Chernobyl ... and Pripyat, the city that died!

April 26, 1986 a nuclear reactor at the Chernobyl Power Station exploded. This accident had the ability to cause widespread chaos and death around Europe as huge clouds of Radioactive dust drifted across the European landscape. 

 

There are officially 59 deaths attributed to this incident however out of 500,000 liquidators (those drafted into going into this radioactive zone and cleaning it up) over two thirds have apparently passed away all before the age of 50. They have since sealed off this radioactive wasteland into two highly restricted military zones. The 30km zone is surrounded by fencing and has secure checkpoints maned by the Ukraine Military. Scientists cleared by the government are given access to this area to study the longstanding effects this has on the wildlife.

The 10km zone is more heavily guarded and all 4 members of our party were checked and double checked against paperwork as passports before being allowed access along with a Ukranian Government representative into the area.

The surprising thing is the reactor itself is quite disappointing. Its a grey rusting steel structure and you are able to get quite close to it with the level of radiation being around 4000 roentgens. This level is quite low as we later found out as this is THE most clean area of the whole 10km zone. 

 

Staring up at it you wonder what all the fuss is about. See its quite odd, if you were looking up the top of a hill to find a raging army running down towards you I bet your heart rate would rise quite quickly. This particular enemy is unseen and because of this it's really quite hard to grasp the danger being greater than my first example. The locals call this accident The Battle of Chernobyl .... and I understand why, their military fought and died to protect their country from the fallout. It was in now way any less brave than any other wars fought throughout time. 

We also managed to sneak a picture of the new construction underway to replace the current coffin which is slowly falling apart. Apparently this will be hermetically sealed and a more controlled environment however we were advised not to take pics of this as we were unauthorised to do this ... Naughty Mr V ... you can imagine my panic as he was taking these!

So we saw the reactor and then moved onto the bit that really interested me ... the city of Pripyat. Haunting images of a once busy city now abandoned and preserved in time looks like a scene from a post-apocolyptic horror movie. It was surreal and quite creepy walking around a city that 20 years ago had been teaming with over 12,000 people. Imagine those 12,000 people all being evacuated within a 3 hours period being told they would be back within a week only never to return. Now a ghost city it seems to have lost all sense of life. Nature seems to be taking hold of the city with trees covering old pathways and roads almost hidden. 

Its very hard to explain just how eerie this experience was so I will attempt to show you with pictures.

 

Finally we drove quite quickly  through the red forrest. Apparently not long after the accident the entire forrest turned from a lush green to bright red. The forrest was bleeding and has continued to do so for the next 20 years. We didn't stop or even slow down here with the Geiger Counter beeping wildly and flashing 9.9 as we drove through. 

Oh and just in case anyone has concerns over whether I now glow in the dark I can safely say after 4 individual checks by government officials and radiation counting machines  ... Im clean.

The Little Red Button ... Isn't Red

Today was much more of a boys trip and my little boy was bouncing around all over the place. Today he got to play with nuclear war heads. Ok not quite but pretty close. Before 1992 Ukraine was listed as the third largest nuclear armed country. In 1992 they disbanded their Nuclear weaponry with the help of the USA and there is one very isolated base that is now open by appointment to tourists. This has been one if Mr V's BIG exciting moments on the trip and I am happy to report he was not disappointed.

Firstly it is located 4 hours away from Kiev in the middle of the countryside in the centre of the Ukraine. This means an 8 hour round trip which obviously would put a few people off a visit. As such we had the place to ourself. A military escort showed us and our guide around taking us down to the control rooms 8 storeys below ground. Mr V got to sit in "the seat" and we were show the "go" button is actually grey The red button is to cancel the launch .... you learn something new every day!

It is actually kind of creepy walking around looking at disabled nuclear missiles and hearing about how it takes 22 seconds from the time you receive the order to fire and the actual firing of the missile. You watch all the Austin Powers movies where there is a 30 minute period to set up a nuclear missile ... not true - it would take 25 minutes from the order to launch the missile and it hitting New York City. I hope you can see how unnerving this was hearing about it deep underground by someone who was stating the destruction of now just a city but possible a quarter of the country in such a relaxed way.

Overall an interesting day - tomorrow is going to be even more interesting ... Tomorrow is our tour of Chernobyl. I must admit ... I may be slightly nervous about this particular tour however Mr V and the Tour operator have promised it is safe. I look forward to sharing my thoughts tonight.

Oh yes - and in keeping with my previous tradition - if I thought Russia was cold Ukraine is positively frigid. I seem to spend hours trying to work out ways to add an extra later of clothing without looking like rolling would be easier to walking!!!

The end of Russia

Mr V banned me from talking to my lovely bloggers until now. Apparently I was tired and slightly grumpy and he didn't feel it was fair for you to be submitted to this particular horror. Personally I think I have a very good excuse, the last hotel had a bed that is easily comparable to a stack of bricks, that's right, im admitting I might be slightly grumpy and I'm blaming it on my lack of sleep! 

Yesterday we visited Catherine Palace. A country palace its decorated in traditional Baroque style which for me personally seems rather over the top but I will let you make up your own mind. The outside of the building is lovely, its this soft shade of blue which just looks magical against the snow. 

We also visited the Leningrad Siege Memorial which I have to say was touching. For those who don't know St Petersburg used to be called Leningrad. During world war 2 Hitler laid siege to the city, surrounding the city on all sides he declared he was not going to waste precious men on this city, he would starve them out. 900 days later the Russians finally beat the Nazis back however it came at a great cost. We found out in the last 100 years over half the population of Russia had died. Can you imagine living in that type of constant devastation your entire life?

Finally we finished with the tour guide! I have to say both Hubby and I breathed a quiet sigh of relief at having survived but lets keep that between us! Now today we have left Russia and have started our journey into the Ukraine. It should be a very interesting could of days and I'm looking forward to sharing it with you!!!

St Petersburg ... A great day.... BUT!

Let me start with the good stuff - today we spent more of time exploring the city. We visited the world famous Winter Palace ... AKA the Hermitage. 

The winter palace used to be the winter residence of the Russian Tsars however from what I was told it was far to big and so mostly used for formal occasions with the Ruling families living in smaller cosier palaces close by. It has now been turned into a large art gallery and even if you are not into art it is well worth a visit as the building itself is mind blowing. The excess and the details gives you some idea just how rich these ruling families were.

Next it was a visit to the Church of the Spilled Blood. Almost a Russian icon itself and recognised around the world seeing this in real life, the snow softly drifting around you is almost magical. The story behind this particular church is quite interesting, Nicholas the first, second last Tsar of Russia was travelling home when a terrorist threw a bomb at the carriage. This bomb didn't actually harm the Tsar but it all went wrong when he got out of the carriage to help the innocent passers by. While he was out of the safety of the carriage a second terrorist ran out of the crowd with another bomb and killed him. The church was erected on the very spot where this tragedy occurred and the cobble stones from this time are still visible.

Inside was even better with every surface covered with colour and stories. Paintings just don't survive in the harshness of this climate so all the art in both churches we visited today are actually mosaics. These tiny little pieces of precious stone bring more life to the space than any painting could! The building itself is almost 3 storeys tall but the space extremely narrow forcing you to crane your neck to see all the images higher up. I really could have spent hours wandering around this quiet peaceful space. 

 

Finally St Isaac's Cathedral - Totally different in style to the Church of the Spilled Blood it seems to be a more formal church, a much larger space it has a sense of grandness to it and you get an overall feeling of your insignificance. I must admit I much preferred the other church but this was still lovely to see.

 

Now onto my one little gripe. Over the past few days our guide has dropped a few hints and comments that give us both the feeling she feels superior to both Mr V and I. This morning it went to a new and entertaining level with her asking Mr V why he doesn't try to better himself. She explained that in order to better himself he needs to engage in more academic pursuits. We tried to explain that although Mr V does not have a university degree his job is highly technical and I personally felt he is actually smarter in many ways than a lot of people I know. I wasn't saying this just to defend him,   I truly believe that there are more ways to "bettering" yourself or "educating" yourself than just books or university, however our guide just couldn't comprehend this idea at all and throughout the day continued to push books or ideas on poor Mr V.

 

Another lovely comment that really made me grit my teeth was to imply that young people could not afford to travel to Russia as it was far to expensive and that the only reason we could afford to come was because we were travelling in the off season. Oh yes, she is extremely happy passing on her well thought out, well educated opinions without even considering our circumstances or our thoughts on being judged so harshly.

While in preliminary discussions about the Hermitage I stressed that neither hubby or I are particularly interested in art and our primary interest in visiting was the architecture and the building itself. She however felt it was her duty to educate us in art and although we interrupted  a few times explaining that while we are sure the art is beautiful we are much more interested in the rooms itself, she continued to drag us from one masterpiece to another desperately trying to impress us with her knowledge of the art world. 2 hours later poor Mr V was at his wits end and practically dragged us to the exit. 

While it would be very easy to take the guides careless comments to heart we have decided to take it with a pinch of humour finding her sometimes misguided opinions hilarious as opposed to insulting. Tomorrow is our last day with this particular guide and while to be honest we are not particularly fond of her we are seeing, learning and experiencing much more than we would if exploring on our own.