The Salty Triangle of Tyva

Description

A two-day trip through southern Tyva, in the Ubsunur Hollow by the Mongolian border: four lakes, three of them salty and one fresh, ringed by sand dunes. Distances on steppe tracks are about a hundred and thirty kilometres, but speeds are low, and after rain the clay is merciless to ordinary cars; the settlement of Erzin is the most convenient base. The first lake is Erzinsky Dus-Khol, also called Bai-Khol, “the rich lake”, twelve kilometres northwest of Erzin: nearly two square kilometres of mirror and salinity of twenty-five parts per thousand. Check the names carefully — there are three Dus-Khols in Tyva. The second, Samagaltaysky, lies forty-five kilometres south of the district centre and is an order of magnitude saltier: 339 parts per thousand at a depth of less than a metre — one of the saltiest points of the route; photographers and geologists prize the contrast of whitish salt deposits and dark water. Farther southwest is Shara-Nur: a salty lake of about five square kilometres at the foot of the Agar-Dag-Taiga ridge, with mineral springs on the southern shore. The Mongolian border is five kilometres away — papers and route must be in order. The finale is fresh Tore-Khol, partly extending into Mongolia: about thirty-five square kilometres of the Russian part at an altitude of about a thousand one hundred and fifty metres. The lake formed when moving sands dammed a tributary of the Tes-Khem, and dunes up to twelve metres high now rise from its shores; pike and peled live in the water. Mind the dust storms, carry spare water and fuel — and remember this is the periphery of the Ubsunur Hollow biosphere reserve.