Visiting Taltsy Museum near Listvyanka

Since it had been almost two weeks since we’d gone to Arshan for a weekend, it felt time again to take a road trip out of Irkutsk, Russia. This time we were headed to Listvyanka but had plans first to head to the Taltsy Museum. Well, I guess you could call it a museum but it was more of a small village out near Lake Baikal which actually sits on the huge Angara River.

It took us about an hour or so to reach Taltsy Museum from downtown Irkutsk going along the Baikal highway. When you pull up, its good to have a local with you since the entrance is blocked with guards.

A random deer walking around

I guess you’re just supposed to know you’re to pay the office which is barely marked off to your left in the woods in a small log cabin. It’s about 50 rubles per car and 50 per person. While I really didn’t understand the entrance fee at first, I realized later the cost and did think it was worth the money to come out and see this place.

Basically, the Taltsy Museum is a collection of Russian type architecture as well as the history of its people who include both Russian and the local natives, the Buryats which makes this place that much more interesting. After we started walking into the village, the very first thing we did was walk around on a pair of stilts. Random I know….

My first time, don’t laugh…

Why this was a Russian tradition in this area was beyond me but there was simply a large platform/stage area in the middle of the village with stilts lying around. I took part in this along with about 3 other Russians. It took me about three attempts to get the hang of it but realized my form was a bit off on the first two runs…

After that, we headed down toward the Angara River. Along the way, we passed a couple of Buryat tents which were very similar to the Ger Tents you would find in Mongolia. We entered one of them which depicted the typical style of how these were made up for the Buryat families which lived in them. It really was amazing to see how these people lived in the past on up to today. The entire family would live inside this open roomed area.

And after walking along the Angara River, we headed back up the hill to walk the center of the village. Most of the buildings were set up in a way to depict exactly how each of these served its purpose in town for its people. In total, there are more than 40 monuments throughout the Taltsy Museum.

There was the main schoolhouse, which had its main room consisting of just six desks with each holding two students. There would be no electricity, just heaters and lanterns hung throughout. In the rear of the schoolhouse would be the teacher’s quarters as she would live there in the schoolhouse permanently.

Inside the schoolhouse at Taltsy

The teacher’s quarters within the schoolhouse

We also visited a cluster of buildings that housed the animals of the village along with an ‘Old School’ Banya. The way they were designed back then was simply a small room in which there was no chimney, only an area in the corner where a bonfire would be built on top of a pile of rocks which helped hold the heat. With nothing but a small window into the room for ventilation it was amazing to me that people didn’t suffocate from the smoke inhalation!

While there, we also stopped in at the local church, the government official’s quarters and a larger building with an open deck platform for events and dancing. The entire place was extremely unusual and interesting and I’d definitely recommend anyone on their way out to Listvyanka to stop here at the Taltsy Museum on the way. It’s a great way to see how life was in Siberia back in the day. You could probably see the entire place in about two hours. We ended up eating lunch there so our stay was a bit more than that but there was still plenty of time to get out to Listvyanka for the day which was good because the weather was supposed to turn tomorrow….