Ulan-Ude Russia - Baikal Lake from Buryatia

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Ulan-Ude - A travel report by jorge

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Ulan-Ude, Russia - Buryatiya	11738 readers		jorgesanchez's travel reports
Baikal Lake from Buryatia	19 votes		Page: 1 2 3 4

Ulan Ude is one of the few stops that you should not miss during your Transiberian, or Transmongolian, or Transmanchurian journey by train. The other ones are: Irkutsk, Novosibirsk, Yekaterinburg, Vladivostok with Nahodka, Kazan, and Khabarovsk.




	Ethnologic museum of Ulan Ude

Ulan Ude is the capital of Buryatia, one of the 21 Russian autonomous republics (including Ichkeria, o Chechenia). It has a population of about 400.000 persons, and the town was founded in the year 1666 as a winter station by Russians Cossacks. The Buryats, one of the 30 ethnic minorities in Siberia, are related with Mongolia, and their language is very close to the Mongol. Buryats belong to the first Siberian ethnic group by number and importance (second are the Yakukts, followed by Tuvans, Khakassians, Altaics, etc.). Buryats feel very proud of their nationality, and during the Russian invasion of their land they offered a strong resistance, like the Tatars and the Chukchi. Ulan Ude deserves a few days stay. Near the Hotel Baikal, in the main square, you will find the greatest Lenin head statue in the world (record Guinness), a superb ethnologic museum, the beautiful theatre of Opera and Ballet, looking like a castle, and just at about 30 kilometres distance you can reach a Buddhist monastery, or datsan, called Ivolginsk, where all the monks are Buryats (Buryats, Yakutsk and Tuvans are Buddhists). Inside this Tibetan monastery (Mahayana-Gelugpa sect, or followers of the Dalai Lama), you can visit several temples, the museum, the library and the monks rooms. There are some monks who speak English (in case that you do not speak Russian) and will explain you about the monastery. If you are planning to visit Saint Petersburg as well during your same journey, then in that town you should go to the nice Buddhist temple in Primorski Prospekt number 91, constructed in 1913 by a great monk of Ivolginsk called Dorjieff, who was the advisor of Tsar Nikolai II. Dorjieff was arrested during Stalin times and died in an Ulan Ude prison in 1938.

Favourite spots:




	Lake Baikal view from Severobaikal. I had another picture without me, but Globo does not accept it.

While in Ulan Ude I very much advise you to go to Severobaykalsk (in Russian language means North of Baikal), which is a stop of the BAM train (Baykal Amur Magistral). From there you will have a better view of the Baikal Lake than in Listvyanka, near Irkutsk. Furthermore, Listvyanka is a Russian village, while Severobaykalsk is Buryat, therefore more exotic. Baikal is the deepest lake in the world, reaching 1637 metres (the second one is Tanganyika, between Tanzania, Zambia, Burundi and Democratic Republic of Congo) and contains the 25 % of all the sweet water of our planet. There are ferries from Severobaikal and Listvyanka to Irkutsk.

What's really great:




	The Transiberian train crossing the taiga

One of the best things of going to Ulan Ude is the transport in the longest railway in the world, from Moscow to Vladivostok (And then you can continue by boat to Yokohama, in Japan). There are several kinds of wagons in the Transiberian train. First you have “Miagki”, or first class, with compartments that you can lock from inside, with a capacity for two people. “Kupeini”, or second class, is the same than first class but with four passengers instead of two, and two beds upstairs, like in the Army. Class “Platskartni” is the cheapest, with open wagons and plenty of beds everywhere, even in the corridors. If you are an extroverted person and enjoy talking, that is your class to travel. You will share your food with the other passengers, will drink lots of vodka, and will eat from kasha Hercules to pelmenie, “kalbasa” and borsch soup. For short distances there are trains called “elektrichki” with a general class and plenty of seats, called “Obshee”.

Accommodations:




	Opera and Ballet in Ulan Ude

Hotel Baikal is very conveniently located and not expensive. Near the Railway Station you have hostels. It is also possible to find private rooms. When you arrive by train to Uland Ude several women will offer you rooms at a good price. Inside many railways stations in Russia you can sleep for the equivalence of a few US Dollars.

Restaurants:




	“Rundfunkhaus” in central Uland Ude

There are plenty of “stolovaya” type restaurants in Ulan Ude and around the central market.

Other recommendations:




	This monolith in the Urals separates Europe from Asia

RUSSIAN COLONIZATION OF SIBERIA
--------------------------------------------------------
Everything started when the Tsar Ivan the Terrible conquered Kazan in 1552 finishing up with a long period of Tatar yoke on the Russians. Soon, there followed the foundation of many new towns along Siberia, until the Pacific Ocean, lasting 300 years. Tiumen was the first town set up by the Russians, in 1582, followed by Tobolsk in 1587, Beryozovo in 1592, etc., etc. Finally Vladivostok was established in 1880.

Published on Saturday July 9th, 2005