Adventures in Altai Mountains

It's been a while since last time. After 4 days on a train first to Novosibirsk and then onward to Barnaul a shover at a Hotel was heaven. We had no shower on five days coz the shower at our hostel in Moscova was broken. In Barnaul we payed a bit more for a nice hotel room for 3 persons and allso we had opportunity to register at least once in this country. You shoul register in a town if you stay more and 72 hours but the system is more than confucing so when they did the registration for free at the hotel we where more than happy. We also spent almost one night on the trainstation in Barnaul coz we arrived at 3 am so we didnt want to pay for that night so a dicant hotel room on the third try was great. We went to two other hotels before but they said they where fullbooked, maybe we smelled to bad:)

All was worth it coz trough a agency in Barnaul we managed to book a 5 day adventure in Altai Mountains. The first day we went there in a minibus and it took us 9 hours coz there was a military parade that stopped thwe trafic for 2-3 hours. Then back there we got tents to live in and the food was made on open fire. It was very cozy and on the first day we meet some people from Moscova who spoke a bit English and some of them we learned to know a bit better and that was great. There was no other forigner tourist only a French man who worked in Moscov, but somehow wit a bit of English and some Russian and a lot of Bodylanguage we learnt to know eachother a bit.

Every day we where at the mountains we had some activities. The first day we did a riding tour with horses. After a lunch in the forrest there was a huge tunder and we got a bit wet, but then again the sun was there and dride us. The second day was great we went treking in a forrest and there was a cave. We went to the cave with the ovners of the camp we lived in and it was also the first time they visited the cave. It was really cold in there and when we got deeper in we realized that there was ice in the cave that never melts, we where ther in the middle of the summer. It was really cool, the ice sparkled like diamonds from the litle light outside and when we got deper in we had torches and candels to light our way. We had lunch at some local peoples home and at the camp we had a refreshing sauna in russian style.

The last day we went rafting and got totally wet, but it was so much fun and a sauna after 4 hours of rafting was welcome again. The Grandmoter of the place gave me a grat sauna experience when she spanked me with the birchs leaves and i did the same back...finally I felt tottaly clean.

The last evening we drank both Russian and Finnish Vodka with our new friends. It's a tradition to toast and say someting before every drink and there was a lot to say:)

With our but hurting from riding, with our legs and arms hurting from climbing and our back hurting from padling we returned to Barnaul, tired but very very happy. If your path ever takes you to Siberia Altai mountains is a must!

Then we had a hot train ride in a "platskartny" wagon to Tomsk. It was a wagon with 56 beds and most of our fellow passangers where from the Russian army. But the ride went okey even if it was too hot and no aircondition. I think it was around 36 degrees in the wagon and the air was still. Anyway, now we are in Tomsk that is a University town and here we can even find a netcafe. We have arrangge to travel forward to Irkutsk tomorrow and we be there after about 34 hours on train = some waiting in a city called Taiga. First when we tryed to buy the tikets the first laydy said no can do, after lining an other half hour to an other laydy we suddenly where able to get tickets...thats the way it works here.

A lot of hugs from Siberia, I realy like it here and people here are mostly really great!

Take care! -Linda-