Irkutsk

We were woken early and Roy made some strong coffee, while I made myself some oats. We said a sad farewell to the train and
our friends from Holland and Berlin. I hope the Berlin lady does look me up on Facebook.

Saying goodbye to our Berlin friends

Train to Siberia

Watching our train leave. Sad. 

Our clocks were all a little out with the change in time zones. so we were taking the 8.10 train in local time, but the 3.10 in the morning, Moscow time. It was a three hour wait slightly stressful because our
train ticket had a train number which wasn't on the board. A policeman with very little English tried to help us, but as it turns out our ticket just showed the wrong number. Nobody seemed to notice or mind. We were happy to see day tourists arriving and we piled onto the train. It was part bus, part train, being powered by a diesel engine, not overhead electrics. It sounded like a car.

We were shown our correct seats and were the only people with proper luggage. Most had brought picnic lunch and warm clothing. Although we'd bought first class tickets it still felt a little like cattle class as it was full and crowded . There were two coaches with a dining shop in the middle. We shared a table with a young Russian
boy about 16, and a couple, her from Russia and him originally New Guinea. I kept wondering what he saw in her as he was a tall athletic looking man and she seemed interested only in eating. He spoke a little French and so I was able to work out from him how long the stops were.

Our first stop at Lake Baikal

Lake Baikal is the biggest volume of fresh water on the planet. It has been suggested that if all the rivers in the world drained into it they would still not have filled it in a year. We wished we'd come here a few weeks later when the entire lake freezes so that trucks drive over it . From pictures it looks beautiful, like thick glass.

Pretty village along the way

The only other English people on the train was an Australian lady with her children and her mother in law. Her husband worked in Moscow and they'd been working ail over the world for the last 14 years- Their boys seemed to cope ok with it.
The train ride was from Irkutsk, along the shore of Lake Baikal for the day, stopping at various spots throughout the day for an
average 20 minutes.

Our train/bus

There was an hour stop for lunch in a pretty village. It was a cold but beautifully clear day and we enjoyed the stop.

The cold shore of Lake Baikal

The family sitting next to us on the bus / train along with the Australians had pre arranged a lunch at one of the homes in the village, and the Russian family kindly brought Roy and I some left over Dumplings which were still warm.

I'd been feeling sad for their son, who looked like he could maybe have had down syndrome, but very slightly and got totally ignored by the family unless he was being told off, while the young 'normal ' child was showered with attention. I wonder if they realised they were doing it. I wanted to reach out to the young man, but he avoided eye contact with strangers and seemed so intent on trying to please his parents. We finally arrived at Port Baikal in the evening (Roy and I had a few naps along the way).

Our host was waiting and easily identified us by our luggage, but the only English he knew was the name of his lodge, 'Fort Baikal '. I recognised that, and after giving left over food from the train to a local dog, we climbed into his car and did the short trip to the lodge. Here we met his wife, Tatiana, a short dark haired lady who also spoke not a word of English. We managed our way through introductions and that dinner would be served at 8. I can't

remember the husbands name but he is quite a character and showed us where the various communal showers and toilets 

were and then carried my heavy bag up all the steps to our cute wooden cottage in the forest.

The main house, taken the next morning when it was light

Looking up to our cabin.

One of the other guests we met at the communal kitchen could speak English, a lady with a young baby, and she helped with translating. We relaxed in our warm cottage for a bit before going down for dinner. It was delicious, and just what we felt like. A coleslaw and tomatoe salad, and fried potatoe with onion and chicken. We took a small gift as is custom, but all we had was a fridge magnet we got on the train. It didn't feel enough. We also took a bottle of red wine, but nobody liked this! When the husband popped in we offered him some, but he pulled up his nose and insisted we have some vodka instead. Roy happily agreed and was most impressed. Using our phone translator I asked if he made it himself, which he had, using pinenuts to flavour. I stuck with the wine and we cheered to good health.

Homemade vodka with Pinenuts

Dinner. See Stalin on the wall behind - bizarre

Tatiana insisted that I look through her whole book of guests comments before we had to get the full tour of the place a second time. Eventually we were free to retire to our cottage and have a nice warm shower in one of the communal buildings. I needed to pee in the night and went to the little loo behind our cottage only to find it was just a whole in the ground. Did the job though.