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Irkutsk and Lake Baikal

It was another early start 4am Moscow time 10am local (all trains on the Trans Sib route run on Moscow time). We were met by our transfer to Lake Baikal the largest freshwater lake in the world. We were staying in the very sleepy village of Listvyanka at a hotel (can't remember the name of) that just doesn't fit in with the scenery. Now Lake Baikal is supposed very beautiful and picturesque, I suppose it is, well what I could see as when we arrived it was very murky and misty, in fact the weather was a bit s***.

Didn't actually do much there, I went to the Lake Baikal Museum, had a boat trip and bumped in to various other tourists on the Trans Mongolian. Tony and Sam on the other hand braved the cold water of the lake to go for a swim, which apparently was absolutely freezing.

I didn't particularly like the place, mainly because there was nothing much to do there, perhaps if the weather was better I may have liked it more. Then again on the last morning I actually saw a blue sky!

We had a day to kill in Irkutsk, basically wandering around killing time before our evening train for Ulan Bator at 9.50pm. Oh we did see about 10 weddings, I think we must have seen a couple a day in St Petersburg and Moscow, they also have a tradition of going to a fence near a river or lake and attaching a padlock to show the strength of the union,

Oh also before I forget I don't think I have seen one good looking Russian since I arrived! Oh unless you count the pictures of a young Stalin that I saw in Gori!