Baikal in winter
€2050.00
price per person
On this trip you will get to know winter in all its facets. The mighty Lake Baikal caught in ice and snow, the calm and yet again and again the loud gasping when the lake moves and large cracks form in the ice.
A landscape that can hardly be more different from summer. Fascinating and of incredible beauty.
Included in the price:
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German speaking support
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Excursions and visits including admission
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All transfers by 4x4 vehicle
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Accommodation
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meals
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Camping, kitchen equipment (food)
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Russian Bahja / Sauna
Not included in the price:
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Flight to Barnaul and back (from 400 EUR)
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Obtaining a visa (EUR 85)
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dining out
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Travel cancellation and health insurance.
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Single rooms are limited and only available on request
travel program
1 day
They arrive in Irkutsk by plane in the morning. An employee of a partner agency will be waiting for you at the airport. Then there is a three-hour city tour in German. Lunch is not part of the city tour. After the city tour you will be driven to Listvyanka. The former fishing village and today's tourist hotspot is located on the only outflow of Lake Baikal, the Angara River. You will be accommodated with a host family in a house with two separate double rooms. Dinner is included.
2 day
After breakfast the first adventure begins! Dog sleds take you on a wild ride across the frozen Lake Baikal from Listvjanka to Tankhoy. I will wait for you in Tankhoy and take you to the hotel. Depending on the time, we can also visit the interactive Baikal Museum, which is absolutely worth seeing.
3rd day
We drive along the Baikal by car, making a stopover at Ilynka if desired and visiting the hot thermal baths. A bath in the 38°C warm water is certainly extremely pleasant in the cold ambient temperatures. Then we continue north over the frozen Selenga, back to the Baikal to Ust-Barguzin. We will be guests of Aleksandr and Galina in their homestay for the next few days.
4th day
Today we will be driven to Katun village on the Holy Nose peninsula and from there we will hike on the ice to the "Snake Bay". A hot spring with the possibility of bathing in it also awaits us here. So pack your bathing suit! After that, walk back to Katun and drive back to Ust-Barguzin to the warm room.
5th day
The program includes a two to three hour snowmobile tour. We will stay overnight in a heated yurt on the ice. Plus a banya (Russian sauna) and cool off in the Baikal water in the specially designed ice hole.
6th day
Today we take a Bukhanka (Russian minibus) to the Ushkani Islands across the ice. These are home to the largest population of Baikal seals. Overnight again in Ust-Barguzin with Aleksandr and Galina.
7th day
Return to Ulan-Ude and visit of the most important and largest Buddhist monastery in Russia, Ivolginsk. The facility has grown tremendously in recent years. Not least because it houses a special kind of mystery. The corpse of Lama Etigelow, who died in 1917, whose body shows no signs of decomposition. The lama seems to have reached a kind of absolute meditation. See also Geo 360° > http://www.geo.de/GEO/geo-tv/das-mysterium-der-siberischen-mummy-2663.html or Wikipedia > https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daschi-Dorscho_Itigelow. You will have a guided tour of the monastery complex and you can ask the Lama Dashi-Dorsho-Etigelow for health and well-being.
After visiting the monastery, we drive comfortably in the direction of Ulan-Ude to your hotel
8th day
Travel on the Trans-Siberian Railway from Ulan-Ude to Irkutsk. You will be met at the train station and taken to your accommodation in the historic center. Please provide your own food on the train and in Irkutsk. I like to give tips.
9th day
Early in the morning transfer from the accommodation to Irkutsk airport, where unfortunately your flight home is already waiting...