Sights in Irkutsk
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Volkonsky House-Museum
A short walk behind the pretty pink Preobrazheniya Gospodnya Church then through big heavy gates is the Volkonsky House-Museum. It’s the preserved home of Decembrist Count Sergei Volkonsky, whose wife Maria Volkonskaya cuts the main figure in Christine Sutherland’s book The Princess of Siberia. The mansion is set in a courtyard with stables, barn and servant quarters (beware of the dog). Downstairs is an (over-) renovated piano room; upstairs is a photo exhibition including portraits of Maria and other 1820s women who romantically followed their husbands and lovers into exile. Labels are only in Russian but a R70 English-language pamphlet tells the stories.
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Znamensky Monastery
Set in a leafy garden behind a noisy traffic circle, the 1762 Znamensky Monastery is 1.5km northeast of the Bogoyavlensky Cathedral. Echoing with mellifluous plainsong, the interior has splendidly muralled vaulting, a towering iconostasis and a gold sarcophagus holding the miraculous relics of Siberian missionary St Inokent.
Celebrity graves outside include that of Grigory Shelekhov, the man who claimed Alaska for Russia. White-Russian commander Admiral Kolchak was executed by Bolsheviks near the spot where his statue was controversially erected in November 2004 at the entrance to the monastery grounds, on a plinth that's exaggeratedly high enough to reduce vandalism.
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Angara Steamship
Moored near the Angara Dam, the Angara Steamship is an ice-breaker ferry originally imported in kit form from England to carry Trans-Siberian Railway passengers across Lake Baikal (the trains went on her bigger sister ship Baikal, which sank years ago). Officially closed to visitors, the ship is currently used as drinks storage for a nearby summer café, but the impressive engines still work, as you might see, should the café owner decide to befriend you.
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Angaram Ice-Breaker
Some 6km southeast of the centre, the 1956 Angara Dam is 2km long. Moored nearby, the Angara Ice-breaker was originally imported in kit form from Newcastle-upon-Tyne to carry Trans-Siberian Railway passengers across Lake Baikal (the trains went on her bigger sister ship Baikal, which sank years ago). The steamer is now a less-than-inspiring museum reached by a permanent gangway.
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Art Gallery
The grand old Art Gallery has a valuable though poorly lit collection ranging from Mongolian thangkas (Buddhist religious paintings) to Russian Impressionist canvases. Behind a photogenic 1909 facade its sub gallery is strong on Siberian landscapes and petroglyph rubbings and has some superb 17th-century icons.
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Regional Museum
Irkutsk’s pleasant, if fairly standard, Regional Museum is within a fancy 1870s brick building that formerly housed the Siberian Geographical Society, a club of Victorian-style gentlemen-explorers. The small gift shop is good for birch-bark boxes and jewellery made from purple chaorite, a unique Siberian mineral.
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Akvarium Nerpy
Nessie and Tito, two much-loved nerpa (freshwater seals), live at Akvarium Nerpy and perform 'shows' every half-hour with no minimum attendance. Unlike some small 'zoos' elsewhere, the experience is positive and relatively humane. Feats include 'singing' (nasal flatulence?), break-dancing, ball-tossing and even basic mathematics.
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Regional Administrative Building
The magnificent Annunciation Cathedral that once dominated pl Kirova was demolished during one of Stalin's bad moods. It was replaced by a hulking concrete Regional Administrative Building, the ex-Communist Party headquarters. Tragic.
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City History Museum
Small, far from central, but well presented, the City History Museum shows various eras through shop-window–style displays. Take bus 8, 11, 23 or 25, or trolleybus 8 or 10K to the ‘Muzey’ stop.
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Raising of the Cross Church
The 1758 baroque Raising of the Cross Church has a fine interior of gilt-edged icons and examples of intricate brickwork in a rounded style that’s unique to Irkutsk and the Selenga Delta village of Posolskoe.
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Kazansky Church
Nearing completion, the gigantic Kazansky Church is a Disneyesque confection of salmon-pink walls and fluoro turquoise domes topped with gold baubled crosses. Get off tram 4 two stops northeast of the bus station.
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Angara Dam
Some 6km south of the centre, the 1956 Angara Dam is 2km long. Its construction raised Lake Baikal by up to 6m, causing various human and environmental problems, but the dam itself is hardly an attraction.
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Bogoyavlensky Cathedral
The fairy-tale ensemble of the Bogoyavlensky Cathedral's restored salmon, white and green towers add a colourful dazzle to the otherwise rather grimy riverfront.
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Dom Ofitserov
A collection of Soviet tanks and missile launchers guard the Dom Ofitserov, which has a sporadically open museum and occasional concerts of patriotic songs.
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Sub-Gallery
Behind a photogenic 1909 façade is the art gallery's Sub-Gallery which is strong on Siberian landscapes and petroglyph rubbings and has some superb 17th-century icons.
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Saviour’s Church
The whitewashed 1706 Saviour’s Church has remnants of murals on its facade and until a few years ago housed a museum, hence the rather colourless interior.
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Trinity Church
The newest gilt spires to puncture Irkutsk’s boxy skyline belong to the 18th-century Trinity Church where restoration work continues apace.
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Trubetskoy House-Museum
The smaller Trubetskoy House-Museum was dismantled and carted off for renovation in late 2007 but its return is imminent so it’s worth checking.
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Wooden Houses
Some fine Wooden Houses are sparsely dotted around town, notably on ul Dekabrskikh Sobyty, east of ul Timiryazeva.
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Preobrazheniya Gospodnya Church
The pretty pink Preobrazheniya Gospodnya Church is in front of the Volkonsky House Museum.
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