Hunting and fishing are traditional Russian leisure activities, but many foreign tourists find them exotic like a flight on the MIG-29. Such services also cost much. The tour costs from 3, 000 euro, without cost of the flight and accommodation in the hotel. The tour operators provide different services, in order to the guests could feel themselves like the Russian counts and princes: they can try themselves in hawking (sport of kings), hunting with hounds of venery and the Russian wolfhounds. The hunting and fishing tours take place in different exotic regions. For example, fishing on the Baikal Lake or bear hunting on Kamchatka compose exotic tour to place and exotic activity.

Bear hunting in Kamchatka is one of the most exiting trips among the hunting tours. You visit one of the most exotic places in the world (all the fauna of Kamchatka distinguishes a little from the common species), where the biggest brown bears live. So the traveler becomes a possibility not only to hunt a king-size bear, but to see famous volcanoes, geysers, thermal springs and plenty of strange and exciting things Kamchatka is famous with. The bear hunting usually takes place in spring in the districts of Kamchatka which are not natural reserves. The bear hunting trips are usually combined with fishing.

The Kamchatka bear (Ursus Arctos bearinganus) is the most well-known chaseable specie on the peninsula. The average size of a male bear amounts to 2, 7 meters. The coloring varies from hazel to almost black. Approximate population of the beasts on Kamchatka amounts to 12 – 15 thousand heads. The population is very dense: 1 beast for 1, 6 square kilometers.

The hunting areas are often covered with snow during the spring hunting, so the tourists are taken to the location of the killing the animals by snowmobiles. The marking down and killing of the animal is carried out without any transport units, except the skis, if it is necessary. Experienced huntsman escorts the group during all the hunting. During the hunting itself (about a week) the tourists live in the camp, in the heated tents.

The temperature fluctuates there from – 15 degrees Celsius at night and 17 by day. The tourists should take it into account. The bears are usually active in the morning and in the evening. The also can be met daylong lying on the rocks and thawed patches, sunning themselves. Take aim accurately… Your trophy will be primarily converted.

Fishing on the Lake Baikal, the second tourist attraction, maybe more moderate, is available from May to October. The trip includes fishing with spinning. The fish species for spinning are: pike, perch and carp. There are also burbots, but they are for net and big enough to be speared. The pikes in Baikal are rather big; the exemplars of 7 – 10 kg are not uncommon. The tourists can process the catch by themselves: to kipper, for example. The fishing trips to Baikal are made in the form of cruise with visiting of the nature reserves for observing monuments of nature and curious things like Baikal seal grounds, not for fishing of course. Fishing takes place in the bays and from the boat on the move.

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Taimen fishing

Taimen is a legendary flesh-eater of northern rivers. Every spinner dreams of catching it. In Russia there are many places where you can pit your fisher's strength against this fish, and the fishers and tour operators recommend the rivers all over the Siberia, from Yakutia to Altai, next to Mongolian frontier. As far as this beast is red-listed, you will have to let it swim, so it is fishing for sport.

Among the places to catch taimen are the following rivers of Yakutia:

Ujel'-Siktjah – this river flows in 990 kilometers from Yakutsk, and has many feeders; it is a rather unfrequented spot. Taimens caught there weight more than 20 kilos. The river of Olenek, sometimes included into the same fishing tours is one of the most outlying and hardest-to get-to rivers of Russia. Olenek heads and flows down Central Siberian Plateau and runs into Laptev Sea. The river is fast and full of shallows in the upper stream and quiet and full flowing in the low course. It became accessible for tourists since 2006 only. The River of Undjuljung is one of the best rivers for taimen fishing in Yakutia. It is a confluent of Lena River (the largest river of North-Eastern Sibera). The weight of taimens caught there reaches 30 kilos.

All these places are hard-to-get, so the tourists-fishermen are delivered to these outlying places by planes An2 or by helicopters. After that the tourists raft down the river or land directly next to the fishing place, depending on the river. Pikes and whitefish are to be caught there as well. By the way, they are not red-listed.

Taimen fishing is available in the rivers of Tyva Republic, Khabarovsk Region, Buryatia Republic, in the river of Amur and in Baikal and Teletskoye Lakes. But to my mind it is better to do it in the back country, because the nature needs time to revive after fishing, even fishing-for -sport.

It is a reminder that taimen is a salmon fish (one of the biggest between the salmon fishes), which lives in the inland water reservoirs all the time, instead of a true salmon, living in the sea and runs to the fresh water for spawning only. It looks like a salmon but lives as a trout. Be careful during fishing! Taimen's strength and intellect makes it able to tip the boat over.

When: since June (after spawning season) till the late autumn. The tourists live in tents, and it can rain, so warm waterproof clothes are appropriate.

Hunting on the wild boar

This type of hunting is one of the most popular types of hunting in Russia, together with moose hunting. It is so because of some features of boar's behavior. You do not need to go far in taiga to fly somewhere on helicopter all the more; the wild boar tends to live not very far from the farmlands. Moreover, this specie lives and is available for hunting in the western and southern regions of Russia, in the foothills and mountains of Caucasus, but in Primorsky Territory as well, i.e. everywhere in the hardwood forests.

One of the reasons to go for wild boar hunting just to Russia is the size of the trophies. Their tusks reach 30 cm long! The big hogs can attack a brown bear defending themselves without hesistation. Harsh winters with deep snow cover allow only the biggest boars to survive. In addition, predation by wolves, lynx and Siberian tiger in the Far East breads large and strong animals only.

The types of hunting are stalking or using the dogs. The hogs can be extremele dangerous.

Anyway, services like this cost a lot of money, but it is worth it, to make an outstanding trip to the exotic place and come back with a unique experience and trophy.

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Yulia Buzykina

    turzona.ru

    www.kamchatkaoutfitters.ru

    baikalvisa.ru

    www.fishingtravel.ru

    hunt.rin.ru

    www.sportfish.ru

    www.garms.ru

    www.russianhunting.com