The Ultimate Trip - Has ended

Spent hours yesterday haggling at the Pearl Market in Beijing. The most fun part of it is not what you buy for $1, but the whole process of convincing the merchants to sell it to you for $1! I probably could have spent the entire day just bargaining for little items.
This market is HUGE! It is on 3 enormous floors of a building (it was nice to be inside, away from the cold). The first floor is mostly electronics, the second clothing and souveniers, and the third pearls and other jewlery. Of course, each floor has the usual spattering of scarves, backpacks, handbags, North Face jackets, and all the other cheap stuffs. It is overwhelming.
I did my best to buy some electronics cheaply - like an mp3 player. But they were unwilling to go as low as I wanted. Just as well, because the technology was a bit old. I did find a great pair of pants. Have you ever spent two months wearing the same pants day after day? It is great to have something else to wear! After I paid for them, the merchant walked me down the street to a woman who hemmed them for me for next to nothing. She cut, sewed, and ironed them in about two minutes flat using her foot powered machine. The best part was that she was stationed in a grocery store! I guess people come down for a hem, and sit around in their underware waiting. Can you imagine buying your groceries next to some guy in his tighty whities?
With my new trousers (I've been corrected since pants means underware) on, we went out to find some live music. Lets just say that the search for music was more exciting than any music we found. We've been told that we missed some good tunes, but maybe we are just getting too old......... :-)

Woke up early this morning to go see Mao. Yes, even though Mao died in 1976, they have preserved his body for eternity, just like Lenin. It is a bit surreal to line up with all the Chinese for a quick view. The wait was quick, only about 5 minutes in the light mist, and then we were herded toward the masoleum along an outlined track. There was a quick stop to buy prepackaged flowers, which have to be left outside His hall, and then we shuffled into the room where he is kept. Apparently, he has to be removed a few times a year for cleaning, but we were lucky enough to catch him while he was in. Mao sits, or rather lies, underneath a box of glass, which is carefully guarded by two sentries. The whole room with Mao and the guards is further incased in glass, and we were able to walk along outside this. We had a very quick look at the dead man, because we were shooed along quite quickly by more guards, but this is what we could tell.
Mao is dead, for sure. And he glows! He sort of reminds one of those glowing Mary statues that you sometimes see. You know, the fluorescent kind. He really could be made of wax and nobody would be the wiser. In fact, maybe he is??
The most amazing thing is that most of the viewers were Chinese! They really love Mao, and plenty bought flowers to leave near his "resting" site.
The whole 10 minutes was definitely worth the price - Free.

Yesterday we spent the day traveling like the locals! We rented push bikes and peddled our way through the city streets to the Summer Pallace - a good 2 hour ride away. Ok, so we were riding single speed city bikes and going very slow, but at least we got a little excersize. It is pretty scary riding around Beijing. Even though there are dedicated bike lanes, they are used by bikes, walkers, pedicabs, donkey carts, and even cars. And with 11 million people in the city, rush hour is hectic! You have to weave in and out of all the people and only the Chinese really know how to maneuver.
After winding our way through the city, we were rewarded by the beauty of the Summer Pallace. It was created by the emperors as an escape from the summer heat of the Forbidden City, and it is amazing. Seventy percent of the grounds are under a huge lake, and this is surrounded by small mountains. It is a very green area and there are small temples everywhere. We walked to the top of a very tall temple, probably 200 steps up, for one of the best views of the city.
By the time we left it was already getting dark and it had started to snow! The light covering added a touch of something special to our visit to the "summer" pallace. Hovever, riding home through the wet streets was less fun. We made it in one piece after dealing with crowded streets and major round-a-bouts like pros.

It appears that while we are in China we are able to post to our weblog, but we are unable to check out our blogger site. That means that we are unable to read and respond to any comments you make. Please keep commenting, though, and we will read them as soon as we leave China (we hope). You can also send us email directly, as we love to hear from all our friends and family!

We spent the weekend at the Crowne Royal Plaza Beijing, thanks to my dad and stepmom! What a change from the dorm beds at the local (slightly dirty) hostel. There was actually a large king size bed (yeay, sleeping in one bed on our honeymoon) and clean towels in the bathroom. Not to mention all the little freebees that they leave by the sink ;-). I guess these are the kinds of things that can be exciting on any long trip where living on a budget matters. Our new hotel was close to many important sites - Tienamen square, the Forbidden City, the best food markets and the main shopping avenue. And even though we did get to all of them, we lounged in the lap of luxury as much as possible. Watching CNN and Sex in the City has never been so good!
The weekend flew by way too quickly and we are back at the old standard with our new family - Marion, Matt and Clem. It was nice to feel like royalty for a couple of days, but it is also nice to be back with people that we know and like.

The Forbidden City is HUGE! We spent 2 hours wandering from courtyard to courtyard, and still were not able to see all of it. It really is what it is called: a city. Each courtyard is made up of a number of houses, or rooms, each used for a specific purpose (as a school, where guests were met, where degrees were granted, etc). There seemed to be a throne in every room! Of course, common people were not allowed in the city, only the royals. The place is so large (1 kilometer long and 700 meters wide), that I wonder if it ever felt emptly and lonely. You could play one great game of hide and seek there!
Perhaps the most interesting part is the royal garden. It is filled with plants as art and architectural sculpture (functional art?). There are huge cyprus trees that have been split at the trunk so that it appears like two trees have grown into one and others that are just all twisty and turny. Large hills have been formed out of rock, with hidden staircases and caves. I could imagine that the best time to visit would be in the spring, when everything is in bloom. But, it was still impressive.
After two hours we were pretty beat, and all the courtyards started looking the same. Perhaps we will have to go back sometime on a guided tour to really learn more about the place.

We picked up our Vietnamese visas today, so it looks like we will be off for this SE Asian country on December 16th. Patrick and I are toying with the idea of returning to China in January to study Mandarin for a month. It seems as if we like this country more each day!

If you love food you have to come to Beijing. You could spend a whole day wandering around watching the street vendors cook, ducking in and out of tiny restaurants, and just taking in all the smells of cooking food.
Today we wandered around Wangfujing street, close to Tienamen square, and were bombarded with the sights, sounds and smells of great street food! It seems that BBQ everything is Beijing's favorite fast food, and I mean bbq everything. There are hundreds of stalls all cooking up food on skewers. You can see sticks of chicken, beef, lamb, liver, shrimps, eel, tofu, squid, octopus, sparrow (yes, the bird), scorpions, grubs, crickets, frog legs, chicken hearts, and other fantastic food! The same stalls also fry up noodles right in front of you, make soup, scoop ice cream onto bread and sell sticks of fruit diped in toffee (banana, orange, plum, strawberry, lechee, melon - all on the same stick). And the colors - everything sits side by side making the most beautiful display. If we hadn't just eaten great dim sum (at Hong Kong Food City), we would have been gobbling everything up!
In fact, almost everything we have eaten since we arrived in China has been great. We have tried everything from the smallest diner, where no one spoke English and we just let them bring us whatever they pleased (lunch was huge, and came to $2/person), to a very touristy Beijing Duck restaurant ($5/person for duck, spicy liver and beer) and lots in between. It was all great, and we haven't had the same dish twice.
The Chinese seem to love variety, which is great for those of us eating out often. They also know how to use vegetables unlike their neighbors to the North. Everything they use is absolutely fresh, even in the smallest restaurant. Many kitchens are open, so you can watch the chefs prepare your dish as you wait.
And it is really true, you do not know Chinese food until you have eaten in China!!

bed in dorm: $4/night
metro ticket: 35 cents
huge meal for 2 people, including drinks: $4
650mL beer: 25 cents
entrance to see Mao: free
Well, we are still in Beijing, and it doesn't look like we are leaving any time soon. Every day is a new adventure here, and both Patrick and I are loving this city!
On our second day in town, after turning our passports over to the Vietnam embassy (visa process), we managed to wander into the Silk Market accidentally. Well, we were looking for the market, but thought that what we found couldn't possibly be the "real" market because it seemed so small and empty of buyers. But, that was just perfect for us to haggle hard! I bought a "Rolex" for $5 to replace the watch that Patrick lost, and a new shirt to give me a new look. They also had lots and lots of rip-off, and real, outdoor gear - is anybody interested in a nice 650 fill goose down Mountain Hardware winter jacket? After all the bargaining (no, we really didn't buy much), we were famished and feeling like a bit of Sichuan food, so we wandered across the street to the closest place. We sat down and started to order before realizing that this restaurant was a bit more expensive than we had planned for. In fact, we didn't even have enough money to cover the meal! Patrick ran out to find an ATM, but as I sat there watching the other customers, I realized that they were all in big groups and the dishes were HUGE. The two of us couldn't possibly eat that much food, besides it being too expensive. So I quietly gathered my belongings and slinked out of the place, feeling a bit stupid. Patrick arrived just at that time saying that the ATM wasn't working, which helped the cause. The waiter tried to convince us to stay saying that they accepted visa, but we were already out. We ended up having a fantastic meal at some small place on a side street for about $4! Cool!!

We are in China!! I am so excited. China is one of the places on my top 10 list, and I can't believe that I am actually here!
We left Ulaan Baatar on my birthday, after having a little celebration. Patrick cooked a big pasta dinner, complete with home made sauce, for everyone staying at the guest house, and we toasted with wine from the state department store. I even got to cut a cake that I bought for $2.50. Can you imagine a whole cake for $2.50? Ridiculous! Idre gave me a set of rare Mongolian stamps and Clem made me a Calvin and Hobbs card which everybody (even Togo) signed. It was a beautiful birthday, about what I would want. Thanks to everyone who sent me birthday wishes over the internet. It was so nice to hear from everyone.

The train ride to China was long but relatively comfortable. There was a change of trains in Inner Mongolia, China, and the second train was a real Chinese treat. Each carriage contained lines of bunks in sets of 6, 3 high. There were walls between each six, but no doors to the isle, so it was basically an open configuration. Although the beds were fairly comfortable and the lights were out, we had to contend with people talking, smoking, snoring and just plain smelling (maybe the smell came mostly from us). I kept waking up every hour hoping for a glimps of the Great Wall, but I must have missed it.

We had quite a time in the train station trying to find our way to the hostel. At first, we thought that we might take the Metro, but we couldn't find the entrance. There were plenty of touts trying to find us places to stay and rides, but you try telling them in English where you want to go. Between the 5 of us, our Chinese was almost non-existant and what we thought we could say was obviously tonally incorrect. I think that every driver we spoke with said a different sounding name for the street we needed to get to! We finally got wise, and showed one driver the map from the Lonely Planet guide, which solved our problems. Then we had to negotiate a price, another amusing feat made possible using the numbers on a cell phone. Well, needless to say we arrived safely and without paying too much.

Just finished my Gobi post, so if you only saw the first part, check out the rest below.
Spent the day out and about UB with Clem, a Brittish girl staying at the guest house. Patrick was in dire need of a day in and alone! It is so easy to get worn out on a big trip like this. To help ease him back into good spirits, I went out and bought him a tape to listen to (Morcheba, it was the only one I could find that wasn't something like Brittney) and some cool stickers of the wild mammals in Mongolia. I think it helped!
Found out that the train we were suppose to get on tomorrow morning is totally full, so instead of taking the direct train from UB to Beijing, we are getting the local train. It will take us to the border, where we will be picked up in a car and driven across to China and then dropped off at the train to Beijing. I guess there won't be any DeLux car for us on this trip after all. Thankfully, Siskey, from the guest house, went to pick up our train tickets and was able to arrange everything - including both trains, the car ride between them and even a meal on board! I'm so glad that we stayed at Idre's Guesthouse, they have made our stay in Mongolia so special and have been extremely helpful in everything!
On to China tomorrow, arriving on Tuesday morning. We will be staying for the first few nights in the FeiYing International hostel near Tienamen square. Hope to blog again soon.

Back from the Gobi, boy is time flying! What an interesting trip with way too much driving and so much to tell I don't even know where to start......
We left UB (Ulaan Baatar) on November 6th with 6 travelers - Marion and Matt from Australia, Tim from England, Uraguchi from Tokyo, and the two of us - 1 guide, Idre, and one driver, Togo. Togo drives an old Russian van where the front seats have tons of leg room, the back seats have none, it is sometime hot and sometimes cold, and your feet are always freezing. And it is his baby. You can tell by how he works on it along the way and by the plastic garland of roses and leaves that line is windshield, along with other effects.
When we left, the thermometer at the guest house read -16 Celsius! We were promised warmer weather in the Gobi. It didn't take long to find the end of the paved road, and move on to the very bumpy dirt roads that criss-cross most of Mongolia. Actually, there seemed to be many roads all over the place, where ever there looked to be a good place to drive. Needless to say, the ride in the back of the old van without much suspension or seat springs was tiring. We rode for most of the day, stopping at a ger restaurant for lunch and then at the rock cliffs for a quick look around. The area is beautiful and desolate, somewhat like the highlands of Iceland! Our first night was in a hotel dorm room - all 8 of us squeezing in. Luckily, we all got on pretty well, swapping stories from home and comparing differences in language and musical taste.

The second day was more driving, with a stop for lunch at a canteen, where Idre cooked for us while we bought some beer. The locals really wanted to have their pictures taken and Matt was suckered into taking them. Somehow, he is suppose to send these pictures to them using a very unreadable address that they scribbled on the back of a piece of scrap paper. Hmmm. That night we stayed in our first ger, although it was a tourist ger. They are somewhat like a yurt; they are round in shape and have a wooden frame that is covered in very thick felt. At the center of the roof is a small opening for the chimney of a stove that is used both for heating and cooking. Different people seem to heat their gers with different fuel, ranging from coal to wood to creosote and I imagine to cow and camel dung, although we never saw it.
Another tour group showed up late that night, having come from the mountains we were heading for. Apparently, they had attempted the route, but couldn't make it because of snow and were turned back. Although Idre suggested they follow us in the morning, they decided to turn back for UB. I think that part of their problem was that they had arranged their tour through another guest house that didn't provide an English speaking guide, so they were having a hard time communicating with their driver. I think they were just sick of traveling blindly.
Undeterred, Idre hired another 4-wheel drive jeep to accompany us up into the mountains in case we got stuck. Togo is quite the driver, though, and managed the whole way without incident! We stopped at the top for a hike through the ice valley, a beautiful hike along a frozen river (ok, well, on the river) with steep cliff on either side. It was a well needed stretch of the legs after being cramped for 2 days in the car. We ate next to the vehicle for lunch - toasted sandwiches made in a pudgy pie maker!!
That afternoon the road really started getting bad, if you still wanted to call it a road. After bumping around for a few more hours, feeling our bones crunching against each other, we arrived in another little town well after dark. We were lucky to find another guest house open that had heat and hot water. In fact, the owner generates his own electricity, so when there is a black out, people come to his place for a hot meal and a warm shower. That was our last shower of the trip, and I thoroughly enjoyed it! As a thank you for staying there, the owner gave us a bowl of Mongolian cookies that are made from soured milk and tasted strangely like mutton. Lets just say that the bowl was returned full.

The morning of November 9th we started our drive along the Gobi Sand Dunes, made of beautiful golden sand. These are shifting dunes about 260 km long, 10-20 km wide and about 800 M tall. They shift about 700 cm per year, I'm not sure in what direction. It is truly amazing to see these huge sand dunes grow out of the middle of nowhere, with absolutely no ocean in site. We stopped smack dab in the middle of the length of the dunes at a family winter camp where we were given two of the families gers to stay in for two nights. We arrived just in time for their annual slaughter of a cattle, the meat of which will last 3 families the entire year. They do not waste a bit of the animal either, saving even the head and the hoofs for use in soups. Every member of the family participates, collecting the blood, cleaning the intestines, butchering the meat and preparing the hide. It was a full afternoon's work for the family, starting early in the afternoon and taking almost until dark. Although it was pretty gruesome to watch, I can honestly say that I respect how the Mongolians live and I will forever give thanks to the animal that gave it's life so that I could eat.
Since we were not really prepared to help in the process, our group set off to climb the tallest sand dune in the Gobi! It is certainly hard work pushing your way up a hill of sand, but well worth the view from the top. We could see mountains in the distance, that we would never make it to on this trip, and then out across the open expanse of the Gobi. It is a truly flat steppe, with almost nothing but tumble weed growing.
Idre cooked another wonderful meal that night - every meal on the trip was different! He managed to include lots of veggies, cheeses, pastas, soups even some fruit along the way. We experienced a very different diet from that of the Mongolians, who subsist off mainly meat (beef, camel, sheep, goat and sometimes horse), flour and dairy products. Fresh fruits and veggies are very rare, as there are hardly the right growing conditions. Thanks to Idre for keeping our diet healthy, varied and delicious! After dinner, Togo taught us the how to play the Mongolian bones game, a game that uses animal knuckle bones. A fun game that mixes both chance and skill, Jeff, I think you will like this one!
The following morning we were up early and out for a 4 hour ride on the two-humped camels. We rode to the dunes and back, stopping for our guide to pull a funny tasting veggitable out of the sand and again to eat our "snacks". I actually think that the guide was using our trip to check on all his camel herds in the area. The most beautiful camels, in my estimations, were the all blonde ones, which seemed to be very rare. Riding a camel is a very slow and tedious process, as the camels tend to walk along at about 5 miles per hour. Sometimes they will speed up for a second, like when going downhill, but it doesn't persist for long and the gait is a bit awkward. They are really beautiful animals, though, and once trained are very gentle. Certainly, a morning of camel riding was enough for me; my knees were really hurting when we were through. We arrived back in time to watch the family start the training of one camel who was to learn how to pull a 2 wheeled cart. My guess is that they will use him to pull around fuel and supplies for their camp. That afternoon was our first time off from activities and driving; a much needed respite!
too be continued...

continued.....
Sadly, we had to leave the following morning for the journey back to UB, which would take 2 more full days of driving. We drove most of that day and visited the Red Flame Cliffs and the Gobi "forrest" along the way. The cliffs were huge red sand stone hills jutting out of the steppe floor, places where dinosaur bones have been found in the past. Alas, we were not so lucky on our poke around, but we did find lots of names and dates carved into the sides of the cliffs. We were then dropped off at the "forrest", a not so dense stand of Saksual trees. These seem to grow no more than 3 feet tall and are very twisty and turny - they are used for fuel in many ger stoves.
By this point in the trip, we were all pretty sick of the type of living we were doing. Extreamly cold beds, no showers and having to use an outdoor pit toilet. These pit toilets are the worst! They basically dig a big hole in the ground, stick a little wooden shed over it and leave one board out of the floor for you to do your business through. The problem is sometimes the sheds feel like they are going to fall in, or the boards might crack, the pits absolutely stink and it is absolutely freezing (think -20 C) outside at night. And then there is the problem of aiming when the space between the boards is a bit too small. You get the picture. So, to forget our woes a bit, and to celebrate the trip, we convinced our guide and our driver to take us to the closest town, a 30 minute drive, to buy some beer and vodka! Had a hell of a party that night, with Idre and Togo singing traditional Mongolian folk songs, and us all trying to sing some of our homeland folk songs. The Mongolian ones were definitely better ;-) Idre even surprised us when we thought all the drink was gone, and pulled out a special Gobi vodka! Even though Patrick had already gone to bed, Togo brought him a glass of this special vodka and made him drink it right away. What a wake-up call! The worst part about it was having to get up in the middle of the night to pee.........
Our final night in the Gobi was spent in another small village, in the local hotel. Again, the toilet was outside - a little far away - and our rooms were on the second floor! But we had another interesting Mongolian experience. We went shopping for food, which entailed visiting 7 different shops, 5 of which were in the same small building, before returning to the first one to buy our supplies. You can never tell where a shop might be, and just have to poke your head into the front (or back) door of any building you find. At night we headed out on the town with our fearless leader Idre to both of the bars in town. The first, a karoke bar, was completely dead, but we were told that in another hour there would be plenty of music. But they had the infamous Airag, which is the Mongolian's beloved drink of fermented mare's milk!! We all split one pint of the stuff, and I thought it was OK. It is kind of like slightly sour, liquid goat cheese with a kick - about 12% alcohol. We ditched the dead bar for a quick round at the "disco" bar (all it really had was a single disco ball without the proper lighting) before hitting the hay for the long ride back to UB.
Our final day of driving was a particularly long one, but we had a long anticipated stop at the first restaurant ger for some traditional Mongolian dumplings, called "buuz". A delicious end to our Gobi experience!

Another day in Ulaan Baatar, mostly spent at the Black Market. This is not really a "black" market (I think), but just the name of the huge market in the city. There must have been a thousand different booths selling everything from boots, to jackets, to food and about ten thousand people wandering around. We rode over this morning from the guest house with a few other people staying there. Immediately, we lost them in the crowd!
Patrick and I spent about 4 hours wandering around looking for some warm clothing to take with us out to the Gobi. It was a ton of fun checking out all the stuff from China, especially the North Face knock-offs. They are ridiculous! A pair of gloves we were looking at were labeled "Gore-Tex", but were just thick fleece. Pretty funny. Patrick settled on a pair of warm boots for $12, and I bought a new cutie hat for $4 and a pair of woolly insoles. Lunch was a pile of lamb pancakes and salty Mongolian tea (same as Tibetan tea), all for less than $1!
I had to try on one of the traditional Mongolian over-coats that was silk on the outside and animal hair (I think yak) on the inside. They are absolutely beautiful and look somewhat similar to this http://www.skiouros.net/varia/ncmpr/ncmpr051.htm only for a woman. It was fun having the women dress me up and tie my waist with a traditional belt. Couldn't really bring myself to buy it, even though it was probably worth more than the $80 they wanted for it. How could I carry it for the rest of the trip?
Patrick had his first real encounter with the pickpockets today. They managed to get into his front jacket pocket, that was zippered, and pull out a pair of woolly insoles and our Mongolian guide book. It was a sad loss for us, but I'm sure they were a bit dissapointed at the take. HA! At least they didn't get anything more important.
Saw many more stray dogs today, and the one that absolutely broke my heart was the puppy, all alone, in the middle of the market. I really wanted to do something for him, but what could I do? If anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to hear them.

We ended up wandering around the food section of the market for a while (I'm sure you are not surprised), wondering what all the interesting looking white and off white creations were. After sitting by one stall for a while, watching all the customers buy this globby goop with raisins, the vendor took pity on us and started offering us large tastes of everything. The globby stuff turned out to be a sweet pudding like stuff, which we bought 1.5 kilos of (for $1) and she then gave us cookies made from soured milk. That was a bit strange.

Well, tomorrow is the Gobi trip, so we won't be posting for a while. Don't forget to check out the pictures and we will post as soon as we return!

Today.
Please read my previous post first, as I just finished writing it and am now going to post again.
Also, some of our photos from our trip are now on the web at www.clubphoto.com. Search for my email address, shumeet90@yahoo.com and look for the albums titled "Ultimate Trip". Haven't labeled any yet, but will when we have a better connection.

We are in Mongolia and so far so good. We definitely feel as if we are finally in Asia! We are staying at Idre's guest house, a really friendly (and cheap) apartment in town. Idre's sister, Sisky, is organizing an excursion for an Aussie couple and the two of us. We will be headed to the Gobi for 8 days, staying in traditional Gers with Mongolian families (not the tourist kind) and hiking to some interesting places, including the cliffs where dinosaur skeletons have been found.
Today we visited the Winter Palace of Bogd Kaahn and the Gandantegchinlen Khiid Monastery. The architecture of the area is totally different here, with a much more Asian feel than in Siberia. I absolutely love it!
One thing that has really been bothering me is the number of stray dogs here. They are just everywhere, and people seem to take no notice of them. It is really upsetting, especially now that the weather is so cold. We have already seen 3 dogs who have frozen to death. I really wish there was something I could do - does anyone want to move here to open a dog rescue with me???? It is just so hard to watch. I have seen stray dogs in other places in the world, and it is always upsetting.
Well, not to leave you on an bad note, but.....

Finally in Mongolia!! It is very cold here, winter is definitely upon us. Just a little info for those interested
Temp: -10C
loaf of bread: 25 cents
bus ticket: 20 cents
bed in double room: $4.50
language: Mongolian
average meal price, including drinks, for 2 people: $2.50

There is lots to tell about Mongolia, but first I am going to back up a bit to our last days in Russia...

1 November
Woke this morning to heavy snowfall and strong winds. Unfortunately, we had to get up at 6:00am to leave BG and return to Irkutsk to catch the night train to Ulaan Baatar. Staying with Baba Guta was wonderful! She is an old Buryat woman who is like a grandmother to everyone in the village, hence the title Baba. Who ever said that we would lose weight on this trip obviously hasn't stayed with Baba Guta and eaten traditional Russian food 3 meals a day. Wow, at every meal there was far more food than we could possibly finish. Lots of potatoes (Russian's favorite), tomatoes, pickled mushrooms, cabbage, carrot salad, chai, and we even tried salamat - a dish of cooked cream, flour, salt and water with lots of butter. Very rich and filing. Yesterday, Victor, our guide, brought us on a hike alongside of Lake Baikal. What a beautiful area with an original forest of pine, birch and other trees I cannot remember. Victor is part of a group trying to promote and maintain eco-friendly usage of the area. They are attempting to clear a hiking trail completely around the lake, but only have a small section completed thus far (they are always looking for volunteers....). The shore of Baikal in this area is mostly smooth stones and pebbles, making for an easy walk back along the shore. We managed to collect about 3 bags of garbage on our way. Unfortunately, there was much more to collect and we didn't have enough space or hands to carry it all. A couple of interesting finds were the lake sponges that are responsible for keeping Baikal clean and the mroe gruesome stick with bloody rag attached. Victor seemed to think that it was a piece of a fishing boat that was lost earlier this year in a huge storm with all 3 of the people on board. Two of the men had tried to tie themselves to the boat using the fishing net. Yuck!
We also visited the Orthodox church, which is still under construction, and met the minister Serge, who seemed like a friendly young man. You have to imagine this town, with small, brown, wooden houses, dirt roads and about 500 inhabitants. And then there is this one large and colorful building, the church, with a very colorful cemetary alongside. It was pretty funny to see.
After lunch, back at Baba Guta's, Victor took us to see the town Buryat historian, and she gave us some instruction in Buryat history. We were a bit dissapointed with what she had to say, not much more than we had already read about. And she seemed reluctant to answer our questions very openly. But she was a beautiful 90 year old lady, who seemed very sweet.
That night we went to our first Russian Banya (Jeff, you must be proud)!! It was at the neighbor's house and Patrick and I had the steambath to ourselves. We spent about 45 minutes going between the HOT steamy sauna and the cooler water bath in the next room. We forgot to collect the traditional birch branches that are used to "whip" each other. I can honestly say that it was a fun experience, but definitely NOT romantic! After we relaxed into a puddle, it was back to Baba Guta's for another hearty meal, including many vodka toasts with Victor. He told us more interesting things about life in the small village and explained what all of Baba Guta's pictures concerned. This was my favorite moment in the trip because I started to feel like we were getting to know our host on a personal level. I only felt bad that we didn't have any pictures to share with her.
So, we woke up early this morning for the minibus, and somehow the bus managed to make the 2.5 hour trip, along windy dirt roads, covered in fresh snow, back to Irkutsk without incident. The bus was totally empty, which was a surprise because our ride out to BG was hell for a clausterphobic person like myself. We rode in a mini van, meant to hold about 13 people, including the driver. In reality, we had 17 epople and enough baggage to completely fill all the floor space, even with some one laps. Patrick and I were sitting in the seats farthest back against the rear door, which I thought was a good thing. I really shouldn't have asked whether the door opened, because it turned out that it was chained shut and could only be opened with bolt cutters. The driver was very cautious, though, and we arrived safely.

The train ride to Ulaan Baatar was OK, although we spent 8 hours at the border station while the guards searched every compartment, and even the space above the hallways! On the second night of the trip, a young Mongolian man joined us in our compartment. In broken English we learned about his family and his job and his hobbies. He was a super friendly guy, who even offered to share his newly bought smoked fish with us!
Before we knew it we arrived in Ulaan Baatar (at 6:10am), and a woman from the guest house we are staying in met us at the train. Lucky for us, because it was so cold and dark when we arrived, I think otherwise we would have felt a little lost.