3 Days in Ulan-Ude

The Lenin head is the reason most people have heard of Ulan-Ude. It is 7.7 meters tall, 4.5 meters across and weighs 42 tons, and it sits on a 6.3-meter granite pedestal, so the whole monument is about 14 meters high. Work started in 1970 for the 100th birthday of Lenin, and the official opening was on 5 November 1971. The sculptors were the brothers Gennady and Yury Neroda. It was cast in two halves at the Mytishchi stone-cutting plant near Moscow and sent east by rail.

Locals call it simply Golova, the Head, and village kids studying in town once used it as the meeting spot, which earned them the nickname golovari. A 2011 poll found most Buryats counted it as their second symbol after Lake Baikal, and in 2015 it entered the Russian Book of Records as the largest sculpted head of Lenin in the world.

Lenin Street runs south from the Head toward the river, and part of it is a pedestrian stretch locals call the Arbat, after the Moscow street. In the 19th century Verkhneudinsk was a trading town on the road to China, and the merchants' houses, trading houses and churches of the old center are its best-kept part. The fairs were held on the Bazaar Square, now Revolution Square, where Gostiny Dvor, the merchants' arcade, stands.

Walk it slowly and look up: the carved window frames on the old houses are the real attraction, more than any single museum.

You can't visit Buryatia without eating buuza (in Russian pozy), steamed meat dumplings that have become the modern symbol of Buryat cooking. Bite a small hole in the dough first to drink the broth.

Look for a cheap cafe on or just off Lenin Street with a steamer on the counter. Pair the buuza with suutei tsai, milky salted tea, or a bowl of bukhlyor, the thick meat soup. Restaurants here come and go, so ask your hotel for a place that's open now rather than trusting an old list.

The cathedral is the first stone building in the city, built between 1741 and 1785 on the right bank of the Uda near where it meets the Selenga. It's a rare piece of Siberian baroque, a symmetrical building shaped like a ship, with a bell tower at its western end.

Its history is the Soviet century in miniature. The church was closed in 1929, its last rector, Archbishop Gavriil Makushev, was executed in 1930, the bells came down, and from 1937 it housed an anti-religious museum, later a local history museum. Six bells went up again in 1996, and the lower and upper chapels were handed back to the diocese in 1999 and 2000.

The Buryat State Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre stands by the Lenin Head, so the evening needs no transport. It's a good place to see Buryat singing and dancing in costume without leaving town.

Check the playbill that morning, because programs change. If there's no suitable show, a long dinner and a last walk past the Head works just as well.

The Ivolginsky datsan is the center of the Buddhist Traditional Sangha of Russia, the country's main Buddhist body. It lies in the village of Verkhnyaya Ivolga, about 36 km west of the center by road. Buddhism was nearly wiped out in the USSR in the 1930s, and this monastery is what came back. A Soviet decree of 2 May 1945 allowed it to open, a wooden house was made to look like a temple, and the first public service was held on 12 December 1945. Legend says a white horse chose the spot. Most of the temples date from the 1970s, and a Buddhist university was added in 1991.

Walk clockwise around the grounds and spin the prayer wheels. The souvenir stalls by the gate are commercial, but the chanting and the families who come to pray are real. It's an active temple: dress modestly, no shorts for men, and ask before taking photos inside.

On the datsan grounds stands a separate temple, the Blessed Palace of the Khambo Lama, built to hold the body of Dashi-Dorzho Itigilov. He was the 12th Pandito Khambo Lama, head of the Buddhists of East Siberia, and he died on 15 June 1927. According to the tradition, he sat in the lotus position, asked his students to read the prayer for the dead, and told them to look at his body after 75 years. He was buried in a cedar box in the same pose.

Lamas lifted the body out in secret in 1955 and again in 1973 and found it unchanged. On 10 September 2002 it was raised for the last time and taken to the datsan, and the palace was consecrated on 31 October 2008. Believers hold that he is in deep meditation. Scientists who tested samples found a bromine level far above normal, and one Russian doctor was blunt that the body is not alive. Research was suspended at the Khambo Lama's order in January 2005. What you see is a silent hall and a robed figure behind glass, and pilgrims take it very seriously.

The open-air museum opened on 19 August 1968 on 37 hectares at the edge of the city, in the district of Verkhnyaya Berezovka. More than 40 historic buildings and over 11,000 exhibits have been moved here: Buryat felt and wooden yurts, a wooden Buddhist temple (a dugan), an Evenki camp, and a one-sided street of Old Believers' houses, including a two-story house of a rich Old Believer family brought from the village of Kuytun in 1972.

Dress for the cold, because most of the visit is outdoors, and some houses may be closed in winter.

The newest Buddhist temple in town sits on a hill north of the center and is built for the view. It was founded by the Tibetan lama Yeshe Lodoi Rinpoche with the blessing of the 14th Dalai Lama, and opened on 27 June 2004. Inside stands a six-meter gilded Buddha statue brought from China in 2004, said to be the largest in Russia. Eight stupas were added in 2005 and the Bell of Four Seals, the biggest Buddhist bell in Russia, in 2009.

Come about an hour before sunset: the viewing platform, at 888 meters above sea level, looks over the city and its rivers. It's windy, so bring a hat.

After the cold, go for the heavy end of Buryat cooking. Salamat (also shanakhan zookhei) is sour cream boiled with flour, stirred until it forms lumps and a light crust, and it's eaten mostly in winter. It isn't subtle, but it's right at minus twenty. Boovy, pastry twists, are the sweet side.

A Buryat-themed cafe in the center is the safest bet, and a yurt-style one if you want atmosphere. Check that it's open the same day.

Tarbagatai is one of the largest Old Believer villages in Transbaikalia, home to about 4,250 people. The Old Believers, or Semeiskie ("family people"), rejected the church reforms of the 17th century and were banished from the Vetka area, now in Belarus. They settled here from 1765, when the empress wanted farmers for the border lands. The Semeiskie kept their faith, their polyphonic singing and their large wooden houses, and the group's culture was placed on UNESCO's intangible heritage list in 2001. Walk the main streets and look at the older houses. It's a working village, so ask before photographing people, and never open a gate uninvited.

The village museum, Elements of Semeiskie Antiquity, was founded in 1982. One tour description says the collection was gathered by a village priest and includes handwritten 17th-century books and an iconostasis. A short visit gives you the context for the rest of the day.

Opening days and hours aren't published where we could check them, so go with a guide who can call ahead.

The best lunch in the village is in someone's home, set up through a guide or a tour. Expect Russian country food: pies, soups, pickles and homemade drinks. Bring cash, and tell your host about any dietary rule before you sit down.

The singing is the reason the Semeiskie are famous. Their songs are polyphonic and notable for their dissonance, and range from religious texts to everyday songs. The village ensemble Sudbinushka, formed in 1990, holds the UNESCO title Living Treasures, awarded in 2001.

You can't count on a performance on any given day, so ask your guide to arrange one in advance.