Lake Baikal

The next morning was an early bus ride to the lake. This is one of the wonders of the natural world. It is the deepest lake on earth, dropping to a mile in certain sections.

It holds 20% of the worlds fresh water and it is thought that if all the worlds supplies ran dry this could quench the thirst of the worlds poputalion for 40 years. So all in all it's big.

Apart from tht it holds hundreds of creatures that are not found anywhere else om Earth including fresh water seals, we did see two of these but they were in a tank in the well presented museum. Another of the unique creatures are crustation that eat every all dead matter and in doing so purify the water to a point that it is almost distilled, it tastes good I have to say.

It's also bloody freezing, I can say this with authority as I had a swim in it. Legend has it that this will add 25 years to your life so I should see 50 now!!

On the way up there I'd mentioned to our guide that the road was extremely good considering it wasn't a major industrial area and he explained that during the cold war a US preeident was making a trip tpo the country nd part of his ittinery involved a trip to the lake therefore teh Soviets spent millions making this fantastic road to show off to the president how great things were all over the country. In the end the president did not come to the area but all the locals are still benefiting from this now and are very pleased too.

The surrounding coutryside is beautiful, we spent a nice couple of days walking and took a boat over to the section of the lake where the trans-Siberian train used to run to get the ferry across the water.

The evenings were spent in a nice returant/ bar where we met many of the people we'd met on the train, we were also taught completely diferent rules to the Russian pool.

Had my fist ever sauna here too, only cost two pounds for an hour in the hot room with an ice cold plunge pool that took your breath away every time you jumped in, I recon that's taken a few of the 25 years back off.

Today came back to Irkustk and am typing this prior to an evening train to Ulaanbatar, We've heard the border crossing can take 11 hours during which time the toilets are locked, nice. Will hopefully get some photos on here soon.