NOTES, COMMENT AND BUZZ FROM EUGENE KASPERSKY – OFFICIAL BLOG
October 15, 2020
At last – on my Altai-2020 trip the water-based action was about to commence. Ready for some Katun white-knuckle/white-water fun?…
But first we had to get over the mountain between us and the Katun – the final hop before the water. And the best way to get over it? By hopping onto a chopper of course…
September 14, 2020
I think I’ve mentioned in passing recently – perhaps more than once – that I took my annual summer vacation this year in Altai. But it’s mid-September already – and still no Altai series of pics and tales? Eh? But don’t worry, it’s on its way – coming up soon. The thing is, there are soooo many photos this year, and so much video too that needs professional digital editing. Still, I am today able to at least give you my traditional taster, aka, starter course, aka aperitif, as a warm-up…
First, I can tell you – no, repeat to you, since I’ve been to Altai before, and even wrote a travelogue-book about the experience – that Altai is one of the most magically enrapturing places in the planet, IMHO. It’s crammed with: marvelous mountainous beauty, rivers with water of various bright colors, glacial lakes, and assorted other extraordinarily beautiful natural landscapes. But what’s perhaps most extraordinary of all is the fact that the place has a mysterious, powerful… energy, which you almost start to feel physically after several days there. I don’t know what it is; it must be some kind of magic force that’s emitted out of the Altai earth. What I do know is that it affects how you feel: better overall; experiences and sensations are brighter, richer, more intense; and your mood is always fairly cloud-nine! And the wildlife there is similarly other-worldly: ants are huge – the size of cockroaches; mushrooms grow to the size of watermelons; while the region’s mosquitos… – you might expect them to be similarly crazy and mutant-ninja, but no – they’re not interested in humans, leaving them practically completely alone! EH?!
So yeah: Altai: oh my, oh my. Natural, wild beauty redefined!
September 13, 2017
One of the most fascinating places along our Upper Yenisei adventure was where the Baliktik-Hem and Kizil-Hem rivers merge. It’s here where the ‘Yenisei’ is first mentioned on the maps (when viewing the rivers going down from the mountains); specifically, that first mention is Maliy Yenisei (Little Yenisei).
Round that corner is the Kizil-Hem, which starts out as a small stream in Mongolia!
September 12, 2017
Now it’s time for me to tell you about the ‘living quarters’ – the most important part of any expedition through the great outdoors.
Along the Upper Yenisei, there are lots of campsites – they are dry, comfortable, some have excellent river views, and sometimes they are ideal for fishing. There wasn’t a single campsite that our team didn’t like.
September 11, 2017
Rafting on Balyktyg-Khem and Ka-Khem (aka the Little Yenisei) was pretty chilled – there were no particularly dangerous rapids to speak of. The plan of action was simple: keep paddling along the main part of the river, keep clear of rocks and immediately obey the captain’s orders. The instruction that our crew performed fastest was “Stop!”.
There were only a few rapids, probably five. Apart from that there were sand bars with light riffles, fast sections, two or three standstill sections. For rafters, standstills are an inconvenience – you have to paddle! Thankfully, we always had the wind at our backs, or there was no wind at all.
September 4, 2017
The Yenisei River. Many of you won’t have even heard of it. But that doesn’t make it any less of a mega river: starting out in Mongolia (!), it’s the main river of three great Siberian ones, and the world’s largest river system flowing into the Arctic Ocean. Anyway; introductions over – we headed its way after our Tian Shan adventure…
…And not long after we reached it, sure enough – we were heading down its rapids in rafts.
Now for a bit of geography…
September 15, 2016
The GoPro photos and videos of our recent Altai-2016: Big Water Trail have started to arrive.
Here are some fun pics of us going down the Akkem rapid. There’s no ‘horizon line’ – there simply wasn’t one :). The camera was fixed to my helmet. Enjoy:
September 5, 2016
After passing the Akkem rapid, we had another day of pure meditation and contemplative activity, which was only occasionally interrupted by the helmsman’s commands: “let’s paddle a little”, “let’s move to midstream”, “there’s a hole in the riffle, wanna go for it?”
September 2, 2016
After the Shyoki rapids, the Katun turns into a relatively calm river and stays that way for a full 200 kilometers, where the river’s smooth (though fast) current is only rarely interrupted by short stretches of riffles. All around there are mountains, lush forests and fields, and not a single person in sight for kilometers – except for us . We didn’t even see any wild animals except ducks, and some local type of nettas or cormorants occasionally flew back and fore along the river.
Our raft with the tourists on board splashed down the river, the captain was silent – there were no orders to paddle – so we enjoyed the sights and landscapes as we floated along. The sun came out, warmed us and looked down on us from above. So we fell into meditation and nirvana…
September 1, 2016
Before, when I heard the words Katun River or just ‘Katun’, I imagined rapids and rafting. It was the first thing that came to mind. Now, that idea is set in stone after more than 400km of rafting, scores of rapids, several dozen riffles and goodness-knows how many thousand paddle strokes. But Katun no longer just means rafting and water – it’s a place of sublime beauty.
But more on that a bit later. First, we need to actually start rafting. For instance, like this:
