Baikal South Shore Railway Road

A long shore route squeezed between Baikal and the Khamar-Daban mountains.

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Why this ride

A long shore route squeezed between Baikal and the Khamar-Daban mountains. The road: R258 and regional shore roads. Distance and riding time are estimates from the checkpoints until the road is measured on this page.

Roadbook

1. Irkutsk start

   Irkutsk was a Siberian trading post that became a city of merchants, exiles and gold, and it has an air of faded elegance that surprises people who expect only snow and railways. It stands on the Angara river, the only outlet of Lake Baikal, about seventy kilometres downstream from the lake, and it was founded in 1661 as a fort. Fur traders, tea merchants and gold dealers made fortunes here, and the grand wooden houses with carved window frames, known as wooden lace, still line some of the old streets, leaning a little as the ground shifts.

   Irkutsk was also a place of exile, and the Decembrists, aristocratic officers who had rebelled against the tsar in 1825, were sent here, bringing with them books, music and manners. Their houses, now museums, are among the city's best-known sights, and the city was long known as the Paris of Siberia, an exaggeration but a charming one. The Trans-Siberian railway arrived in 1898, and the big station is still a landmark. Soviet housing, wide avenues and modern shopping centres fill the newer districts, with a long riverside promenade along the Angara.

   For riders, Irkutsk is the starting point for Baikal, the deepest and oldest lake in the world, holding about a fifth of the planet's unfrozen fresh water. The road to Listvyanka, a lakeside village, winds through hills and forest for around seventy kilometres, with a good surface and fair traffic, though weekends are busy. Farther south, the old Circum-Baikal route and the coast road toward Slyudyanka and Baikalsk pass between steep wooded slopes and the clear blue water, with mountains rising on the far shore. The water is cold enough to take your breath away, even in August.

   The weather is continental, with hot summers, cold winters of minus twenty or lower, and sudden storms. Wind on the lake can be strong, and fog and rain are common in late summer. The best season is June to September, with a short, golden autumn.

   Irkutsk has all the services of a big city, with fuel at many stations, repairs, supermarkets and hotels. Beyond the city, villages have small stations, but they are spaced apart, so fill the tank before leaving. Try omul, a smoked or salted fish from Baikal, sold at stalls in Listvyanka, and drink hot tea afterward. Mosquitoes can be fierce in the forests in early summer.

2. Slyudyanka stop

   Slyudyanka sits at the southern tip of Lake Baikal, where the old railway turns the corner of the world's deepest lake, and the whole town carries the feel of a railway place. The name comes from slyuda, the Russian word for mica, which was mined in the hills behind the town for centuries and used for windows and later for electrical insulation. The mica pits and the quarries that supplied marble to the rest of the country shaped the town, and the stones around here are a collector's dream, with many kinds of crystals and minerals.

   The railway station is the unmissable monument. It is the only station in Russia built entirely of marble, using the local white and grey stone, and it dates from the years when the Circum-Baikal line was being laid, among the most expensive stretches of the Trans-Siberian. The railway squeezed along the cliffs of the lake's southern shore with dozens of tunnels, bridges and retaining walls built in stone, and a trip along it by train or on foot is an experience in itself. The old route is a heritage line today, and you can still find old stone portals of tunnels in the forest.

   Baikal itself is on another scale. It holds about a fifth of the world's unfrozen fresh water, it is more than 1,600 metres deep at its deepest, and it is thought to be twenty-five million years old. The water is so clear that you can see far down, and the shores here are lined with pebbles, rocky headlands and coniferous forest. The lake is cold even in August, and the swimming is bracing. In winter, it freezes to a thick layer of transparent ice that can carry vehicles, a spectacle of cracks and bubbles.

   From Slyudyanka, roads lead west along the Tunkinsky valley toward Arshan, a village at the foot of the Sayan Mountains with mineral springs, and east along the lake toward Baikalsk. The roads are generally decent, with long straights and some gentle curves, and the mountains of the Khamar-Daban range rise behind. In summer, trucks and tourist traffic are heavy on the main highway, and potholes appear in spring.

   Slyudyanka has fuel stations, shops and cafés. The famous local fish is omul, a type of lake whitefish, which is smoked or salted and sold by roadside vendors, and it is delicious with bread and a hot cup of tea. The best months are June to September, and by October the cold has returned.

3. Tankhoy stop
4. Babushkin stop
5. Ulan-Ude finish

   Ulan-Ude is a Siberian city with a distinctly Asian face. It is the capital of Buryatia, a republic of Mongolic people who follow Tibetan Buddhism, and it sits at the junction of the Selenga and Uda rivers, east of Lake Baikal, with a population of about three hundred and sixty thousand. The Trans-Siberian railway runs through, and the Trans-Mongolian line branches off here to Ulaanbaatar and Beijing, so the station is busy with travellers. Soviet blocks and wooden merchants' houses stand side by side, and in the main square stands the largest head of Lenin in the world, a bronze giant about seven metres high.

   Buddhism is part of the city's identity. The Ivolginsky Datsan, a monastery about thirty kilometres away, is the centre of Buddhism in Russia, with colourful temples, prayer wheels and monks in maroon robes. It is also home to the preserved body of the lama Itigilov, who died in 1927 in a meditation posture and whose body is said not to have decayed. Visitors should dress modestly, walk clockwise around the temples and ask before taking photographs. The Old Believers, Orthodox families who fled religious reforms in the seventeenth century, also settled here, and their villages keep a distinct culture, with elaborate costumes and songs.

   For a rider, the roads from Ulan-Ude lead toward Baikal, whose eastern shore is quiet and wide, with long sandy beaches and low forested hills. The route to Goryachinsk passes through the Selenga delta region, with farmland, birch woods and steppe, and the village is known for hot mineral springs near the lake. Further north the road to Ust-Barguzin leads along the Barguzin Valley, with views of the snow-capped Barguzin range across the plain. Surfaces vary from good tarmac to rough sections with potholes, and trucks and local drivers are fast. Mosquitoes and midges in the wetlands can be fierce, and summer storms arrive quickly.

   Ulan-Ude has everything: stations, shops and repair shops. Zarechny and Sotnikovo, near the city, add a few services. On the road to Baikal, villages have small stations that are not always open or stocked, so fill the tank here. Try buuzy, steamed dumplings filled with meat and broth, a Buryat staple, and salted milk tea.

   Summers are short and warm, winters long and bitterly cold, and the best season to ride is June through September. A morning at the datsan, quiet and incense-scented, is worth the detour.

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