How did you manage with bears? My brother went to Lake Baikal recently and did a bit of hiking but the locals thought he was nuts and warned him where he was headed was teeming with bears
Dealing with bears is a pretty normal activity in USA national parks. You bring bear spray and attach a bell to your backpack, and you don't stand in between a momma bear and a baby bear.
I also remember seeing an informational sign somewhere near Baikal that said there are about 400 individual bears on the 600km coast of Baikal, and in the winter the are hibernating, and they don't do that on the frozen surface of the lake.
Maybe his brother wasn't hiking on the frozen surface of the lake.
I've learned to listen to the (not-unfriendly) advice of groups of locals anywhere, when it comes to animal behavior at least. Maybe the bears didn't find enough food in the summer.
