Petropavlovsk-Kamchatskiy Travel Guide

 jorgejuansanchez Says:  This monument is to be found in the downtown, close to the harbour, at 100 metres from the Main Post Office.It commemorates the visit of famous French explorer La Perouse in 1787 during his long around the world journey.Unfortunately he died some months later in teh Solomon... 

 MikeAtSea Says:  The island group separate the Sea of Okhotsk from the North Pacific Ocean. The Kuril Islands were inhabited by the Ainu from time immemorial until they were expelled from the northernmost by the Russians in the 18th century. Japan inherited them in 1875 (Treaty of Saint... 

 MikeAtSea Says:  On the way to Petropavlovsk one passes the volcanic island group of the Kurils. The island group that is claimed by both Japan and Russia are almost uninhibited and covered year round by snow. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  Living that far away from civilization with very little scope and passing in our local bus I saw this group of locals, a scene that one could easily see elsewhere in the world. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  This is a scene that one sees everywhere in the city, high-rise buildings communist style that is home to most of the 90.000 people living here. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  One can see that one is in the furthest corner of Russia. Since the break up of the Soviet Union little has been done here to change the ‘architecture’ of the fast built socialistic buildings. Some areas I was astonished that actually someone lived in those buildings, and... 

 MikeAtSea Says:  Many trails cover the area of Kamtchatka where one can explore 29 working and about 150 extinct volcanoes, 274 mineral sources, 160 from which are hot, 37 kinds of wild animals, all kinds of a Pacific salmon and rich woods in berry, ramson, the glutton, beavers and otters as... 

 MikeAtSea Says:  Well the west has reached here too as one can see at the Coca Cola advertisement on the mountain hut where one gets drinks and meals. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  The close by volcanoes warm up a number of hot springs and lakes in the valley. The outside temperature when we were there was probably 4 Celsius with the water temperature almost 30 Celsius. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  In this valley is a small museum situated that informs about the ecology, nature and the volcanoes as well as the discovery of the region. However most of the information is in Cyril hence a translator is essential if you can’t read Cyrillic letters. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  We landed about 90 km inland in a valley that makes out the Nalitchevo Park. The surroundings were volcanoes of more then 4000 meters height. This park can also be reached on foot or skies from Petropavlovsk and is a three to four day hike. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  Imagine that it is already June and yet outside still meters of snow cover the mountains. Imagine coming here in January? 

 MikeAtSea Says:  Flying across the snow covered hills and mountain, away from the coast was spectacular. Sadly on our day the cloud cover was too low and our trip to one of the volcanoes had to be diverted. 

 MikeAtSea Says:  One of the easiest ways to travel into the surrounding areas is by helicopter. We took the services of Kamtchatka Airline. The old Russian military helicopter that was sprayed into civilian colours was flown by three pilots. My believe sitting in the rear of that helicopter...