The Altai Mountains
The Altai Mountains are spread over Siberia, Mongolia, Kazakhstan and China which form quite a prominent ‘cross’, as you see on the world map above. This is the basis of The Four Borders Expedition (there are actually five borders in the area – see if you can work out why).
Mongolia
Mongolia is the world’s second-largest landlocked country. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south. Mongolia’s political system is parliamentary democracy. Its capital and largest city is Ulaanbaatar.
At 1,564,116 square kilometers, Mongolia is the nineteenth largest country in the world, but also the least densely populated. The country contains very little arable land as much of its area is covered by arid and unproductive steppes, with mountains to the north and west and the Gobi Desert to the south. Approximately 30 percent of the country’s 2.8 million people are nomadic or semi-nomadic. The predominant religion in Mongolia is Tibetan Buddhism, and the majority of the state’s citizens are of the Mongol ethnicity; Buriats, Kazakhs and Tuvans also live in the country, especially in the west. About one third of the population lives in Ulaanbaatar.
As far as we are concerned, Mongolia has the most potential for first descents; the Russian border in the Altais has only recently opened to foreigners (in 2004). There are some rafted runs such as the Ulaan Tag and the Khovd Aimag, but our maps and Google Earth suggest there is more to be explored.
Russia – Siberia
The Russian Federation stretches over a vast expanse of Asia and Europe. With an area of 17,075,400 km², Russia is the largest country in the world, covering almost twice the territory of the next-largest country, Canada, and has the world’s eighth-largest population. Russia shares land borders with the following countries (counter-clockwise from northwest to southeast): Norway, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, China, Mongolia, and North Korea. It is also close to the United States and Japan across relatively small stretches of water (the Bering Strait and La Pérouse Strait, respectively).
Siberia is a vast region of Russia constituting almost all of Northern Asia and comprising a large part of the Euro-Asian Steppe. It extends eastward from the Ural Mountains to the Pacific Ocean, and southward from the Arctic Ocean to the hills of north-central Kazakhstan and the borders of both Mongolia and China. All but the extreme south-western area of Siberia lies in Russia, and it makes up about 56% of that country’s territory.
The Altai are the highest mountain range in Siberia and said to be one of the most beautiful parts of Russia. Belukha is the highest peak at 4406m and the region is packed with nearly 1500 glaciers. Many rivers have been rafted extensively by the Russians and we have conflicting reports on the amount of possible exploration. Some rivers have only been run in Bublics, leaving the opportunity for first kayak descents. There are definitely rivers not yet paddled by British citizens.
We plan to paddle some remote, multi-day rivers such as Bashkaus (5 days) (“one of the most difficult [rivers] in all of the former Soviet Union”) and Chulyshman (4 days). There is also the potential for a second descent of the Chulchya which is a big hike-in.