The ultimate away-from-it-all

My name is Yevgeniy Veselovskiy, I live at Teletskoe Lake in the small village of Yaylyu (we’re only 200 people here). Since 1989 I have been working in Altai Biosphere Nature Reserve. 

Every morning after a swim in the lake and a cup of fresh coffee, which I drink listening to log fires crackling in my stove, I take a camera and go for a walk around my usual excursion route with a great friend of mine, Rickford Bonifacio Morfius, my Rhodesian Ridgeback. 

Today, as usual, me and Rick left our house and walked west along a bank of Teletskoe Lake to see how a little river called Chechenek is doing. 

Chechenek is an Altai name, which means Chatty. It is chatty indeed, running through stone debris of a steep gorge, making a cheerful sounds with its clear waters and giving the impression that indeed it is talking to us, telling about all the news and events it witnessed on its banks...  

Chatty Chechenek has indeed seen a lot of interesting events, as this is a very comfortable place for living. The name of our village, Yaylyu, translates as ‘a warm place’. And people have been living here for a long, long while. Bronze arms and house utensils made from bronze and terracota were found here. Telyos tribes and Russian Old Believers lived here. This Altai Nature reserve was opened some years ago, and the original boat of Teletskoe Lake, the steamer St Innocent, has retired here. 

I would like to tell you more about it and many other interesting things, and so does the Chatty Chechenek, so hopefully you will pass by here soon.

Cheers from Altai! A glass of our cider anyone?