We arrived in Irkutsk at 10.35am, and were met by our driver. We decided to hire a private one as offered by our accomodation, 30euro each. The drive to Olkhon Island was supposed to be anywhere from 4-6 hours, so we figured after a 56 hour train ride we didn't want to be stuck on a stuffy bus for that long. In hindsight it actually delayed us, but added to the experience! He was a lunatic driver, drove erratically, constantly speeding, over-taking on the crest of hills, at some point or another we each had our head in our hands at disbelief at this guys driving, a complete cowboy! He hadn't a word of English. Despite this Dave tried to talk to him to keep him awake as he seemed to be fairly tired! Took 4 hours to get to the ferry port, and when we did we skipped a mile long queue, sweet we thought! However we ended up waiting for 5 hours to get the ferry , so there we sat at the front of the queue for 5 hours and we did what we could only do at that point we sat in the sun and had a few beers. By the end of the 5 hours I saw our driver with one too, afraid to think how many he had! Everytime the ferry came there was revving of engines, shouting , gesticulating wildly, the four of us jumped into the car optimistic that "this is the one!" we did that about ten times.
The view at the ferry dock area was beautiful, lovely cliff edges curved down to the ferry point, on climbing them there was beautiful views over Lake Baikal. After 2 beers I abstained as it meant venturing more times to the public loo, which undoubtedly deserves a mention here, it was the worst loo I have ever experienced, on par with the one in trainspotting for those of you who know it! Except there was no physical loo, a mere hole over which to squat! And not a tree in sight and loads of people around, so we had to brave it! Ugh!
By the time we crossed I'd fallen asleep, only to wake at Nikitas Homestead and see an empty bottle of Stolichnaya on the back seat and three giggly boys. Apparently I missed the hairiest part of the journey, bumpy dirt roads, and excessive speeding drove the lads to drink. How I slept who knows!
Nikitas Homestead was a really cool spot, all wooden log cabins, the whole island is like that but more ornate in Nikitas. 1500 people live on the island, they only got electricity in 2005!!! So the standard of living is fairly basic, it looked very like the villages we passed on the trains. Wooden houses, outhouses, little plumbing. No paved roads. But absolutely amazing scenery. Food was great in Nikitas which made a change. Banyas (sauna/washhouse) are big in Russia, so included in our accomodation costs was 20 minutes free daily in a banya. This was the only way to wash too. After 3 days without a shower I was disappointed to say the least, to find there was no showers in Nikitas!! However Dave and Fitz were staying in a type of homestay, it's where surplus guests of Nikitas stay, and they had a shower, cold mind you but I didn't care after 4 days!!!
We did a bit of a trek one day along the beach, and climbed into the woods, and up towards a viewpoint which was breath-taking. We did plenty of lazing on the beach, not much swimming though. The water in Baikal is particularly cold. I mean being reared on summer holidays to the Atlantic I was sure I'd find it no bother, but the Atlantic isn't a patch on this lake! It's icy cold! 'They' say if you can get you're whole body in and submerged it adds 25 years to your life! So one of the days when we cycled 13km and had worked up a sweat we jumped in, but it was still freezing, a few front strokes and we were running out screaming! The longest amount of time a professional swimmer has spent in it is 30 minutes, and that was part of a relay team swimming from shore to shore. So by no means professional swimmers we got in and flailed around for a bit and made a quick exit. The cycle we did was 26km round trip, exercise much needed all round, but tough terrain on crappy bikes meant it was hard enough. Worth it though, great way to explore the island.
Met some really nice people during our few days. Had a good session one of the nights, guitar came out, 'Russian Girls' got its first public debut, very funny, wasn't sure it was the best spot to be singing it but by the end of it everyone was joining in. Very cosy outdoor bar, all wooden benches and tables. A flame thrower came by one evening when James was playing and performed along to his music, very cool, as it was pitch black at that point. Another night we joined up with a few people we had befriended and made a campfire down on the beach, sat singing, drinking and watching lightning flashes far off in the distance sky. We could hear the thunder way off but waited it out till we felt the first raindrop and then legged it home.
One of the mornings we got up for a yoga class at 8am (yes lads included) pack of amateurs but it was beginner stuff, and our instructor brought us up to a cliff top to do it. I thought it was fantastic, beautiful views over the lake, sun coming up over the mountains on the opposite side, very peaceful and quiet. It was also entertaining watching the lads trying to do some of the stretches, priceless stuff! As Fitz said "first time and probably the last time". Enough said!
It has been the longest we've stayed anywhere so far on the trip and it was worth the journey to and from Irkutsk. Olkhon is an amazing unique spot. I highly recommend it.
We stayed in Irkutsk on the way back, thankfully for just one night. From the moment we arrived none of liked the vibe of the city, people seemed harder, an altogether dodgier spot. It is the AIDS capital of Russia, with a population of 600,000, something like 80,000 of the inner city population have HIV. Drug use being a major cause of this because historically it was a major trade hub in Siberia. Luckily we were all wrecked and just wanted food and to hit the hay. Having found our hostel which had signs up to say "Don't venture out after midnight, it is dangerous" we took their word for it and hit the Subway across the road and back to the hostel to shower and sleep. This involved interrupting the beauty routine of the Chinese women in our hostel who were preening themselves for bed, and were highly offended by us wearing our shoes indoors. The funny thing was as the night went on we were all woken by the snoring from these dainty,petite ladies, their hairy legs hanging over the edges of the bed, it was hilarious, the lads were like meek, little lambs beside them!ha!
However we were also woken by gunshots at one point too. We were very glad to be outta there the next morning.
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