The Magical Land of Tuva

In this, the fourth in our series of articles on Gary and Monika Wescott’s drive across Russia, the couple visits the Republic of Tuva, best known for its postage stamps and throat-singing. But the “usual” tourist attractions are not what the Wescotts were after...

From the moment we entered the Autonomous Republic of Tuva, we felt a friendliness and togetherness often missing in other parts of Russia. The forested mountains and rolling hills had a manicured look, and the small white yurts in which many Tuvans live radiate a sense of warmth and tidiness. Kyzyl, Tuva’s capital, was an easy town to take care of traveler’s business. The summer markets were wonderful, and the monument designating the Center of Asia was interesting.

We had heard about camels and yaks in the south. As we were driving to the town of Erzin, Russia’s ‘federally designated highway’ (M54) changed to a sandy two-track with grass down the middle. We continued as far as the military post at Zagan-Tologay near the Mongolian border and turned around to camp a mile up the road by some friendly yurts. The sleepy guard at the military post must have mentioned our visit to his captain – the “Paper Boys” were on us like flies to dead meat. We had evidently strayed into their “controlled border zone.” Three teams of officials visited us to check our documents. We had been recorded.

Our unprecedented adventure was clearly making the military and border patrols nervous. The road police were totally confused, having never seen a California license plate or an International Driving Permit before. The Passport Control people were fingering their rubber stamps and mumbling to themselves. No one liked the idea of foreigners armed with cameras, video equipment, a satellite navigation system, and a stack of highly accurate military maps driving their own self-contained camper all over the country. Tourists were supposed to follow the straightest line possible between two Intourist Hotels. Their attempts to control our movement were humorous.

East of Erzin, in the village of Moren, we splashed through a stream at the edge of town and continued into the mountains, crossing bogs and mud holes, and fording rivers sometimes over the top of our bumper. At length, we stopped at a cluster of yurts and made our traditional tea visits. The Grand Father of one yurt made us officially welcome. He wore more medals than most Russian generals. We camped nearby for several days. A sheep was slaughtered in our honor, and we sampled many Tuvan dishes, all accompanied by fresh milk, cream, butter, cheese and huge pans of fresh yogurt.

Returning to Kyzyl, we were just in time for one of the biggest Tuvan celebrations of the year, National Republic Day (Naadim). There were horse races, khutesh wrestling matches, throat-singing, folk dances, street markets, and our favorite, ‘Yurt City,’ where Tuvans from all corners of the republic had come and set up their yurts.

Our objective was to head south and west, into the Altay. So we were not interested in the ‘march route’ north to Novosibirsk (suggested by the Paper Boys in Kyzyl’s OVIR Passport Control Office). Locals told us to try to follow an old trading route along the Mongolian border. If it could be found, it would take us closer to the spectacularly beautiful Mongun Tayga mountain range, whose glacier-clad peaks are the highest in Tuva.

Out of Chadan, we followed broken pavement and dusty dirt down a green river valley toward the Mongolian border. It was the beginning of harvest season, and many villagers were busy in the fields, cutting grass with hand scythes, loading hay onto wagons and digging potatoes.

Where the old track jogged left into Mongolia, we followed the newer road which supposedly stays well inside the Russian border. We checked out the guard tower at the Sagly military camp with our high-powered binoculars to see if anyone was watching, then headed west with no one the wiser. According to our U.S. Defense Agency Tactical Pilotage Charts, the road west ended in Sagly.

Throughout this high mountainous region, there are herds of yaks, a shaggy looking beast about the size of a cow, but with shorter legs, a smaller head, and very long, beautiful hair which almost brushes the ground. Some could pass for a giant dust mop. We never tired of watching them.

Descending steeply down a flash flood channel, we dropped 2,340 feet in four miles. At the base of the mountain, there was a road leading south to Lake Uureg-Nuur in Mongolia. We turned right, up a wide arid valley, stopping only to photograph herds of camels. We approached them carefully; their intelligent brown eyes watched us with passive suspicion. Camels are known spitters, and we had no desire to find out what or how far...

Driving through the remote town of Mugur-Aksy, we continued northwest to camp along the Kargy River, about six miles out of town. In the morning, the ‘Paper Boys’ showed up. They had found us again. Despite our protests, they said we had to return to Mugur-Aksy to register, and we could not go this way. Their orders had come from Kyzyl. Eyeing their loaded Kalashnikovs, we packed up.

Back in town, at the military border patrol headquarters, the young Tuvan Captain made a loud phone call to his headquarters in Kyzyl. (Most long distant phone calls in Russia are loud.) The decision was changed. Not only could we continue, we had a choice of routes: our original route, to the north of Mongun-Tayga, or a slightly ambiguous trail, inside the border zone to the south, through an obscure outpost village called Kyzyl-Khaya.

As we drove west up a wide river plain, the glacier-draped escarpments of Mongun-Tayga towered before us. The two-track wandered up the left side of the valley, fording small creeks at its convenience. We had just paused for lunch when an old woman came galloping up on a spirited dapple-gray. She was so excited to see us, she couldn’t stand still. She was 56 years old, and she couldn’t believe she was talking to Americans. She said we absolutely had to come for tea in her yurt across the river where she lived with her daughter.

This worked out rather well, since we had spotted her yurt before we stopped, and had remarked what a perfect place it would be to make an early camp. It was nestled in a grove of larch and cedar next to the river, beneath the stunning mountains, and surrounded by herds of yak, sheep and goats. We stayed three days and became part of the family, watching and helping with the chores of milking yaks and goats, separating cream, making butter, and the endless job of chopping wood for the yurt fire, which was always kept burning.

Our continuing trek led us up the narrowing valley, finally forcing a climb over an 8,260 foot pass. The tops of these passes were always marked by a few fluttering prayer flags and a mound of ceremonial stones and vodka bottles. We added a rock for luck. We were relying completely on the Global Positioning Satellite readings for our location.

As we entered the Khindiktig-Khol Lake basin, the wind-tossed water reflected a cold, unfriendly gray in the late afternoon light. Dark clouds obscured the sun. We had reached the only part of this track on which the word bolota had been used. Bolota means bog or swamp. Which means mud, usually deep mud.

A web of multiple-choice tracks gave no indication of the best path. Angling our way through a couple of deep creeks, rocks the size of basketballs left no question that vehicles which normally follow this route had at least three inches more clearance than our Ford F-350. Crossing a soft area, the trail split into a dozen sets of deep, boulder strewn ruts. A second, somewhat better track veered left, up the spring-fed slope through low scrub. We took the path of least resistance, and it was good for half a mile. Suddenly, without warning, the surface under the wheels disappeared into a sponge of black mud and moss, hidden beneath the low bushes. Both axles were touching. The only way out was backing down our own ruts. There wasn’t a tree in sight that we could attach our winch to. It started to snow.

In the approaching darkness, a cold wind whipped our faces, whistling across the low-growing gooberberries. Three Tuvan yak-boys rode up from the lake shore where their herdsmen’s hut was huddled behind the mountain. They said a chance of another vehicle coming by before spring was nil.

Using our HiLift Jack, we lifted each wheel a foot and a half in the air, built a rock ramp under it, and installed our Pewag mud and snow chains. The yak-boys helped find stones. By midnight, it was snowing hard and we had turned the truck and trailer around, tied up the horses, put the tools away, scraped the mud off our clothes and popped the camper top up. The five of us sat in the warm camper while Monika whipped up one of her surprise, one-pot meals.

Morning brought new disaster. Three inches of fresh snow had covered the boulders and drifted ambiguously into the ruts and holes, leaving an already nearly impassable track to the west out of the question. We had no choice but to retreat. The trail we had come in on had vanished. The multiple-choice ruts across the bog were nearly hidden by drifting snow. We knew some were a foot and a half deep, which would quickly high-center the truck. Which ones? It was like driving across a mine field.

Blowing snow limited visibility to less than thirty yards. Monika scouted ahead, stumbling into holes and checking the tracks for depth. I watched how far she sank and chose my course accordingly, often crashing across unknown terrain, using the brute pulling power of four chained-up mud-terrain tires to muscle through. Reaching firmer footing near the mountains, our problems were not over. Snow-covered side-angles were treacherous.

By noon, we had refueled in Mugur Aksy and began our search for the southern route. There are no signs on these backcountry byways. The roads were never made. They just became “roads” from use and convenience. Everyone following them knows where they’re going. The treeless, grass-covered mountains reminded us of Mongolia, which was in fact just over the ridge. The hills were too steep to traverse across the slope, so tracks normally went straight up and straight down.

A steep set of rocky switch-backs that looked like it could have been part of the original Silk Route snaked up the side of a mountain. From the 8,410 foot pass, we could look into the narrow valley to a string of picturesque lakes draining the 12,835 foot summit of Mongun Tayga.

Below us, to the west, was a jumble of boulders that barely deserved the term “trail.” It took us two hours to negotiate the next nine miles, descending 1,380 feet to the valley floor. At dusk, we reached the outpost of Kyzyl Khaya, a miserable, dusty village of perhaps 1,000 unfortunate souls whose purpose for living there we could not imagine. We crossed a rickety bridge over an unnamed river and camped for the night. We thought the hard part was behind us. It wasn’t.

The track now turned north to follow a deep canyon carved by the river. There were four, questionable log bridges, and several deep fords. The “road” was often so vague, there was a feeling that we were always lost. By 6 p.m., dark clouds filled the sky and the flakes of snow which had started an hour before were sticking.

We could see on our military TPC map that we had at least two more summits to cross, and it was snowing hard now, covering the boulders and disguising ruts. Water-filled holes had iced over and blowing snow gave them the appearance of solid ground. Again, Monika ran ahead, searching for the best line.

We knew if we turned back, the road could be no better. The difficult track out of Kyzyl Khaya had been well over 8,000 feet. It would be impossible in snow. We had to get through the next two passes. If we failed, we could be stranded for days, perhaps months. Exhaustion was creeping over us now, and that makes for sloppy decisions. Pure adrenaline kept us going. At 8,020 feet, we crossed a boggy basin and entered a new drainage to the west, but the snow-covered tracks continued to climb. The mountains to the south rose vertically off the valley floor. Jubilantly, we saw the mound of rocks and the prayer flags whipping in the wind at 8,590 feet!!

The road was still as treacherous as ever, but we had to get off this mountain before stopping for the night. Snow drifts had covered holes and rocks, and only a faint depression gave any sign of a track. We stopped every few yards to study the terrain ahead. Progress was slow. We had two valleys and a low ridge to cross. “Down, down, down!” we chanted. Our driving lights sliced through the blowing snow. It was 11 p.m. when we broke out of the storm at 7,000 feet and found shelter from the wind behind an abandoned cow barn. A hot meal and a warm bed never felt so good.

We were now in the Altay region, famous for its wild rivers and snow-capped peaks. Guide books call it the Switzerland of Russia. We camped in a grove of cottonwoods on the bank of the Chuya river outside of Kosh Agach to make a new plan.