Many people would like to see where the real mammoths used to live but only few of them know that most of the mammoth bones can be found in Yakutia. The layer of permafrost preserves thousands of unique exemplars incomparable to any others in the world. The Yukagir mammoth found in Yakutia not long ago is a demonstrative example and is expected to be a hit of forthcoming Expo 2005 in Nagoya.
We are happy to offer you this program as a chance to visit one of the unique mammoth graveyards on the Ulakhan Suullur Mountain in Verkhoyanskii region, Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) with no extreme or special problems. You will have a great opportunity to take part in the mammoth bones search. More than that, the organizers of the route can guarantee your success 100%.
Date: 1 July-15 September
Participants: 4 to 6 persons maximum
1 DAY Thursday
YAKUTSK
Arrival to Yakutsk. Representative of the “TourService Center” and English speaking guide meet you at the airport, assist you to collect your luggage and transfer in a comfortable microbus to the Tygyn Darkhan Hotel or the Polar Star Hotel, both situated in the centre of the city. After the check-in hotel, you are invited to make a sightseeing tour along the city in the microbus with the experienced guide. Excursion to the Museum of Mammoth. Then you have lunch in one of the local restaurants.
After dinner – visiting the exhibition “The Treasures of Yakutia”, where you can see all wealth of the mineral resources’ of Yakutia and unique jewelry. The next places of sightseeing are the tourist complex “Chochur Muran” and the Permafrost Kingdom where you get from summer to winter with snow, ice and frosty air.
In the evening, you have dinner in the local restaurant and rest in the hotel.
2 DAY Friday
YAKUTSK-Batagai
After the breakfast at the hotel restaurant transfer to the airport. The departure of your flight is before afternoon with the accompanying paleontologist and interpreter of the Tourservice Centre. You fly by AN-24, 40-places plane of local airlines. The flight takes an hour and fifty minutes and then after midday you arrive at Batagai, the centre of Verkhoyanskiy region. Local time is one hour ahead. The settlement is situated on the Yana River, 60 km from Verkhoyansk, the world-known Pole of Cold of the northern hemisphere, where the lowest temperature – 67.8 degrees centigrade – was registered.
At the Batagai airport a guide meets you with off-road UAZ microbus, which is perfectly fitted for this region. After the lunch served in a local cafe you are transferred to Betenkes, a small village 46 km away from Batagai. During the trip that takes about an hour and a half you can enjoy spectacular landscapes of the Verkhoyansk Mountains and attractive sites of wild nature.
In Betenkes village accommodation is provided by local families, one or two persons in the room. People are very hospitable and are glad to welcome you in the best houses of the village, tidy and clean. There is no plumbing or water supply, like in every house in the northern villages. So you have to use a washstand and go outside when you need a toilet. If you are willing to experience a real Siberian bath the villagers are happy to provide you this opportunity. Neat comfortable beds are done for you.
You have an excursion to the local museum that exhibits the unique findings from the area that you are to visit next day. The curator of the museum can tell you many interesting stories about the Ulakhan Suullur mammoth graveyards.
Having visited the museum you come back to the families where dinner is served for you. It consists of some peculiar cooking like pirozhki, home-made jam and sour cream as well as other special recipes passed on from generation to generation.
3 DAY Saturday
After the breakfast in the families your group accompanied by the local guides and a paleontologist leaves for the dig area Ulakhan Suullur, that in Yakut means “a big crumbling mountain”. The trip on the motor boats (3 persons per one) down the quiet Adycha River takes about an hour and a half. Ulakhan Suullur is a unique place where the whole history of fauna development over a period of thousands years is preserved. Native people got used to such outstanding findings as remains of a prehistoric elephant, mammoth’s progenitor; fossils of bison or woolly rhinoceros that existed long before the woolly mammoth.
People find it every now and then, especially after the spring flood that reveals ice sheet and erodes riverbanks. So it will be easy for you to find mammoth bones under the guidance of experienced specialist.
Right there on the riverbank you have your lunch provided by your families – pirozhki, vegetables, meat and fish, etc.
After the expedition you come back to the Betenkes village on the motor boats and have dinner in your families. In the evening, if you have spare time, you can watch a little concert performed by a local folklore group.
4 DAY Sunday
After the breakfast in the families you go to the dig area on the motor boats. Continue the mammoth remains research in Ulakhan Suullur. Your guides prepare a lunch on the riverbank. In the evening you can visit the horse-breeders’ settlement where the ancient times way of life still remains. Ancient buildings and constructions help you to imagine how the ancestors of the Yakut people used to live hundreds of years ago. Then you come back to the Betenkes village and have dinner in your families.
5 DAY Monday
After the breakfast in the families you go to the dig area on the motor boats. Continue the mammoth remains research in Ulakhan Suullur. Your guides prepare a lunch on the riverbank. In the evening, you come back to the Betenkes village and have dinner in your families.
6 DAY Tuesday
Batagai-YAKUTSK
After the breakfast in the families you leave for Batagai airport on the Russian UAZ off-roaders. The departure of your flight is at 12:55 pm. Arrival to Yakutsk is approximately at 1:45 p.m. After the accommodation in the hotel you have lunch in one of the restaurants. Then you have some time for shopping in the gift shop where you can buy souvenirs made of mammoth bone for your family and friends.
In the evening you have dinner at the local restaurant and some spare time in the hotel.
7 DAY Wednedsay
After the breakfast transfer to the airport and departure.