Yakutsk to Tiksi – what goes up, must come down…

In the previous post, I left you with us leaving Tiksi earlier than planned. We left earlier to avoid the coming storm, which could have seen us stranded in Tiksi for more than a week. Now, Tiksi is a wonderful place, but staying there for a week+ sure wasn’t in our plans. We all agreed: “Let’s get the hell out of here!” And that’s just what we did – on the winter road back the way we came…

We left at 4pm – just in time for the sunset:

As per, the going was mixed: sometimes fast on smooth ice, sometimes slower on bumpy ice and snow…

Two hours and 130km later and we were back in Nayba; not bad considering it can take two days!…

As night fell (hellishly quickly), the weather worsened somewhat. It was the start of the worse weather we could have experienced back in Tiksi. Good job we had set off earlier, and now what we needed to do was cover as much distance as possible – that way we might stay ahead of the storm…

And low and behold – we did stay ahead of it. Later we heard that hours after we turned onto the river-based winter road the road was closed for a full week!

Not that we drove without a hitch. Heavy snow cover, then the effect of heavy trucks making deep ruts in the snow saw our Tanks bottom a few times – lifting the wheels up and seeing them spin round helplessly. Each time we pulled the stranded Tanks forward with rope tied to the higher-wheel-clearance pickup ->

We caught some aurora borealis (northern lights) this evening too, but only a faint white stripe across the sky – the pic below is what the much better vision of my camera saw:

Arriving after 2am in Khayyr, the day’s stats looked like this:

So what was it going to be in the hotel-less Khayyr? Bedding down in a schotel? A schafé? Nope – a schoncert hall! Up on the stage, no less ) ->

Given that we didn’t hit the sack till after 3am, our rise next morning was very late for us: 10am. By 11am we were off…

The yellow building in the pic is the village’s concert hall. Not bad for a population of around 400!

Today we were back onto the ultra-winding Kuchchuguy-Kyuegyulyur river, which we’d dubbed the Great White Dragon ->

Cliffs:

Finally, our first sight of reindeer – a whole herd of them:

And from the drone:

When the drone got nearer the herd – the reindeer all grouped together into a big circle! Drone? They don’t know what a drone is, but what’s not known can easily be a foe – thus the round formation! Very clever! Apparently they use this tactic for known enemies – predators – so the latter has a harder time selecting its particular prey in among the crowd; well now they also use it for drones :) ->

We decide to reduce the poor reindeers’ stress: up flew the drone to leave them in peace. Minutes later we were back on the road heading to the Yana river…

The winter road hits the ice of the Yana; there-along – suddenly: café! ->

“Wait – café? I don’t see one”…

Well, actually, as a matter of fact, the café is… in this! ->

We could hardly believe it either. And we’d have passed it by if it weren’t for the sign on the road pointing it out!…

Inside though – didn’t seem so bad. Still – rather modest ) ->

But it was warm (see the furnace there?) and even had a flat-screen TV. Main thing though – the food was ok (in fact – food in all eateries along the winter road is reasonable). The dish of the day (if not all days) was not surprisingly venison (with buckwheat). Yum!

The WC was an outdoor one (brrrr), but also mobile! ->

After lunch – onward! ->

Next up was Ust-Kuyga, where we stayed the night; the day after we were headed to Batagay still on the Yana; like so ->

Let me turn that phone-display version round so it fills a computer screen…

Occasionally – dangerous naleds slowed us down…

When there weren’t naleds – vroooom (into the sunset)! ->

The day’s stats:

Overall:

Our lodgings for the night (a private home) ->

As per – not the Ritz, but it did the job! ->

Next morning, up and gone early ->

The winter road comes off the river and onto land – bumpy land:

Here’s the on-land section on the map:

Suddenly – traffic jam! Turned out it was drivers of trucks carrying coal having a pow-wow. Fortunately we could pass them without disturbing their discussions…

Traffic cops! Not to worry though: they asked us what we were doing, where we were headed and from where, then wished us luck and a safe journey!…

The winter road got real bumpy, and overtaking slow trucks wasn’t easy as a result ->

We make it to Batagay. The day’s stats (shocker: just -2°C; the day before it was -21°C!).

There was no room at the inn at Batagay, so we were forced to spend the night in this here dormitory! ->

The dorm reminded me of the one in Nepal last year we stayed in on our trek up to the base camp of Everest. But that dorm didn’t have such a spacious bathroom ) ->

The rest of the photos from our Yakutsk-Tiki-Yakutsk expedition are here.