An eventful month on the island

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OPF Sakhalin Aug 2007

Usually heading back to Sakhalin is an unexciting, generally dreaded, experience. However, lots of interesting "firsts" happened this month which made the whole experience all that more comfortable. It all started with the journey back to Sakhalin...

After a relatively easy check-in, i got to the gate to be told i needed a new boarding card. I was being upgraded to first class. A very pleasant surprise, especially when one is not so happy to be taking the flight anyway. The first class experience was great, tick that one off the "things to do" list. I took the pyjamas they gave me as a souvenir (it was a long haul overnight flight)!

When i arrived to the island, they had just had an earthquake. Yuzhno was unaffected, but the village of Nevelsk was largely destroyed, and thousands of people were left homeless.

My work colleague and friend from Netherlands visited the work site not long after i arrived, and we had a good time catching up. The week he was here went very quickly as we caught up for lunch, and on the Saturday night had a good chat over a bottle of red, and headed to the on site bar to party it up.
He also arranged a BBQ down the beach, which was really great, the weather was still warm and the sky particularly beautiful that evening. We had fresh caviar, Russian style, as a Russian guy plucked a fish from a river, slit it open and pulled out its eggs. After washing them off, everyone enjoyed it, except i was never a big caviar fan. Interesting note: Russian caviar is very famous around the world, and little known is that all the black caviar in Russia comes from the Sakhalin region, but the Kremlin insist it is frozen, packaged and sent to Moscow to be relabelled as from Moscow.

Another Sunday, we took a drive down along the coast to Lunskoye Bay, which was absolutely gorgeous. There were wild blue berries growing on the dunes, which we picked and ate. And at the bay, the sea was a lovely colour of blue, and a pack of around 20 seals were swimming around just off the shore. It was amazing to see. We also caught a glimpse of a stellar sea eagle floating around in the sky. I really was appreciating the wild beautiful nature of this part of the world.

One evening we borrowed some mountain bikes and road to the beach, which was some good exercise, and saw the beach for probably the last time in a liquid phase. I think next time i am back, it will be cold, and during the winters the ocean freezes over - another special sight being a boy from oz! Got eaten by mosquitoes though!

Amongst other things, saw some great sunsets on the island. And as the weather was changing, some amazing cloud formations and rainbows too. This month on the island was probably one of the most fun I've had, mainly because i got out and did a few extra curricular activities. But as always, i was still eager to get back home, particularly looking forward to the trip to Switzerland for my birthday!

Cheers
Steve

Some more interesting Sakhalin facts:
To get to work i have to take:
1) Worlds longest domestic flight -> Moscow to Yuzhno, Sakhalin 8.5hrs
2) Worlds slowest commercial train: 600km takes 15hrs

Makes for a great commute to work!