Museum Stations
THE CIRCUM-BAIKAL RAILWAY
The Circum-Baikal Railway is Lake Baikal’s main man-made attraction. It is a unique monument representing the architecture and engineering of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and employs all the technical achievements of the period.
This most complex railway artery became the most important milestone in the history of the Trans-Siberian Railway’s construction.
The name Circum-Baikal today applies to the 94-kilometre line between Trans-Siberian Slyudyanka 2 – Kultuk – Marituy – Port Baikal, which terminates at an officially designated nature reserve.
The first train arrived at the shore of Lake Baikal on 21 October 1898, or 2 November according to the old Julian calendar used in Russia until early 1918, and was then commissioned on 13 October 1905.
The Circum-Baikal Railway is the most expensive and most attractive railway in Russian. It is called the "golden buckle" of Russia’s steel belt, "buckle" because it connects the Trans-Siberian Railway, which Lake Baikal divides into two, and "golden" because its cost exceeded that of all the other railways that had been built up to that time in Russia.
The Circum-Baikal Railway is a unique monument to railway engineering and art under the open sky. Architects and engineers from Russia, Italy, Latvia, Poland and Albania constructed the line between 1896 and 1905 and built 39 tunnels, 16 stone galleries and 248 bridges and viaducts in just two years and three months. The line runs along the very edge of the lake’s shoreline and through the slopes of the Primorsky Ridge. Here, along the entire length of the shoreline, cliffs drop vertically to a great depth into the lake. At 777.5 metres, the longest tunnel on the line passes through Cape Polovinny.
Another historical and architectural monument is located along the 84 kilometres from Baikal to Kultuk stations. This part of the line features unique tunnels and stone galleries built according to atypical designs and which remained unchanged in the subsequent years, remaining true to the original design of the architects and engineers from the early 20th century.
The Circum-Baikal Railway has no equal in Russia. Indeed, it features some of the highest number of engineering structures in the world. At the time, it surpassed all the other railways in the world in terms both of the number of various types of work per kilometre of track and the difficulty of their construction.
The Circum-Baikal Railway encircles the southern shoreline of Lake Baikal, the "Pearl of Siberia". With its unique nature, the Baikal region is a favourite tourist destination, a place to which people come from all over the world for active recreation. Lake Baikal has a positive, almost mystical effect on people’s inner state and feelings, helping them to find their peace of mind, positive emotions and universal energy.
"Baikal is amazing. Not for nothing is it called a sea, not a lake. Its waters are unusually transparent, so that you can see through it as through air. Its colour is light turquoise and pleasant on the eye. The shoreline is mountainous and swathed in dark, impenetrable forest teeming with game all around…"
Anton Chekhov.
HOW TO GET THERE
Most passenger trains stop at Slyudyanka station, from where tourist trains depart for the Circum-Baikal Railway. From Slyudyanka station, a local rail bus also runs along the Circum-Baikal Railway and halts at each stopping point. The first stop is Kultuk station, which is reached just 20 minutes after departing from Slyudyanka and features an "entrance" stele to the Circum-Baikal Railway.
Passengers can reach Slyudyanka station from Irkutsk in 2.5 hours by electric train. Tourist trains for Slyudyanka and on to the Circum-Baikal Railway depart from Irkutsk.
SLYUDYANKA STATION
Slyudyanka station is a unique architectural monument. Built a century ago, it is the only operating station in the world made entirely of white and pink marble.
Slyudyansky station was the first building on Russia’s railways at which Baikal marble could display itself in all its glory, although initially it was the station’s dazzling white walls that impressed.
The station facade features an example of pronounced symmetry in the rhythm of vertical lines. The building itself is set on a strip foundation of roughly-hewn stone blocks and consists of three parts, the main central section and the two flanks. The station’s central hall has two stories, and while it has no intermediate floor, the second row of windows is of mainly compositional significance. Symmetry is also present in the layout of the station. The architect has thought through the interior’s functionality to the smallest detail, taking into full account the convenience of the passengers.
In the summer of 2021, an interactive exposition dedicated to Lake Baikal was opened at the station. One of the exhibition’s features is an interactive floor that can imitate the transparent surface of Lake Baikal and the waves, while projections onto the ceiling show how the sky above the lake might look – all of which creates the effect of presence for visitors.
There are also installations dedicated to Lake Baikal’s flora and fauna, tectonics and geology. Some of the expositions are equipped with a touch-screen that can work both as a classic screen with animation, video and graphics illustrating the commentary and as an online help system.
One of the installations about the Circum-Baikal Railway reproduces as faithfully as possible the layout of the Circum-Baikal Railway tunnels, thus creating the effect of a moving steam locomotive.
The exhibition ends with a photo zone where passengers can take pictures as souvenirs.
PORT BAIKAL STATION
Port Baikal is a cargo and passenger port located on Lake Baikal at the source of the Angara River in the village of Baikal in the Slyudyansky District, which is part of Russia’s Irkutsk Region.
The central part of Baikal village is decorated with a restored wooden railway station and platforms decorated in a retro style. The station building houses a museum with an exposition on the history of the village, station and port.
Baikal Station is located at the 72nd kilometre of the Circum-Baikal Railway because the mileage of the Circum-Baikal Railway does not begin at Irkutsk’s main station – the passenger station – but at Irkutsk-Sortirovochny station.
This station was called Innokentievskaya until 1934 and was the administrative boundary between the and Transbaikal Railways.
Next to the station, at the termination on the shore of Lake Baikal, is an L-4647 steam locomotive. Designed by Lebedyansky during the Great Patriotic War, which lasted from 1941 to 1945, it is nicknamed "Lebed" or "Lebedyanka" in honour of its creator and bore the official name "Victory". One of the heaviest Soviet steam locomotives, the Lebed saw active service on the country’s railways in the middle of the twentieth century.