The plan was to spend 1 night in Irkutsk then go to Olkhon Island but the guy in the hostel said we couldn't go. I never quite figured out why as his English wasn't great but he said we could go on the Wednesday. We decided to take a bus to Listvyanka which is a small village on the shore of lake baikal. The common trend with this trip of no one speaking English and it being very cold continued in Listvyanka. There were some guys working on some ice sculptures which were pretty impressive. We asked them to we take their picture and they didn't seem to mind.
Ice Sculptures
Listvyanka is quite a scenic village with some great views of lake baikal. It felt a bit strange to be walking along a frozen beach in the extreme cold.
Listvyanka
We walked through the village and followed the road up a hill. About half way up we decided to turn back as we didn't know where we were going and also Martin couldn't take the cold anymore. There were 3 people walking in front of us and once we turned around they started shouting at us in Russian (another common theme of this trip). At first we didn't think they were talking to us but then the were running after us and calling us. So we stopped and explained we didn't speak Russian and couldn't understand them. Eventually we figured out that they didn't want us to turn back and that we should follow them and that we would be able to take pictures. They were doing hand gestures to explain that we could take good photos if we went to some cliff. So we decided to follow them.
Walking around Listvyanka
One of them explained that she was from the Ukraine and that she was a train conductor on the train from Moscow to Ulan Bator. She did this by making train noises and gestures and saying the word conductor. We talked with them as best we could and followed them to another beach with a cliff and great views of the lake.
Lake Baikal
Once we got there we took some photos and they took photos and got us to take photos of them. Then they took out a blanket and put it on the frozen beach. They had a picnic basket with them, bread, meat, cheese, salad, a flash of tea, cups, plates, vodka and so on. Within a few minutes they had given us tea, vodka and bread with ham and cheese. We didn't have much choice in the matter, it was impossible to say no.
Food and drink on the beach
After more photos and more eating/drinking we explained that we had to go as we were too cold. We thanked them and took their picture before we left.
Our Ukrainian friends having a picnic on a frozen beach
Looks great Dave.
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