of sugar cubes and figure out how to open it. He also served me store-bought biscuits, but honey and cheese he made himself.

I made a point to ask him about his religious icons, which pleased him. One is genuinely beautiful, hand-painted on wood, of the Archangel Michael.



This is his house. My room was the one with the triangular window and the new door on the second floor.



And this is the view!



I was looking forward to coming back in the evening with a couple cold beers and just sitting in the doorway and staring at the lake, which I did after tea. I left the door open and fell asleep staring at the lake...

Scuba diving in Siberia

I finally got to see Lake Baikal today. Here it is from the town of Listvyanka.



Not only did I see the lake from the top looking down, I saw it from the bottom looking up. I went scuba diving.

I knew I wouldn't see much, and I figured the cold would be excruciating, but I wanted to be able to say I went diving in the world's deepest lake.

Baikal is famous for how clear its water is. People get vertigo because they can see the bottom when the water is quite deep. But there was a storm yesterday, which stirred up the water, and we didn't go far from shore. This is an artist's rendering (mine) of what I saw:



We wore thick wet suits and the water near the shore wasn't terribly cold. My guide said it was 15 degrees, or about 59 degrees Fahrenheit. That's cold, but not unbearable. We eventually got down to about 20 meters below the surface. To do so we passed through a thermocline, a layer of much colder water.

Using my keen scientific intellect I estimated the water temperature there to be about 875 degrees below zero, but my guide said it was actually 5 Celsius, or about 41 Fahrenheit. That's still pretty cold.

The night I left Moscow it was quite chilly. That was the only time on the trip thus far that I have had to wear a jacket. It's still quite warm in Siberia. I took this self-portrait before suiting up to go in the water, and I was perfectly comfortable in shorts and no shirt.

Eclipse

I was bummed that I couldn't stop in Novosobirsk to see the eclipse. There were a lot of people on the train who were in Siberia just to see it. I was surprised to find there's a whole worldwide subculture of people who travel to see every eclipse.

Although I didn't get to see the "totality" (as the eclipse geeks would say) I did get to see the eclipse from Irkutsk. My Swedish friend Kjerstin and I found a nice park with a clear view and watched as best we could without burning our eyes out. From where we sat the sun was roughly half eclipsed.

I tried to take a picture through my sunglasses. You can see a slight indentation in the bottom right of the sun if you're looking for it.



And here is me with the partially eclipsed sun in the background.



And here's a self-portrait of Kjerstin and I. Yeah, she's a little crazy...



She's an avid horse rider and leaves tomorrow for Mongolia for a 12-day horseback riding adventure.

The Trans-Siberian Railway

This is my carriage before it left the station. In the front you can read Irkutsk, and then Baikal. It's not a true Trans-Siberian because it doesn't run the full route to Vladivostock.



I was in the first carriage. Just to the left is the engine. Since I was in the front I had to walk past 14 carriages. It's a long walk! Especially with a backpack, a knapsack and a bag full of groceries.

I was in a second class, or kupe compartment. It looks something like this.



There are four beds and a small table. Baggage can be stored under the bottom beds or over the door. The idea is that the bottom half of the compartment is shared during waking hours.

In the front on the right is my new Swedish friend Kjerstin. We hit it off, which is a good thing when you're stuck on a crowded train for over three days. The other folks are part of a large Dutch contingent scattered throughout the train. This group got off in Irkutsk but were eventually going onto Beijing because the couple on the right has a daughter competing for the Dutch water polo team. Pretty cool.

They were all extremely nice and welcomed me into their group. Which was good, because there's a reason this picture isn't of my cabin.

I was fully expecting to be the only English speaker on a train full of Russians. I brought along a bottle of vodka to help me make friends. I've read and heard a lot about how part of the fun of the train is sharing compartments with strangers, sharing food and drink and having broken conversations in multiple languages.

I shared my compartment with Nelke, the Dutch woman in the front left of the picture above. Notice that she is not in her compartment either. That's because the two of us were stuck with two truly awful people. They were Russian and didn't speak any English, but that wasn't the issue.

The Fun Couple truly felt the compartment was theirs. It never occurred to them that they were supposed to share. They were either sitting at the table or sleeping. Only when we stopped at platforms would they leave the compartment, and then it was usually only the man. They reminded me of a loud, white-trash couple from East Baltimore. Picture an old Bawlamer hon with frizzy white bottle-blonde hair and a old man with a beer belly sitting on a stoop in Dundalk.

They didn't so much as acknowledge my presence. From talking to other people on the train I discovered there is a fairly elaborate etiquette on the train. For instance, generally couples will take a top and bottom bunk and so have one side of the train to themselves. It is customary to offer women the bottom bunks. This would have been nice in this case because Nelke is a bit older and had some difficulty getting up and down.

But the man in the Fun Couple was probably too obese to get up and down. Not that it would have occurred to him to offer. Both of them snored to wake the dead, but what's worse is that even when awake they talked in inappropriately loud voices and made all sorts of weird groaning and sighing noises. It was like sharing a cage with two wild animals.

They slept at odd hours, which is fine, except that they didn't respect that Nelke and I slept at normal hours. So they'd wake up at 2 a.m. and have tea. But not just tea. They'd sing or read to each other or cackle like witches. I didn't sleep a wink the entire trip. God forgive me for saying so, but I've never hated two people so much in my life.

End of rant.

Having said that, the overall experience was enjoyable. I would love to do it again. I'd like to do the entire trip. I'd like to see it in winter. However, after three days I was feeling pretty grungy and yes, the Fun Couple did give the compartment a distinctive odor. I can't imagine how I'd feel after doing the whole trip, which takes about 8 days!

The trains were not designed for tourists. This is how Russians move around the country. The menus in the restaurant cars have English, but the staff there don't speak a word. But at least you can point to what you want. There isn't a wasted square inch on the train. There's no place to lounge around except in the cabins or restaurant car.

There's a schedule on the wall which lists the time and duration of each stop. At the longer stops we'd get off and stretch our legs. There were almost always kiosks to buy Coca Cola, cigarettes or Pringles. (Why are Pringles so popular around the world?)

If we were lucky there would be local folks selling "real" food. Sausages, pickles, bread, pilmyeni (Siberian dumplings), etc. At one stop people were selling dried, salted fish. I was trying to buy one from a woman when she suddenly dumped everything into her bag and walked a way. I thought, "Fine, if you don't want my money..."

Then I saw three soldiers walking down the platform. So apparently what I was buying was illegal. At one stop a woman was selling small smoked sturgeon, which I'm almost positive is illegal. (Sturgeon is the fish from which we get caviar, and they're chronically overfished.)

After the soldiers left the woman came back to me and sold me my fish. Kjerstin bought a different variety, and later we ripped them apart and ate them like barbarians. It was wonderful.

I was hoping there would be some sort of observation platform on the back of the train, but no. The windows don't open, which makes sense considering the trains go through Siberia all winter. But it's difficult to get a decent picture. And you can't see what's ahead of or behind the train unless it turns, which happens rarely. For hours on end the train goes on in a straight line with nothing but trees on either side.



The one constant sight out the windows are power lines and poles. The trains are run by electricity, which is a bit disappointing, as it deflates the romantic idea of a steam train chugging along through the countryside.

There are major cities along the line. This is Krasnoyarsk, a city I had planned on stopping to see. Because of it's location on the hills above the Yenisey River it's considered the most scenic city in Siberia.



I'm sure this city, as well as Perm and Novosobirsk and other cities we passed through, have their charms, but mostly all we could see from the train were industrial sites and soulless Soviet-era buildings, basically giant, rundown concrete boxes.

But especially as we got further east we saw more and more traditional Siberian settlements, where virtually all the buildings are made of wood.



We passed acres and acres of meadows covered in beautiful wildflowers, mostly yellow and purple. Even though this shot didn't turn out, I like it because it looks like an impressionist painting.



Finally, here is a shot from Irkutsk, where I am now. In the foreground is the Angara River, the only river that flows out of Lake Baikal, and in the background the train station where I arrived.



Irkutsk has roughly the same population as Baltimore, but there are still traditional Siberian buildings everywhere. I'm staying right off the main drag -- Karl Marx Street! -- and just a few blocks away from the bus station, and yet this is the building next door to my hostel.

Siberia primer

I wrote about meeting my guardian angel at the St Petersburg airport. After that I met some girls from the UK at my hostel, who invited me out to dinner. They left the next day on the Trans-Siberian to spend some time in the Lake Baikal region.

Today I came back to my hostel and, in yet another "small world" moment, discovered that two weeks later my UK friends had flown from Siberia to Moscow and, in a city of over 10 million people, are staying at my hostel!

I'm not sure if I'll have internet access in Mongolia. I found out from them that I may not have internet access in Siberia. So I may not be online for a month or more. So here are some fun facts to ponder.

The numbers on Russia, and Siberia in particular, are hard to comprehend. Russia is more than twice as big as the US (including Alaska). Siberia is bigger than the US and Europe combined. The forested regions of Russia cover four times the area of the Amazon basin. Four of the 10 longest rivers in the world are (at least partially) in Siberia: Yenisey (4), Ob (7), Amur (9), Lena (10).

In two days I'll hop on a train to Irkutsk, which is at the southern end of Lake Baikal. I'll spend some time there but I'll spend four nights on Olkhon Island, at Nikta's Homestead, a guest house recommended by my UK friends. (Nikita is a former Russian table tennis champion!)

Baikal is by far the world's deepest lake, at 5,371 ft, more than a mile for those of you scoring at home. It is a completely unique ecosystem. Most of the animals and plants there don't exist anywhere else, including the nerpa, a species of ringed seal, the world's only freshwater seals.

It is estimated that the lake holds 15-20 percent of the world's fresh water. Think about that! More than the Great Lakes combined. Beneath the water is over 4 miles of sediment. It may also be the world's oldest lake, somewhere between 25 and 30 million years old.

Over 300 rivers flow into it, but only one, the Angara, flows out. The pressure at the bottom is so great that it would be impossible to fire a cannon there. And yet the golomyanka lives there, a translucent, scale-less fish that gives birth to live young. Though they live throughout the entire depth of the lake and are thus fairly immune to changes in water pressure, they are extremely sensitive to changes in temperature and literally melt in sunlight.

The chemical composition of the water is so unique that fish that swim downstream into the lake die. It's covered by ice up to six feet thick during the winter, thick enough for trucks to drive over.

I could go on. Is it obvious I'm excited to go there? It's something that's always fascinated me, yet another entry in this trip's list of "things that may only interest me."

Dirty Harry moment

It is with great reluctance that I am changing my Russia itinerary. I had hoped to take the train through Siberia and make a couple stops along the way. But I've decided to stay in Moscow for a few more days, since I haven't seen much of it, and then take a non-stop train to Irkutsk, which is the jumping-off point for Lake Baikal.

It is, in a way, a more authentic Trans-Siberian trip, since rather than making a few "short" trips (by Russian standards) of 20 or 30 hours, I'll be on the train for about three days. I'll "only" be traveling about 3200 miles, for 76 hours and 42 minutes. And it will be exactly that. If there's one thing the Russians know it's trains. By my watch my train from St Petersburg to Moscow left 23 seconds early.

The Trans-Siberian runs from Moscow to Vladivostock on the Pacific Coast, a distance of 5771 miles. The whole trip takes seven to eight days, depending on the train. The Trans-Manchurian route makes a turn south in Chita, just past Lake Baikal, and heads onto Beijing. The Trans-Mongolian makes a turn south at Ulan Ude, just before Chita, and heads through Ulaan Bataar, the capital of Mongolia, and onto Beijing. This is the route I will travel.

I was hoping to change my itinerary to be in Novosibirsk, smack-dab in the center of Siberia, on August 1. There's a total eclipse of the sun that day, and Novosibirsk will be the best place in the world to see it. But there are simply no train tickets available to get there. People from all over the world are traveling there to see it so for probably the first and only time in history Novosibirsk will be the tourist capital of the world for a day.

"A man’s got to know his limitations," as Clint Eastwood memorably said at the end of "Magnum Force." I also decided to modify my itinerary because I have discovered my limitations. I can do okay getting around Russia. I didn't expect people here to speak English.

But buying train tickets in Russia is like going to the proctologist, only not as fun. Without knowing the language it's difficult, time-consuming and stressful. The women who work the counters (they're all women) don't speak a word of English and have absolutely no patience, even for Russians! I have heard them chew out quite a few of their countrymen. I was wasting too much time and making myself too miserable trying to work out the logistics, and not spending enough time sightseeing.

I finally broke down and paid a travel agent to book my last ticket. I had to pay a small fee, but it was worth every penny. I sat with a pleasant young woman who was anxious to practice her English and patiently worked with me as I requested times and prices for different routes. So here's a tip from your Uncle Jeff: If you ever decide to do the Trans-Siberian, book your tickets in advance and/or use a travel agent. It's worth the extra money. This is not the best country in which to "wing it," especially for a traveler as inexperienced as I am.

So I'll be in Moscow for a few more days and then hop on the train for Siberia on the 28th. My Trans-Sib guide book was the first one I bought when I first started pondering this trip about three years ago, and though I considered many possible routes the train ride was always the centerpiece.

I'm really, really excited.