Lake Baikal

by Mark Sergeev, Irkutsk poet
If you are stopped suddenly by a penetrating blue and your heart stops, as it sometimes happened only in childhood, from astonishment and delight... If all petty worries, all the vanities of the world, fall away like autumn leaves, and the soul takes wing and is filled with light and silence. If, suddenly, the ready word holds back, and you feel that nature has its own language and that it is now clearly understood. If a simple earthly wonder has entered your life and you have felt it ennobled by this encounter - it means, this is Baikal. Read more...

Lake Khuvsgul

Known as the "dark blue pearl" of Mongolia, Lake Khuvsgul is one of the country's largest and most spectacular protected areas. Lake is 136 km long and 36 km wide and located in Khuvsgul province, north western Mongolia. Its 380 cubic km of water make it the fourteenth largest freshwater lake in the world by volume, with over 1% of the world's fresh water. At its deepest, the lake dives 262 meters. Lake Khuvsgul located in high mountain, forest. Khuvsgul Lake and it’s surrounding area 838,000 hectares has established as a National Park in 1992. Khuvsgul shares many similarities in origin, flora, and fauna with its larger and more famous sister, Russia's Lake Baikal, which is just 200 km to the east. The lake is 1645 meters above sea level and is generally frozen from January until April or May. The towns of Hatgal and Hankhl are situated within the park. A jeep trail traverses the lake's eastern shore, and a boat sometimes operates between the two towns. Mongols of the Khalkh, Buryat, and Darkhat ethnic groups inhabit parts of the park during certain seasons, and the Tsaatan reindeer herders live in the mountainous taiga and forest steppe to the north and west. Read more...