The Bashkaus (russian: Башкаус) is a river in the Altai Republic in

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive region, geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a ...

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

. It is a left tributary of the

Chulyshman The Chulyshman (russian: Чулышман; alt, Чолышман, ''Çolışman'') is a river in Altai Republic in Russia. The river is long, and its drainage basin covers . The Chulyshman flows into Lake Teletskoye. It freezes up during late Oc ...

, which flows into

Lake Teletskoye Lake Teletskoye (russian: Телецкое озеро, lit=the lake of the ; ) is the largest lake in the Altai Mountains and the Altai Republic, Russia, and has depth up to 325 meters. Situated at a height of above the sea level, the lake is ...

( Ob basin). The Bashkaus is long, and its

drainage basin A drainage basin is an area of land where all flowing surface water converges to a single point, such as a river mouth, or flows into another body of water, such as a lake or ocean. A basin is separated from adjacent basins by a perimeter, ...

covers . It rises from a cirque lake in the eastern part of the Kuraiskii Mountain Range. In its lower reaches, it flows in a narrow valley, which often turns into a rocky canyon. The mean annual flow rate near the village of Ust’-Ulagan measures about .The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979)
/ref> It is widely considered one of the most challenging rivers for white-water rafting in the former

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

. In Russia, it is known as a Class 5 river meaning that its technical difficulty, i.e. the difficulty in navigating it in a raft or canoe, is high while its remoteness or distance from assistance in the event of things going wrong is Class 6 (on the Russian scale of one to six.) Hence, the Bashkaus is anecdotally ranked as the second most difficult river in the former USSR to raft or canoe, behind the nearby Chulyshman River. The Bashkaus was first recorded as fully kayaked in 1992, by a group from Ireland.

References

External links

{{Commons category, Bashkaus River
Kayaking in Russia

Kayaking on the Baskaus River
Rivers of the Altai Republic