“Only three months per year are cold in Siberia”, a Siberian man told us.
As he saw the disbelief in our faces he added with a grin: “The other nine months are VERY cold”.

And in fact, this is the opinion many people around the world have about that region. The only thought which comes to their mind when they think about Siberia, is the long hard unbearable winter.

On our trip we have experienced another side of Siberia. We spent a great, hot summer with nearly no rain in the beautiful vast taiga. The warm and stable temperatures and the traffic-free sideroads through endless nature make it a perfect place for cycling. Only the swarms of moskitos are bad.

Autumn too which we spent in the region of Altai and Tuva was a fascinating season. Because of the colourful leaves it was perhaps even greater than summer and the cooler temperatures were perfect for cycling the mountains there.

Now all the leaves have fallen off the trees. In front of every house are long rows of firewood and the first snowflakes are prancing through the air. Only a few more days and there will be a thick snowcover all over the land.

Wherever we speak with people they warn us that it soon will be unbearable cold and that the snow will be as high as the hips. But we don’t think about leaving Siberia.

Why? We want to experience the side of Siberia it is notorious for all over the world. How cold are minus 40° Celsius or more? Is it possible to cycle at that cold temperature? And how about sleeping in a tent?

The winter comes over night: 30 centimeters snow in the morning and after only three days of heavy snowfalls the snow is indeed as high as the hips. From now on (beginning of November) no asphalt or earthroads exist anymore. The roads have changed to iceroads with more or less powder snow on them and will stay that way until spring.

Especially after heavy snowfalls (or when we want to pitch the tent somewhere) we have to work hard to advance because on many small roads there are no snowploughs. But our chopping board does a very good job as snow shovel .

Soon after the first snowfall the temperatures begin to fall. For a while it has about minus 25° Celsius which is quite okay after we are used to the many layers of clothes. In the beginning the clothes are a bit uncomfortable - especially the gloves because it is difficult to work with them (pitch the tent, pack the things, cook,…) Also the face masks which we have to wear around-the-clock bother us in the beginning. They reduce our sight and are stiff frozen after a short time of wearing (esp. Martin can’t get it off without a warm room because it freezes to his beard )

The colder it gets the more problems we have with our material. For example the lubricant freezes, so even our mechanical camera does not work properly anymore, plastic gets hard and breaks very easy, furthermore our bags are difficult to fold now, gum is hard like stone so it’s impossible to change a tire without heat, … Some very important things like our Primus cooking stove break (which we not only need for cooking but also for melting snow to get drinking water). But somehow we are able to solve every problem.

The most difficult thing in the cold of -40°C or more - which we have over a long period (it is the coldest winter since years) - is to keep the body warm. Especially the fingers and the toes are a problem when cycling. We have to walk long distances every day to warm our feet. Even with our special winterboots we still get frost bites.

We also have some obstinate problems with our health. Now I know what is worse than diarrhoea: it is diarrhoea at minus 40 degrees. It’s really no fun to crawl out of the sleeping bag several times a night to visit the ice-cold “bathroom”.

Despite all the problems it is possible to live in the cold, but after long periods of staying outside at this extreme temperatures the whole body begins to suffer and the mind too. Sometimes when we cycle through villages we feel the urgent wish to be invited in one of the cosy, warm, wooden houses.

So for us it is a really, really great experience to recover a few days in the home of Vladimir and Marina (also Thanks to Kosta!) in Irkutsk after reaching Lake Baikal. After our time with them the lake is frozen and we can even cycle on it. A very strange experience, totally different from winter road cycling.

With Baikal we have reached the goal of our journey we mentioned at the beginning of the trip, but in winter the dream of palms, beach and ocean arose. So we’ll turn southwards and look where the way will take us.