А small outing of a crowd to Frolikha Lake

For both people who visited Lake Baikal and those who would like to see it the word Frolikha is quite familiar. A person who doesn't know anything about our place would think this ambition to have a look at the place rather strange, as there's ample enough room to enjoy the unique beauty of North Baikal without that little lake. Still, many do want to see Frolikha and that's it! Eventually, Frolikha is a name for several nature objects: bay, river (Left, Right and Frolikha itself), lake and a nature reserve. This nature reserve somehow unifies all these objects.
Further I will be giving some extracts from the reserve chronicle presented to me by I.A.Fedenev, director of the reserve, and E.N.Rodionov, chief hunting assistant.

"The state zoological game reserve of the federal status without a limited term of operation was established on January 5, 1988. It is located in Severobaikalsk region of the republic of Buryatiya at the north-eastern shore of Lake Baikal, 40 km from the settlement of Nizhneangarsk and 45 km from the city of Severobaikalsk, where the administration of the reserve has its office at Leningradsky Ave., 7. The total area of the reserve is 109,2 thousand hectares. The holder of the state forest fund and the holder of the right of land user is Severobaikalsk forestry."

As usual, we had been packing for a long time. Finally we got spontaneously ready, just according to a Russian saying: "The Russian peasant harnesses his horse way too long but then rides it fast". While having one of the few July weekends on the shore of Baikal, we flatly decided set forth without hesitation on a small trip in a full company for a period of, say, a week. We guessed the weather would not favor us, and we were right as it turned out later.
Naturally, the subject and the object of the campaign was Lake Frolikha, as it turned out that most of the participants only dreamed of it, while those who had been there, visited the place in winter.

"The climate here is extreme continental with a large amplitude of air temperature fluctuations. A strong influence on the climate comes from Lake Baikal. Besides, the high, steep mountainous terrain creates different conditions for warming up and cooling down of the ground surface, depending on the steepness of the slopes and the degree of their forest cover. The average monthly temperatures in 2000 were: in January - 23 C., in February - 17 C., in March -18 C., the precipitation was 15,10, and 11 mm relatively; in July +13 C., in August +16 C., rains 99,0 and 107,4 mm. The lowest temperature in January was -40 C., the highest temperature was + 17 C. The average snow cover was 20-40 cm., in the mountainous parts it came up to 1,5 meter high. The annual amount of precipitation fell in July.

The northern bounds of the reserve are from Nemnyanka Cape along the watersheds of the Right Frolikha and the Tompuda rivers to the Shirildy riverhead.

The eastern bounds are from the Frolikha and Okulikan riverheads along the watershed between the upper reaches of these rivers, which flow into the Right Frolikha and the Tompuda to the Shirildy riverhead.

The southern bounds are from the Shirildy riverhead to the place where it flows into Lake Baikal.

The western bounds are from the mouth of the Shirildy river within the shoreline of the game reserve to Nemnyanka Cape, excluding the territory of hydropathical spa resort "Khakusy", which occupies 12 km of shoreline and up to 5 km deep into the forest.

The reserve routine includes total ban on any kind of fishing in all the rivers and lakes, on any kind of game and animals hunting, on bird nests destroying, on berries picking. It also bans trespassing the territory without the permission of the reserve administration, and water or trekking tourism without the agreement with the administration".

   Now it's time to present all the participants of this small, so to say, family tour. The Krymtsevs, Olga and her son Dima, who changed their residence for Moscow, but stayed at Baikal with their souls; Sergey Zharkov, who joined them; the Karpovs, Zoya and her son Stepan; the Puchkovs, Pavel, Natalia, their son Artyom, and his friend Sasha Samarin; Vitaly P. Sidorchenko, from Irkutsk - a very interesting person; and the Rasputins, Natalia, and her children Arina and Timofei.
   The backbone of the crowd 9as well as in the whole of Russia) was formed from women and children, though the latter five were already University students. But this didn't change their status s the mothers were always nearby. That's why bass voices were often heard all over the camping- site asking something like: "Moooom, where is/are …" (adding what they needed at the moment). But I've run ahead of the events.
   Victor Karpov, the chief of the local rescue service, took the responsibility for the solution of the transportation problem. I got all the necessary permits from Severobaikalsk forestry and the Reserve. The honor of being a supply manager fell on Natalia Puchkova. Tim was repairing the boat, as there's nothing to do without it on Frolikha Lake. He also checked the life jackets. The weaker part of the company was drying rusks. The men were preparing fishing- tackle for fantastic fishing. At the same time the Sun was generously spilling its warmth on us. Probably, having thought that it petted us enough, the sun gave place to less pleasant natural phenomena, namely a rainfall that was expecting us on the day of the departure - August 2. The Daban mountain pass was all covered with low clouds.
   I had a dilemma, whether we should put off the start or just start in rain for good luck. It turned out I was not alone questioning myself about that. The second idea won, and we started off right away, though my elder son was grumbling: "Nuts! Where are you going in such heavy shower?" We quickly got on the truck, and in less than 5 minutes our joyful yells were heard on the deserted, in such ungodly hour, moorage of the yacht club "White Sail".
   Some fuss and animation happened near the "Medusa" (Jellyfish) yacht, as everybody was determined to get inside as fast as possible. Only the calm rescue service chief Victor was giving the last orders, and the captain Sasha Korovin, accompanied by sailor Anatoly, were finishing the final things to do before the departure. The mount of backpacks was growing. We had to wait till the Puchkovs arrived, and they finally did.
   The captain, the sailor, and Vitaly were the only ones who stayed on the deck. The engine started to murmur and the yacht set off, heading into the light-gray mantle of the rain along the dark-gray smooth surface of Baikal. The hope to go under the sail vanished in the silvery spurts under the rhythmic roar of the engine, as we could expect wind only after it would stop raining.
   Chaos reigned in the cabin of this rather spacious half-ton yacht, very well fit for an autonomous voyage of a company of 4-5 persons. The yacht has a cabin, bow and stern rooms, a toilet, and a caboose. The kids were stick to the walls and corners, as the most of the space was filled with backpacks, boxes, plastic bags, rubber boots, and raincoats. Rather soon, by common effort, all that stuff was sorted out, shoveled away, and we managed to lay the table.
   Worshipping the local God of Lake Baikal - Burkhan is piously observed by the locals when going onto the ice or water of the lake, or else there will be no good weather, and, as a consequence, no good luck. The first drops of alcohol are given to Burkhan by spraying drops of a drink to the four parts of the world with one's fingers, asking for favorable weather. The boys, behaving like locusts, started to eat the home- made stuff. They became happier never suspecting what is expecting them ahead. Only Eugene the 11-year old son of Anatoly flatly refused to have anything. And he appeared to be right! No later than one hour in the open sea there formed a line of those who had to take a portion of fresh air due to being sea-sick. It was so problematic! If one went up to the deck, s/he would get cold under the rain, when one returned to the cabin, it would make him like feeding fishes. I had to urgently take my working place at the gas-cooker; I didn't have to get used to do such things on board the yacht as well. The smell of freshly- made tea with herbs made many guys recover. But the first cups of hot tea went to the captain, Anatoly, and Vitaly.
   The captain took a decision to sail not to Ayaya bay, but to Frolikha bay. In less than 3 hours we came to anchor and gave rest both to worn-out passengers and shivering from cold crew. As if taking pity of us the rain stopped, and the wind started to blow, which in its turn tore the dense cover of clouds. What else did we need for our great joy? We went out to the sea again, doubled the cape, and came to anchor in Ayaya bay opposite the winter hut of the reserve ranger. He came over to us in his motorboat, and introduced himself. We talked with him for a while, he thoroughly checked our permits, and then wished us happy travel with advice to put on high rubber boots, because the path was very wet.
   There was no point to start off that late in the evening, so we decided to spend the night on Ayaya bay's beach. Unloading was almost like a flash thanks to the Yegor Yegorovich's motorboat. We said good-bye to the Medusa's crew, and settled the back voyage for August 7.
   A strong wind from the sea was chilling the bay through, so we decided to camp 200 meters away from the shore, where there was a specially equipped camping-site. We even found some firewood there. While the Rasputins were on duty, the others quickly put up the tents among the stone pines, and scattered around to look at the sites there.
   Ayaya is one of the most picturesque bays in North Baikal area. Its emerald colored surface is trimmed by golden-orange beach with coarse-grained sand. Strange, but true, as the sand along Balkan's shore is somewhat grayish, but here it's always bright like in a picture from a children's book. So is the color of the water, which also differs from that of the rest of the lake, with its brightness in any kind of weather.
   Aya is the only bay for boats to find shelter during storms. Once I witnessed a multitude of vessels, like three big boats, two yachts, two smaller motorboats, and a catamaran, which were hiding there from the anger of roaring Baikal.
   And here was the first godsend: an unusual company of three Evenks, five reindeer, and a young deer were walking in the shelter of trees. From our conversation I found out that a local businessman, who makes money in catering tourists around in summertime, decided to expand his business, offering reindeer as Sherpa to transfer tourists' stuff along the path. The price was reasonable - around $10.00 per reindeer. Sometimes this pack transport found some customers, but most of the time the reindeer were grazing freely under the leadership of a vigorous white female reindeer, breaking the silence with the jingling of their bells. Only the young deer didn't leave the camp- site, that's why it became the object for taking pictures by the tourists. Naturally, we didn't lose such a great chance as well.

"The territory belongs to the zone of a coniferous taiga forest. The forest is formed with dense tract with the exception of treeless high mountainous area. Coniferous types of trees prevail over the leaf-bearing ones. The larch prevails among leaf-bearing types. The species of animals that inhabit the territory of the Reserve are elk, Manchurian deer, musk deer, wild reindeer, sable, ermine, squirrel, red fox, glutton, wolf, hare, brown bear, wood-grouse, the water fowl is represented by duck, teal, gray duck, mallard, golden-eye, some other species of ducks; white swan comes here on his way to the North (it's in The Red Book of Russian Federation). The gray-tail sea eagle, falcon, which build their nests here, and the otter that dwells in the forest, are also objects of Russian Federation and The Republic of Buryatiya Red Books. The chief measure to protect the above-mentioned species is the limitation of Man's access to the Reserve, which is successfully done. There are some other species listed in the Red Books, they are davatchan (a subspecies of the Arctic loach), taymen, both found in Frolikha Lake, and the fresh water seal, nerpa, found in the Ayaya Bay."

First of all, Natalia Puchkova rushed to the green waters of the bay, trying, with her joyful yells, to make the others follow suit. But there appeared no one willing to due to a rather cold wind blowing from the sea; moreover the sun was already setting. The western shore was adorned with the sunset colors, the palette of which cannot be reproduced by any camera. An orange tint goes into a yellow one, a yellow tint turns into a turquoise one, this in turn is changed by bluish, then become lilac, a rosy tint mixes with something else. These momentary changes of tints make one stare at the sky. The tints play with each other, as if in a hurry to do it before the last beam of the sun becomes dim.
The first dinner by the campfire went with the dreams aloud about the forthcoming fishing and a number of pikes and perches lining up to get on the hooks of our fishermen :-)

"All the rivers on the territory of the Nature Reserve flow along the deep gorges. They have rapid current. The longest ones are the Left and The Right Frolikha, flowing into Frolikha Lake, which is the largest lake on the territory of the reserve. Its depth is about 80 meters. The longest rivers are the Frolikha, flowing into Baikal and having lots of branches and channels, and the Shirildy. There are typical species of fish, like grayling, pike, perch, and burbot, in all these rivers. There are natural fodder conditions for the Red Book otter in the rivers."

   An early getting up is not a problem for everybody. Within a blink of an eye the camp was packed up, breakfast eaten. The boys were fast enough to cover the firewood from the rain. Everybody was longing to get to the lake. We started at 8. The guides were Zoya and Vitaly, as the regulars to Frolikha. Pasha Puchkov was bringing up the rear with hardly liftable backpack (what on Earth does he always carry in it?) Entering the edge of the forest we were met by the swarms of mosquitoes, well, crowds, clouds of them with all their peep and peal! But the consequences are the same - mosquitoes! Here goes a bog! We urgently zipped and buttoned whatever we could, what couldn't be covered we smeared and spray our waterproof jackets. Only the skillful Karpovs were grinning from under their anti-mosquito nets.
   Champ! Champ! Champ! We were splashing through the boggy path having some time to eat round the bushes of blueberries. The old brushwood-road on the deepest spots did not save any more. Though ordinary knee-high boots are good enough. Only Tim, Stepan, and Sergey were wearing jackboots. The most problematic was Arina, as her white elegant boots were barely up to her ankles. Of course, water was burgling inside them. She found the way out, and on the deepest spots she contrived to use Pasha's feet as saving hummocks. Well, he was only glad to help her!
   The first halt was at the foot of the mount "Goggle Eyes" as Vitaly called it. To be exact, it is close to the rocky mountain pass. It was quiet and cool there. The flow was roaring falling between the rocks. We dashed up the slippery rocks and stones all together. There was another bog expecting us there again. Well, the water was high that summer. Feeling the lake near, our legs were stepping up by themselves. Through the trees there was a glitter of the Perch Cove. A bit farther and we were on a high mound. To the right was the Perch Cove, straight ahead was Lake Frolikha itself. It was the only open place for a stopover on this side of the lake in case one doesn't have anything to traverse the lake on. But the Perch Cove is not the lake yet; you can't see the lake from here properly.

"Frolikha Lake is a complex nature monument. Its total area is 16,5 square kilometers. It has a form of a horseshoe. The lake is located 8 kilometers from the Ayaya bay. There are two small islands, a wide peninsula, two coves - The Perch and the Khobot (Trunk). The depth is about 80 meters. The Right Frolikha and the Davatchanda flow into the lake from the Southeast. The Left Frolikha and a number of smaller rivers and creeks flow into the lake from the Northeast. Only one river - the Frolikha, flows out of the lake. Mount Medvezhya towers at the eastern shore; it's 1200 meters high. The lake has scientific and recreational importance".

   The boat was taken out rapidly. The boys were dashing to pump it up taking turns. One of the women was wandering around collecting some healing herbs. Tim was already throwing the spinning-rod. Pasha Puchkov was beginning to construct a passage that he had preplanned, so that there would be no need to row a boat. Instead one could pull it from one bank to another. Meanwhile, Sergey managed to bring Vitaly to the opposite bank. Pasha's 20-meter long rope happened to be not enough, we added mine, and the boat with backpacks and Sergey inside set off.
   Stop! The rope caught by the stream was sagging arched. The boat was being carried down the river. Sergey was swearing quietly cursing the tie unable to reach it. Stepan, the only one who has jackboots on was urgently sent into the water with a noose in his hand. Good it is shallow here. Meanwhile, Pasha was rapidly making the whole thing longer. Murphy's law - the fishing line in Pasha's hands became entangled. What else did we have to do? Zoya quietly took the entangled fishing line from Pasha's hands and started to untwine it.
   In about 10 minutes the line gave up and the boat was being unloaded on the other bank. To turn and reel the line more conveniently we ask Artyom to make a bear-spear. No longer than in a moment he brought us a dry twig in a shape of a slingshot. While laughing and explaining what we really needed, a second entangled spot (a beard) had formed. Now six hands were untwining that one! While doing this thankless job, Sergey little by little was ferrying people and backpacks in turn. When there was load for only two-three goes left, Pasha tied the rope-line thing to the boat again. He charged Arina with the most crucial part of the process: to run with the line to and fro along the hillock not to reel this damn one with every return of the boat. In short, we had lots of fun ferrying our stuff. Good we were not pressed for time, and also the sun was shining, the day was just gorgeous. That all meant that the state of mind was the same!
   At last everybody was on peninsula and ready to walk to the cherished beach - the place of the next camping-site. The trail, trodden along the narrow shoreline was flooded and not visible. So we had to work our way through the wood in one place, wade through the water in another, and sometimes walk over high, thick grass. We met such wonderful motley grass herу that the shouts of admiration did not stop for a minute. Many kinds of herbs were crowned with blue, lilac, yellow, and white bells, and clusters of inflorescence.

"According to the data presented by a geobotanic expedition, rare and almost extinct plants, found only in Siberian taiga forest, have been registered in this area".

   Olga and I spotted yellow patches of different sizes in the middle of the thicket. We took another look and got surprised - those were chanterelles! And so many! Of course, there turned up some skeptics among us, who tried to convince everybody that those mushrooms were nothing but toadstools. We just said: "We'll see how you'll be demolishing them when they are fried!" Chanterelles are a big rarity for our place. Still, one could mow them there - small, strong, bright. Creeping under the bushes in excitement we didn't feel the heavy loads on our backs. We calmed down only after we had filled all the packs, packets, caps and what not which was near at hand.
   We passed one beach, then another. The traces of people's visits were seen everywhere. There was a smoking shed made of stones, a framework made of pokes with a stone stove inside, a burnt down hunter's hut. Our advance guard Petrovich, Stepan, and Tim reached the longed-for beach. The group from Kemerovo was leaving it, setting off on a catamaran over the Frolikha river to Baikal.
   A stationery campfire, table, benches, well, everything was in its place. Four colored tents had sprung up in the shade of massive pine-trees. A blue owning got opened up over the table. The water in the coppers started gurgling. The oil in the frying pan started sizzling, betokening a belly party.
   We had such divine beauty around us that the souls were overflowed with emotions; the mouths smiled independently, the bodies were growing young again. We were observing an absolute unity with nature! All the shades of green and blue interlaced, reflexing in one another to the left, to the right, and from above. Only golden warm sand was gritting under our feet. The water appeared surprisingly warm. The sun was shining and scorching. We were about to have a wonderful rest. What else does a man need for happiness? Our hunger was appeased with a king's dinner. Arina cooked three huge frying pans of chanterelles. Our students on vacation prepared firewood. The supply manager of our tour informed us that the entire foodstuff, mounting on one of the benches, had to be eaten. The fishermen went to the evening biting. The sun, meanwhile, was slowly hiding behind Baikal.
   A bit later, as if greeting us, Moon the Beauty, rose in the place of the sun from behind the Medvezhya Mount. It laid a silver path on the lake straight to our beach. Everybody became simultaneously silent and charmed with the magical change of natural scenery. The silence was broken by Nilovna's voice: "Hey, everybody! Let's swim in the moon path!" Two women's and one girl's silhouettes disturbed the still mirror-like surface of the evening lake. They were heading to meet their heavenly symbol and beginning.
   The smell of freshly made tea spread around the fire. As usual, jokes, stories, recollections were being told. Gradually one person got to attract attention and interest of everybody. It was Vitaly. Everyone had heard about him a lot, but not each of us knew him personally. He used to be the director of the Drama Theater in Irkutsk. Presently he is the director of the museum of that theater, a member of the Journalists' Union of Russia, an actor, an owner of the collection of rare billboards, and generally speaking - a very interesting person. We were listening to his stories about his tours, and well-known people. It happened that our kids got interested in Russian history, whereas Vitaly spent much time in historical archives, therefore he knew many facts not written in History books. The questions were many. Vitaly answered them until someone remembered that we would have to get up early for going fishing the following morning.
   The morning of the following day was as divine as all the nature surrounding us. The noise of the surf woke us up long before the sunrise. The air saturated with peace, clarity, original beauty and freshness was penetrating into every cell of our bodies. The feeling of isolation and estrangement from the rest of the fussy world was increasing. The peace and pacification seemed to be piercing through our organisms and every fiber of our being.
   The people on duty were already busy near the campfire; the fishermen were quickly packing up their tackles. Almost all the males of the company went fishing after breakfast. Some of them went there on foot. Some went by boat. Some went to the Right Frolikha, some set out for the riverhead of the Frolikha. Zoya, as an experienced fisherwoman was with green fisher boys - Stepan, Tim, and Sergey. Sergey was an only Uni student who showed some interest for going fishing. And we, women who were left at the camping-site, had to wait and meet the hunters like women had always done before. We cooked a copper of borsch and a copper of compote, so we took liberties with doing anything we wanted to. Olga took a pail and rushed to collect some more chanterelles in the surrounding forest thicket. The students stretched themselves on the warm sand after swimming. Arina retired to the neighboring beach with a serious book. Quietness, calmness, no cars, no phones, no TV, no PC, but only the sub, the sky, sand, water, and all that is in full harmony of color and feelings. Paradise!
   Closer to the evening time our hunters started to return. They were smiling cunningly trying to make us believe they hadn't caught anything. But it's really hard to cover up the feelings of the first catch, especially for the young boys. The first pike was caught by Tim (newcomer's luck!). It was a sudden occasion for both the pike and Tim. He was wading along the shore he stepped on a log, hidden in high grass. That's where the famous water hunter was hiding. Splashing water on him with her tail, she hid behind the nearest stone. Tim happened to be more cunning as he quickly threw the spoon-bait. The pike didn't expect it was a fake fish and got it. Tim had only one thing to do to take the pike onto the shore. A good beginning makes a good ending; everybody started to catch either pikes or perches. Some of them had to dive to get their spoon-baits from the water, as the place had lots of sunken snags.
   Everybody was happy with the catch and foresaw a rich fish dinner. Still all that fish needed cleaning. Zoya was used to cleaning the needles of the perch, so she was the first to start the work. Pasha found somebody's hidden autoclave, which became a smoking device. We cleaned it thoroughly and were expecting some smoked fish later when the fish would get a little salty. In the meantime the fish soul was boiling, there was a number of sticks with perches around the campfire, and the frying pan was full of nice, tanned chanterelles. Our supply manager felt bad because of all that multitude of food found in the lake and in the forest, as the stuff we brought with us didn't become smaller in volume. Nilovna insisted on eating that stuff, the rest said they would do with the fish. "Hunger rebel" in reverse… We came up with the idea, that all the coppers would have something cooked inside, and our "little kids" were free to choose what to eat for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Actually that was the time of vulgar, immoral gluttony. The guys sitting around the campfire were busy twisting around the sticks with perches to fry them evenly from all sides. When Pasha stopped the work of his smoking device and the delicate smell of smoked fish reached the company, everybody became aware that the food would have to be taken back to the city. Well, that was later, and at that time everybody was eating the fish with gusto.
   Whereas the mail occupation of men was fishing, the ladies didn't have such fun; moreover we all were fed up with kitchen stuff at home. We walked around and saw the wooden structures left by someone round the corner, on one of the smaller beaches. We decided to make one into a real Russian banya, a sort of sauna. We had some theoretical views in how to make it, but nobody was aware of that in practice.
   But aren't we Russian women? Settled! We could do that without males, as soon as the stove was there, we needed only to put something on that structure. Good if we had some animal skins, but we didn't. As soon as the banya was pretty far from our camp, we had to collect firewood around the place. We requested Dmitry to help us, we sawed the logs, and he chopped the chocks, so soon we had a pile of firewood near the stove. We left him to heat the stove and went back to the camp. Our students were unhappy of doing nothing, so we sent them to the banya place to give rest to Dmitry. Artyom, Sasha, and Arina who joined them with Bhagavad-Gita book went there.
   Having collected all the big pieces of polyethylene, all the pieces of ropes and cords, added copper to the stuff, we went back to the banya beach. Our "stokers" were good at their business, but not all the stones of this stone stove were heated well enough. We told them to continue their business and went to make some bunches of birch branches.
   Alas, the birches didn't grow around there, so we had to use willow tree branches together with some aromatic herbs. The boys started complaining that they wanted to eat and drink, so we let them go. We started making the most complicated stage of that banya construction - the walls and the roof. Here a cold wind started blowing from Baikal and it made our work quite harder. Can you imagine a two-meter high structure, which had 4 walls and a roof, whereas we had to put some smaller pieces of polyethylene on it with the help of short pieces of ropes and cords, making some acrobatic movements and having only three couples of hands, and not being two-meter tall. We managed! Then we made a piece of untied polyethylene as a door, put branches of juniper around the stove, put herbs on the sand floor of the banya and there we go!
   We poured some water on the hot stones of the stove and made ourselves comfortable around it. Our impromptu banya got filled with balmy air and our joy was immense! In a few minutes our steamed out bodies were in cool water of the lake. Then this heavenly steam again! It was such a simple construction, but we got so much pleasure from it! :-)
   When we came back to the camp all the males were there. Pasha couldn't believe that we managed to build that banya. When we told him to go and wash there, he only guffawed. But in a moment he disappeared together with his son. As the spies told us he started building a new banya, on the place with a stove much closer to the camp. We didn't take it into consideration, as it didn't have a ready-made structure. He built a wooden structure in no time; the stove stones were heated simultaneously. In general, the building process was really fast, as the sun was setting. Pretty soon the evening silence was broken by heart-rending yells of the guys jumping into the lake after steaming out in the banya. :-)
   Another entertainment for us was rowing the boat. Tim supplied it with an inflatable mattress and some safety jackets. We didn't let them row far from the shore without them. The rowed around the shore, but the small island attracted them, as any island attracts explorers.
   Once before the breakfast, I decided to have a look what enchanted us there. When someone near the campfire shouted "Where are you going, Odysseus?" I had already made a hundred meters toward the island. Funny thing is that rubber boat! It takes time to put the oars into rowlocks, then you try to row, but the boat moves slower than a turtle, moreover it moves in quite different direction you intend to. I love kayaks! One move of the oar and one glides over the surface of water in the direction s/he wants. While I was getting used to rowing, and the boat was getting used to me the view of the Perch Cove opened in front, the water became much darker. That meant the depth was really great. I had sinister and mysterious sensations simultaneously. It's impossible to see all the shoreline of the lake from one point. Some compare it with a horseshoe, some think it looks like a butterfly, but the feeling of power and beauty cannot be diminished because of that. I felt the cold and strong spirit of the lake from beneath and wanted to be on the ground again as soon as possible. Here was the island, nothing to write home about, just pebbles, and forest. But as the target to hit it was OK. I turned the boat back to the shore and in a few minutes I was back to the campsite. My son woke up and asked me with surprise in his voice: "Where did you row, Mom?" Breakfast was really good after such experience.
   No matter how well we spent time there everything comes to an end. With great regret we were leaving this paradise with golden sand and gentle green waves. Thanks God the weather was good to us, and the sun reasonably warmed us. It means that our sacrifice to Burkhan was not for nothing.
   As soon as the guys were ready we were leaving the place in groups of 3-4 people. Sergey took the boat to bring the first group through the Perch Cove. The Puchkovs were in the back as usual. The Karpovs started the departure. The road home is always shorter and easier. The backpacks are lighter as well. While we were trotting along the wet trail, Dmitry got an idea to stay longer as there was enough food for 2-3 more days. Too late!
   Our quick boatman managed to bring all the guys to the mainland when a group of Puchkovs shows up from the forest. Pasha wanted to organize the crossing using his system, but it's only his family that was left on the opposite shore. He told Sergey to get out of the boat and grumbling something made three trips to bring his family on our shore. We hid away from his anger under the pines. Two more hours and we were back to our previous campsite. The firewood we collected was still there. While we were cooking dinner, the boys snooped around, and found out that the yacht was nowhere to be seen, and Baikal was stormy. Well, storms on Baikal in August are not a novelty, so we had to wait for better weather. Korovin would never leave the city in stormy weather, so Medusa was not gonna arrive that day. The guys decided to wander around. Arina and Sergey tried to lure the local reindeer for a showy photo shot. Finally they managed to do that with the help of several pieces of bread. I was shocked to learn that the surface of reindeer antlers was pleasant to touch as it was like velvet. It was a great joy to pet the reindeer. Well, if he allows you to do that. I managed!
   Later in the evening we had unexpected guests. They were Sasha Korovin and Yegor Yegorovich. We found out that the waves were not too high. Still, we would have to set off the following morning. Everybody felt the smell of the city. Our old acquaintances arrived with the yacht. They are Anatoly and Eugene, and a muscovite Georgy Georgievich, who has spent summers at Frolikha Lake for the last 30 years! Such enviable constancy and loyalty! Frolikha is worth that!