LAKE BAIKAL KAYAKING TRIP JOURNAL 11

LAKE BAIKAL KAYAKING TRIP JOURNAL 11

Lake Baikal

August 4th Saturday day 45 on the water:

The guys and the kids went to bed early so that was nice that it got quiet before 10 PM. They had told me they hadn’t seen any bears in the area since they had been there the last 10 days, so I went to sleep without bears on my mind.

We were up before the sun once again, even though it is getting so smoky it is hard to tell when the sun comes up, plus we are on the East side of the lake so one doesn’t see the sun till later anyways. No wind, and as the morning progressed it looked like it was going to be one of the best days for paddling on Lake Baikal so far.

The sun coming up. The best time of the day for me.

2nd dead Seal I have seen in a net.

I think I mentioned it before but will again. I have seen 2 lives seals and 3 dead ones. 2 dead in nets in the lake and one along the bank.

As the morning progressed the weather stayed absolutely perfect for paddling and we stopped every 2/3 hours to take a break.

This is the 1st bay I paddled 3.5 hrs.

One of the few afternoons the smoke wasn’t that bad.

I normally won’t attempt to cross a bay, from Point A to Point B a straight line. If I can see Point B I know eventually I will get there. I also can judge pretty good by now how far across it is, but the visibility can make that almost an impossibility. But the weather was holding, not even a breeze so both times I crossed successfully saving me hours and hours of paddling the shoreline, because both bays were very big.

The 2nd bay I paddled 2.5 hours.

See the green line on the rocks?

Who would have thought Lake Baikal in Siberia, the deepest lake in the world and the largest by fresh water volume would warm up enough to “turn overâ€, but that is exactly what it was doing. And to make it worse a green growth is happening in the lake, the entire lake and all the rocks, the bottom of the lake when you can see is covered with this slippery, smelly growth. Strange.

We ended up paddling 12.5 hours this day. The longest day so far in the kayak. The time just flew by and crossing the 2 bays is what added the extra hours to the days paddle. I don’t like doing that, we both get tired of sitting that long, even though I did take 4/5 breaks, but the breaks are never for very long.

As I started to look for a camp spot, I knew there was a river coming into the lake just around the next point, so that is where we headed. I got to the mouth of the river and was sitting there trying to decide which side of the river would be less bear prone and I heard a couple of boats coming across the lake. I couldn’t see them because of the smoke, but I could tell by the different sounds it was 2 boats and they appeared to be heading straight for the mouth of the river and I got curious. So, I just sat there waiting for them to come into view.

In about 10 minutes they came into view and sure enough it was 1 boat with 4 people in it and the other boat had 3 people in it. They pulled up to me and the boat with 4 people in it, the lady spoke some English and when we got done talking, they asked me to camp next to/with them.

Now, normally I wouldn’t do that. But in all honesty, I had found myself getting a little lonely, which is unheard of for me. I wasn’t as engaged now in the paddling as I should have been. I was completely tired of the visibility and breathing the smoke for weeks. I also was just tired and somewhat down. Making the decision to camp next to them was a great decision as time will show as the journal goes on.

Following them into the mouth of the river.

I spent 3 days with them camped there on the bank of the lake where the river comes into the lake. One day the wind blew very hard so I wouldn’t have gone anywhere anyway. Here is the story.

They were from Irkusku and this was the 10th year in a row they had come to this very spot to camp. This was just outside the park boundary on the north end of the lake. They had a friend/family who lived in a pretty nice place just around the corner, who was a commercial fisherman. More on that part of the story later.

As it turns out, the husband was a lawyer and represented 5 very large companies in Irkusku that imported beer, liquor and food items and was one of the few Russians I had met so far that did very well financially. His wife, who spoke some English and their son, who also spoke some English made it possible to communicate along with Google translate. Strangely enough, there was cell service there. The son had, I think one year left of high school and he was considering going to Canada to go to college, if he could make it work. Their daughter spoke no English, but it isn’t that hard to communicate under those circumstances.

Father and son getting ready to bake fish.

The father petting Stormy.

The lawyer had his Dad with them, he and his wife and one of their grandsons from a brother of the wife, they were a great couple. The father is/was a World Champion Cross Country Freestyle skier, in fact he was the World Champion in McCall Idaho in 2000. Imagine that. He had Gold Medals and trophies from all over the world, which I got to see when I spent 4 days with them before flying out of Irkusku a week or so later at their home.

The lady in the back was the wife, the other the grandmother.

These two ladies were some of the nicest people I have ever met anywhere in my life. I got treated just like family. You can’t imagine how well they took care of me, every single day I ate with them 3 times a day. It couldn’t have happened for me at a better time at this stage of the trip. They eat and drink, that is what the Russians do. They eat a lot of fish, prepared a lot of different ways. They eat a lot of fresh cucumbers and tomatoes. They also will barbecue pork quite a lot. What ever it was, it was fresh, it was delicious, and I appreciated it immensely.

The guy in the middle is the Commercial Fisherman.

The other two guys, the one on the right and the one on the left worked for him. The guy in the red hat with his hand on his chin is the Father. The fisherman was a stand-up guy. Once he knew where I had come from and how long I had been in the kayak he was absolutely impressed and treated me with the upmost respect and admiration.

As it turned out, once I knew the friend/the commercial fisherman was going to deliver fish to_________________, I asked if he would take me across the lake with him. It was only a 3 day paddle around the rest of the north end of the lake, but with not being able to see anything, not getting a permit/document for the National Park on the West side, which was about half of what I had left, I decided enough was enough. I didn’t come to make any statement or set a record and I made the decision, with a lot of thought to end the trip.

I knew it wasn’t going to be easy getting to Irkusku to catch my plane and change my ticket, but I also knew if I was patient, I could make all of that happen.

My last night there, they had what was a tradition to them a large fire on the beach.

I am sure if the visibility would have been good, you could have seen this fire from across the lake.

I had spent the day breaking down my kayak and getting it all bundled up. I had already some time ago, made the decision to not take any of the camping gear, what food was left and various things back with me, it just didn’t make sense. I put it all in a pile and told them it was theirs to keep and the fisherman took some of it and they took some of it back to Irkusku. It was all good stuff but made no sense to pay $200 a bag to fly it home.

The next morning, I was ready to take the ride across the lake and the fisherman showed up about 10 AM.

The boat was going to be very full. What you don’t see is all the boxes of fish.

A fellow Kayaker. A young Russian from Irkusku.

What a great family. Stormy and I ready to get in the boat. Kayaker on the left.

What made the young Russian showing up interesting, is this was his 2nd year, he had done the south end of the lake last year and was doing the north end/half of the lake this year. But even more of the story is, 4/5 years previously the wife of the father was his professor there in Irkusku, her still teaching at the college and they hadn’t seen each other since then. They spent half the night talking and reminiscing, he didn’t get up to early. In fact, he had just gotten up when we took this picture, just before climbing in the boat for the trip across the lake.

Last minute requests to bring back stuff to camp before we took off.

We were pretty squeezed in and Stormy had to sit on my lap. It was about an hour and half trip across the lake, fairly smooth. It was just to cramped and tight to take any pictures until we got to the other side.

Pulling into the bay.

Very pristine and pretty place that day.

Turned out the fisherman owned one of the houses on the water up on the right. He just pulls in, opens the garage door on the lake side and the garage door on the street side and unloads the fish right into his truck. That is what we did with my 4 bags. He took me to the bank 1st so I could get him the $5,000 rubles (about $80) we had agreed up on and enough for me to make the next few days work. Then he took me to the train station, where I found out I had to buy all 4 beds in the berth because of the size of Stormy and then it was going to be 4 days before there was a “full†4 bed berth available. That was not cheap, but I had no choice.

Then he took me to a hotel, that was cheap and that is where he departed, and I took the stuff up to the room and settled in for a 4 day wait for the train.

At this point in time, I got very depressed and wished I had just kept paddling and I would be there where I was in the 3 or 4 days I had been sitting across the lake, and another 20 days would have done another 400 miles and just ignored the closing of the park and took my chances. I went thru the same emotional turmoil when I stopped my trip on the Yukon at Grayling, Alaska because my thumbs hurt me so bad. That was a tough time for me, and I wish to this day I would have just toughed it out. Does it make any different, no, not really. It certainly didn’t now either. I hate excuses, I can accept good reasoning.

We spent the days just relaxing, working on the journals, taking walks and basically trying to adjust.

People all over the world like flowers.

Off all place to see this sign.

The train station.

I had emailed the folks from across the lake, in anticipation of them getting home on Sunday and I was leaving on Sunday, arriving in Irkusku on Tues AM. I had no idea what I was going to do when I got to Irkusku because my flight, that I had changed making sure I had plenty of time, was not until Saturday morning the 17th.

We got on the train with no problems, settled in. Stormy slept on one of the bottom bunks, me on the top bunk and my 4 bags went on the other bottom bunk and underneath the bunk. I had brought some fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, hard salami, cheese and bread to eat on the way. I had got so used to eating it across the lake and it settled well with me.

And one could buy drinks and a few snacks from the host of the berth car. I never did go to the dining car.

One of the many rivers along the 2-day train ride.

One of the many small villages along the railroad.

I can’t imagine what a Siberian Winter would be like?

Now, my level of stress increased during the entire 2-day train ride because I had no idea what I was going to do for a place to stay in Irkusku, having Stormy with me and all in a much bigger city.

When we got to Irkusku, at 6AM in the morning, the lady that was taking care of that particular rail car, opened the doors for us to get our baggage out and there standing in front of the door was the couple I had spent all of that time with across the lake. I almost cried, knowing that they took the time to find out when the train was arriving, then to get up that early and come down to get me was completely overwhelming and much appreciated. What a joy.

They helped me load up my bags and we took a short 20-minute drive to their house and it was/is a very nice house.

We had breakfast and he had to go to work and they told me that I could stay there, and they would take me to the airport early Saturday morning at 6:00AM with the plane leaving at 10AM. Talk about appreciating something, that was one of the nicest things that has ever happened to me and of all places, in Irkusku, Siberia, Russia.

1st night’s dinner, Alisha is on the left and her husband standing.

Stormy had her friend again to play with.

The World Champion Cross Country Freestyle Skier.

Some of his medals.

Olkhon Island 2 days:

I had planned on spending a couple of days when I got down to Olkhon Island, and since I did not paddle down that far, I decided to take a bus from Irkusku to the Island, take the ferry and spend the day, a night and come back the next day.

Olkhon Island is the largest Island in the lake, it has some Spiritual claims and it is visited by literally thousands and thousands of people during the few months in the summer. In fact, it was a zoo. I wouldn’t recommend anybody go there for a visit. Just my personal observation.

Here are a few pictures I took. I also did a video I am working on.

I didn’t make any inquiries into a place to stay and that was a mistake, but it would have done no good, the place was packed is booked way in advance. I did get lucky and ran into a guy who knew of another guy who had room in a tipi, I found him, and it was fitting, for me of all people to spend the last night on Lake Baikal in a tipi.

A view I won’t forget for my last night on Lake Baikal.

The tipi.

The owner of the tipi and the little girl in the video I did.

Looking north from a hill on Olkhon Island.

The little girl holding the Russian flag taken from the drone.

You won’t ever find another store/give shop like this one.

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