Lake Baikal day!

Yesterday, just before we had notice we were visiting Nathan on Saturday, we had made plans with the Jacksons to visit Lake Baikal on Saturday. So we had to call to reschedule and today works out well for them – and the weather – so we'll be going! I'm so excited! Lake Baikal is the world's deepest freshwater lake and contains 20% of the WORLD'S fresh water! It also has several species of fish and animals that are unique to the area. The road leading to the lake was built in the 50's when President Eisenhower was supposed to visit the region. He never came but the road remains. This is all stuff I know before our trip so stay tuned to find the trip report below!

Funny anecdote – Last night JJ and my dad called. JJ's was with the guys for a few days while my mom was covering the Oconomowoc Egelseer kids. Anyway I had told dad that next week Friday at the latest we'll have Nathan with us at the apartment. He relayed that to JJ after we hung up. JJ's responses? (precious!) – "Oh good, then I can talk to him!" (he's been waiting but I figure they can talk every night when Nathan's here) So anyway my dad says "But he probably won't understand you!" JJ says "I'll just say 'Hey, Genya' – hey is hey in Russian!" LOL! Then he also said "Oh good, they won't have to travel two hours each way to see him!" JJ knows what's going on!

So here is our Lake Baikal trip account. The Jackson family picked us up at 10am and we headed southeast toward the Baikal area. This was all new scenery for us and very picturesque. It's very hilly – sometimes you crest the hill and can't see the road to go down but overall a nice road. Lots of birch and pine trees as we see so much in this area. It's about 70km from IRK to the village we stopped at (Larkspir?) As we were visiting the area in winter instead of summer there wasn't a lot going on but the scenery is beautiful. Check out the picture section from today for shots – it was warm, probably about 0c, and sunny and a clear blue sky. God's magnificence in nature today! So we walked around a little in a park like area and took some pictures. Then we drove a short distance and stopped at an open air market where they sold souvenirs. Many of them we find here in IRK also so we didn't need to purchase much there but we did get a couple trinket items as they did try hard to sell us on stuff! One gal asked me where we were from and when I said America she started talking German to me – but then switched to English. Tami was our translator but the ones who wanted our rubles knew how to say the amount in English! Steve purchased us all a snack – a bread like item filled with mashed potatoes. The lady pulled them out of her heated portable hot box – they were quite good and very fresh (and 20rubles each). He had a choice of potato, cabbage or liver – chose potato for us all! (good choice). Then we drove along the lake a little more until we came to another village. Andrew had been campaigning for us to visit the Nerpel show – Nerpels are the only fresh water seals in the world and they are found in Lake Baikal. We were at the very southern tip of the lake – it goes about 300 MILES north/east yet and they said the seals are located much further north so even if we were there in summer we wouldn't see them in the wild. We said that if the show was open today we would pay admission for everyone to get in. Well the show was going (every 20-minutes) and we paid – approx $25 in USA money – and we waited a few minutes in a small entry area for the show to start. It was behind a door and I thought we'd get led down to some benches and view a big pool – sort of like a SeaWorld show. Well, we walked about 10 feet and were in a room about 15'x15' that had a pool for the seals about the size of a home hot tub in the USA! We stood around the pool and watched the seals perform. It was fun to see – the seals "sang" and "danced" and "counted" and "dove through hoops" and "played ball" and just showed off. There were four in the pool but two are babies so didn't perform – only the two older ones did. These seals have the blackest eyes you could believe and on their fins they have fingernails similar to us! They were just neat to see and it was definitely a Russian experience! The Jacksons thought that there might be three zoos worldwide that have Nerpels at them, one in the United States. We couldn't take pictures in the show but could buy some after so I got one of two seals showing the tub they performed in. You'll have to see me in person to see that tho!

Then we headed back toward IRK and went to the Jackson's house for a late lunch. Tami had made potato soup and broccoli/chicken/cheese soup and homemade bread with homemade jams. Then she had chocolate chip and peanut butter cookies for dessert. Umm, we're still full! We watched the DVD they put together of their mission here that they showed when they were in the USA on furlough last fall – very interesting and tear jerking! They are wonderful people and we're so glad to have met them and their children. I hope we can do something more with them when we have Nathan with us here. We thank them so much for this day and the great memories (and their children Ashley, Andrew and Melissa just crack us up – they're great kids!) {Melissa, Brian just fell asleep – did you?}

Our day went so fast! We'll probably go for a walk later tonight as it's nice and warm today and tomorrow (before the cold comes again!) and tomorrow afternoon we visit Nathan again. We press on!