Olkhon Island

I've just got back to Irkutsk from a 3 day trip up to Olkhon Island, an amazing place about halfway up Lake Baikal - 4th largest island-in-a-lake in the world, and one of the old centers of shamanism in this area.  I didn't originally think I would have enough time for this side trip, but decided to go for it anyways and am very glad I did.  I'm pretty tired, but will try an write a coherent post :)

We left Irkutsk early in the morning in a minibus, which I knew from a previous trip to Listvyanka would be filled to the top with people- we looked a little like a clown car by the time we finally left the station.  Nearly all were backpackers, but there were two Russian men on our bench, and I ended up as a semi-translator for questions from the backpackers (is the snow usual this time of year, how high does it get?)  As usual, a pretty hilarious exchange where I only understood about 50% and nodded the rest of the time... We zoomed north through flat fields, evidence of recent farming and some large greenhouses, a few very small and crumbling villages, and then we turned east and headed over the hills toward Baikal - my favorite part, and it was sooo difficult to be trapped in a crazy Russian minibus with no way to photograph it all. 

As we got higher, the forests were almost completely birch and larch, more larch than I have ever seen before.  Almost every larch was a glowing bright orange, an incredible color against the snow, and the whole forest looked like it had been scorched but was still vibrant...  After about 6 hours we came to the ferry crossing for the island and huddled with other minibuses and cars while we waited for the boat to cross - enough time to get blood circulation back to our legs!  The wind was bitter cold, it reminded me of a brisk January day in Kodiak as we crossed to the island and climbed back into our bus for another hour onto the main village of Kazhir.  Kazhir is mostly Buryat, a local indigenous people, and fishing is a major part of village life - as we drove toward our hostel, I was watching several people sort out their small gillnets in the street.

I had met another English woman traveling alone, and we were close buddies by the time we reached Olkhon - we shared a room at the Island's backpacker central, which is almost a village within a village owned by a former Olympic table tennis champion.  Our room was above the banya, with a view out over a few other buildings, yurts, and fences to the cliffs along the lakeshore - pretty much awesome.  Even though it was bitter cold, the late afternoon sun and sunset came through the clouds and I went running around on the bluffs taking photos, especially of the photogenic twisted pines with trunks that were completely wrapped in brightly colored fabrics, the equivalent of prayer flags, I think. 

With only one full day to really spend here, Kath and I planned for a long hike into the woods, which was great fun, although we never really figured out which path we had ended up taking- I think we made it almost across to the eastern shore of the island, but there we got stopped when the snow got too deep.  It was great to have a chance to really stretch the legs and go, after time traveling.  We started off in sand and pines and ended up in snow and larch, and then slid our way back down to spend a few hours in the evening on the coastline.  I got to soak my tired feet in the lake (said to add 5 years to your life- a full swim will supposedly add 25 years...) and had a solitary walk along a long rocky beach at sunset, watching a boat pull in it's net and just enjoying the peace and space.  The cliffs run out to a rocky point that is known as the Shamanka, or Shaman's rock (one of the Asian Most Sacred Places), and I watched the last bit of clouds light up from the grassy steppe above the rock, trying to absorb whatever power may be there for travelers passing through.

There was hot mulled wine in the evenings, and travelers talking plans and routes - this is maybe the most easily social time of backpacking I've ever had, perhaps because there are fewer people in a more narrow and defined travel route, and perhaps also because it can be very challenging to travel in some of these areas, and we naturally seek out others for advice and comfort.  In some aspects, this has been wonderful - I am rarely alone and I've really enjoyed meeting so many of these people, most of them with long term travel plans that will end in SE Asia or India several months down the line.  In other aspects, it seems to take away time spent trying to communicate and learn from local people, and since Russia is the only country out of the 3 I am visiting where the language barrier is not so significant, I keep trying to break out from the safety of other travelers... 

There is a certain discomfort I get from traveling in countries where the majority of the population will never have privileges we take for granted in the West, where most people can't imagine taking a month off from work and riding on a train, just for fun.  It seems almost to be a kind of voyeurism...even participating in the odd social volunteer program (a week at an orphanage, for example, which I originally looked at) seems like it is mostly just something to soothe my own conscience and does more harm than good to children whose lives are already in enough upheaval.  I've had this on my mind a lot lately as we really head out of the West and into the more rural and poor villages.  It is a conflict about traveling I've never been able to resolve. However, at least in Russia I can stop and have a conversation with the fishermen picking the algae out of their net, and we can laugh about the fact that I am not married (at, gasp! the ancient age of 28) and I can tell them a little about fishing in Alaska and they can tell me about Baikal.  Mongolia and China will be different, and I have been trying to soak up as much of these interactions as possible...

I'm back in Irkutsk now for the afternoon, loosely traveling with a really great pair, an Aussie and a Brit, who were on the Olkhon and will be on my train tonight to Ulan Baatar.  I am envious they will have more than a month to explore Mongolia, and I am trying to see as much as possible in just a week - we may combine some travel plans next week, or I may link up with other folks, or try to travel solo out to the countryside. I'll arrive in UB on Saturday morning, and will update plans as they occur!