South Ural. Part #3

It was a long time ago. Somewhere in the early 90s, my wife and I went on a trip to Taganai. We wandered the Taganai paths all day and finally came to the Zayachy Glade, through which the Kialim Road passes, to spend the night on it. Now this cozy corner, located on the bank of a stream with “crystal” spring water, escaping from the slope of big Taganay, is well inhabited tourists. In the summer, he rarely goes without guests. And at that time, there were much fewer tourists on Taganaeblo, and this meadow was just beginning to settle down. It had three, or four bonfires, located around the perimeter. In the middle stood a wooden table with benches, knocked together by foresters. Now there is no trace left of this furniture. Most of the meadow was covered with a high growth of sour.

We set up our gable canvas tent at the top edge of the forest; entrance directed to the center of the meadow. As usual, my wife complained to me that she was afraid to spend the night in the forest, and I, as usual, told her that if no one came here before night, then she would definitely not come at night, because it was impossible. Now, of course, and at night you can get to this place. Tourists have adopted LED headlights, and foresters are ATVs, for which a clearing dotted with boulders, but nevertheless proudly called the “Kialim Road”, is the same as Broadway. Having had supper and having sat a little by the fire, we went to sleep. It was already dark. Neighbors did not come to us, so this night we became the sole owners of the "forest communal".

It rained a little at night. I have often noticed that even in good weather Taganay rainfall at night. In the early nineties there was generally a lot of rain, especially in the Kusinsky district - the humidity pole of the Chelyabinsk region, and maybe even all of Russia.

At about three in the morning my wife woke me up and said in fear that there was something to the clearing. I, not believing her, asked: where did you get it? She pointed me to a gap in the tent's tightly closed entrance, through which the light of a bonfire burning on the opposite edge of the clearing was breaking through. ...?

looked at the fire, and his head generated questions that could not be answered. Who besides us lives in a clearing? Who and when lit another fire? Why didn’t I hear the crackle of a dried bird and the knock of an ax? I felt uneasy. I knew that when we went to bed, only one bonfire burned out in the meadow - the one we lit. Now, after the rain, it has gone out completely. My theory that no one walks through the forests at night burst at all seams.

Okay, I think, if the creatures who built the fire didn't harm us when we slept, then these are good creatures; they should not be afraid. I take a flashlight, get out of the tent and head to the opposite edge of the meadow. The wife walks behind, clinging tightly to my elbow.

Going closer, we see that this is not a fire at all. A piece of birch round about fifty centimeters in diameter and about seventy meters long, lying a couple of meters from an old, long-extinct, bonfire burns. There is no one around. My head has generated another packet of questions. Who and how could set fire to such a beam in wet weather (then they did not sell liquids for ignition)? Why set fire to a log if no one is warming and preparing food for him? Once again I rummage through the beam of a flashlight. In addition to our tent and a wooden table with benches, I don’t see anyone and therefore, I don’t understand anything. “I turn on Dersu” (DersuUzala is a hunter, tracker and hero of the works of V. Arsenyev) and I see that the log is “stitched” through with a hollow. With a stone stifled, and everything fell into place.