Today we arrived in the city of Irkutsk. This was the goal for second part of the trip (first part was St Petersburg and third part will be from here to Vladivostok). It is nice to finally arrive here. Irkutsk is a popular tourist destination…the internet cafe is filled with German speaking, English speaking and Asian speaking peoples. My keyboard is set up not only for Russian and English but also Korean, Chinese and Japanese. One of the large attractions in this area is Lake Baikal. The closest point from here to Baikal is 70km. On our route it will be about 105km to Baikal. However, first we will take some rest days here and also get the bikes in top condition. For the third segment of the trip, my brother Bert will join us.

It was chaotic to cycle into the city of Irktutsk. Many trucks, cars and other traffic. We walked around to finally find a place to stay. We have a hostel reserved, but arrived two days before our reservation, so found another place first. Over the next few days, I plan to update the web pages and get photos as well.