2019-08-19 Day 326 Mon

Put the last of our Turkish vinegar in the heater and heated it a little. Hopefully it'll clean up the lime from inside of the boiler and where ever else it sticks.

I walked out and took photos of fungi.

 John took photos of this dinghy and I changed into bathers and had a quick dip. It just looked so inviting

I have now swum in the deepest and largest body of fresh water (unfrozen).

A local church of a different design

At Ulan-Ude we revisited the glass repair guy and his neighbor made a bracket to hold ec’s right hand skirt back on.

Then we went back to the public water and filled up again.

 



 We then visited the cathedral. 

 Obviously prams are not welcome in the church.....

Interesting that 

it was upstairs with a church shop below.

 

Off south stopping at a big supermarket to stock up. Bought some chicken wings for dinner and some more pork chops for the freezer and a cooked chook for lunch.

The square chunks of beef wrapped in glad wrap were not so inviting after google translate indicated that it was pig liver. The meat appears to be band sawed when frozen.So not sure what "cut" I am buying.
 

Out of town towards Mongolia. We stopped at a road stall, two ladies sitting at a fold up table with their freshly grown vegies. They live in a near by village. 
 

Marrows, spuds,carrots, cabbage, cauliflowers, tomatoes(red and green), onions and spring onions.

It all looked great so bought some spuds, tomatoes and some carrots. They would not cut the cauli for me instead they gave it. I took it back to EC and cut one of the flowers off then returned it to them. It was far to big for the fridge or for us to eat.

 

Camped by a river that had so many mossies that even John refused to get out!. Though he did a bit later to take a camp photo.

 334km Camp site  537m alt.

2019-08-18 Day 325 Sun

A beautiful place to wake up in with the waves lapping on the shore.

John had been for a walk to take his camp photo and spoken to a family camped nearby.

The son came around with some cooked pine cones and showed us how to extract the seeds. They just cook them in the fire, Very nice. 

Cooked pancakes for breakfast and had them with fresh blueberries. Yum yum

John took one back to the families camp and came back with father and son to show them the camp potholder that Puff had made us. The father is a welder and had made his own. but with a fixed arm. He seemed quite interested.

Got some blog entries ready to post then made some lunch.

We took the heater out to try and fix the leak and to make an “O” ring to stop the dust.

 I found a leak before getting the heater into too many parts. It was not as expected so will have to order a seal. It is at the end where the hot air is exhausted.

Some people dropped in to chat. 2 couples that had been on a no food diet for 2 weeks and had their first apple as food. 
 

An Italian dropped by who rode his motor-bike here and kept it in Mongolia for 2 years coming back for 1 month every year to ride around.

Finally got the heater all put back and hopefully we will have less dust inside.

The stove is still working but seems to get the glass very hot all over.

Sat outside watching the fiery ball of the sun sink while eating cavier and drinking vodka...

well tasting it any way. Both were a disappointment. Next time I'll buy some caviar that is more than AU$2

Our second night in same spot last time we stayed twice at a camp site was in Kyrgyzstan on the lake.

0km Camp site  446m alt.

2019-08-17 Day 324 Sat

Drove a little way around  lake Kotokel not good for camping but loved by fishermen. 

 

The lake shore was quite reedy in places good for fish. A few fisherman were out in their rubber duckies and mostly with life jackets on..

 

 It is really quite hard to find supermarkets or other shops as they do not look like ours...

Left there found a shop with some wine and caviar.

 

Drove up the coast to Goryachinsk where our map showed sand hills, but was very busy so drove a bit further through the forest and beyond the point, finding a gorgeous spot on a little spit with water on both sides, one rough one calm.

Washed the sheets and got them out to dry. Then after a glass of wine with lunch outside I lay on the bed dozing and reading.

A nice relaxed day after all of our days of bumping and shaking down roads.

44km Camp site  446m alt.

2019-08-16 Day 323 Fri

I cooked up the  red currents into Jam or at least into a sauce.

 The roadwork guys hold up a piddly little stop sign. Very hard to see if it happens to align itself on the orange truck.

 More staues...

 

 Arrived at the embassy about 9:30 so had a half hour wait till it opened. Applied for the visa and as the normal one won't be ready until Wednesday we paid for the fast service. Will be ready by 3pm.

 

These Germans were parked behind us  when we came back to EC after applying for our Mongolia visa.

I thought this a quaint little old house.

 

 Off to the windscreen guy who fixed our cracked and run in the windscreen for 1500rub.

A wash 2 bays down for 1000 but it took a while with suds and all, then a dry.

Driving to find a BeeLine store we parked near the mall as I needed to put more money on my beeline sim. We had a very good lunch. Then to the embassy to pick up passports and visa. All set for Mongolia.

 An interesting building in Ulan-Ude

 

 

Fully laden!!

We drove north to lake Baikal again and on good roads to find a camp right next to the lake, but close to the road.

187km Camp site  463m

2019-08-15 Day 322 Thu

We moved out of our mozzie filled campsite.It had some pretty amazing flowers but I found it hard to stay still enough, long enough to make the most of them.

We followed the south coast of the lake Baikal along for 200km before we headed away towards Ulan-Ude.

As I was purchasing a smoked fish and some fruit 3 Kazakhstan riders arrived they told me the road across the border to Ulaan baartar is very rough, they are building a new road so the traffic is forced to use the “temporary road”.

Some of the rail bridges are fairly long.

 

They still employ the wire tie method on the power poles.

Our camp next to the river Selenge and across it was the very busy rail track.

 404km Camp site  490m alt.

2019-08-14 Day 321 wed

We had not made our 300km yesterday so will try and catch it up today.

The sealed roads are sometimes no faster. With the "wave" just the wrong frequency for EC we have to be extra vigilant.

 

Some wonderful statues are situated outside even the smallest of towns.

Trams are prevalent in a number of towns

 

An amazing church on the outskirts of Irkutsk.

 

The stone that hit us from a truck yesterday did indeed chip the windscreen. We could not see it yesterday but saw the “run” this morning. Chipped it right at the bottom ,in the middle ,on the rubber. We found an auto glass place so drove there. Finding it among the one way streets - the lady was wonderfully helpful. They do not repair but replace. After some phone calls none would do it tonight, as it has been raining so she rang a place in Ulan-Ude where we will apply for the mongol visa. 
 

A very friendly guy said he’d try to help but was not sure we’d fit in his shed.

We left town in rush hour and got out far enough to find a quiet spot along the power lines in the bush.

286km Camp site  736m alt.