Northern soul or "idiot's dream?"

[Dea]

look what I found:

magnificent Lake Baïkal, the "Glorious Sea" of Oriental Siberia. In this region renown for its hostile climate more than anywhere else on the planet, man had to adapt in order to survive. Lake Baïkal is the 2nd most important fresh water reserve after Antarctica with 23 millions cubic meters 636 km in length, 79 km in width and depths of 1637 meters. But most surprising is the quality of its water, the lake contains the purest water in the world and more than 300 rivers flow into it. From December to May, the lake is covered with a thick layer of ice which can attain 10 meters.

10 meters... that's 33 ft! holly cow, can you imagine what ice diving there in the winter be like? you'd probably need a bloody crane to lower you down.

and I looked up on a conversion calculator-- 1,637 meters is 5,370 ft deep

 

[metridium]

Originally posted by Dea
But how did you come up with Kamchatka? what's there? I never heard anything about Kamchatka diving.

Seems like it should be a relatively unspoiled area....military bases aside. It should also be warmer than the equivalent latitudes of the North American coast because of the warmer currents up from the western Pacific, although I don't know for sure.

 

[Dea]

If you look for warm, I bet there are better places than Kamchatka. If diving Russia, Arctic and Baikal are the best choises. They are very demanding but worth the trouble. Also, considering Russia's geography, geology and climate I bet the country has A LOT of unexplored underwater caves. eeh... if I was a rich woman...

 

[budgy]

Dea, look at http://www.polar.org for USA based, I know Australia and the UK have bases and recruitment but can't remember their addresses off hand.

 

[Dea]

Thanks a lot budgy! I just hope nobody fills that jobs before I come back from Asia.
And please, whenever you see any jobs on Polar station, or icebreakers or in Greenland and such... please let me know.

 

[Dea]

All that talk about Russia got me inspired. I looked around for the pictures of Baikal and could not resist putting them together on yet another page.
and while at it, added 3 more pics of the Barens sea. So it is now kind of "dive Russia" album.

I did not know Baikal has seals. In fresh water! and I've read that in March the wiz can be up to 200 feet!

http://www.deeprapture.com/baikal/