From Houston to Sydney 2013

Russian Far East - 2014

I woke this morning to find the sky covered with thick grey clouds and the ground wet from overnight rain.  Although it was not the weather I was hoping for, at least the rain seemed to have stopped falling.

I was the only guest in the hotel last night, and arrangements had been made for me to have breakfast at 7:30am in readiness for an 8:00am departure.  I made my way over the neighbouring hotel with the restaurant, opened the door (relieved to find it unlocked this time), and walked down the corridor past two dogs and three cats to the restaurant.  I arrived right at 7:30, and the breakfast was being placed on the table for me as I walked into the room – a large bowl of hot porridge, two crepes topped with condensed milk, a chocolate bar, and a double sized cup of instant coffee.  It was a substantial breakfast, and I enjoyed it immensely even though not a single item was anything like I would normally have chosen if I had been given a choice.

The minibus arrived promptly at 8:00am, and I found that my fellow passengers for the day were a Russian family from St Petersburg (who spoke only Russian), and a young German man who was stationed in Tokyo for his job and who spoke English with total fluency.

The main destination for the day was Dachnye Hot Springs.  Dachnye is situated at the foot of Mutnovskiy volcano, about two and a half hours slow drive south of Paratunka along a very rough gravel road that climbed up to an altitude of 850 metres.  We made a few short stops for stretching legs and sightseeing on the way, although the sightseeing became somewhat futile as we drove up into thicker and thicker fog as we gained altitude.  The road ended at the Mutnovskaya geothermal power station, but for the last half an hour before reaching Mutnovskaya the ground had been covered in a thick covering of snow and fog (yes, it IS mid-summer in Kamchatka!).  The area surrounding the geothermal power station was much the same, although at least some of the fog seemed to be caused by the large clouds of steam swirling upwards from large holes in the ground.

Part of the Pacific ‘Ring of Fire’, Kamchatka is one of the world’s major geothermal zones (the other notable areas being Iceland, Rotorua in New Zealand and Yellowstone in the US).  The underground water beneath Mutnovskaya is said to be about 150°C, and the high pressure steam generated when the pressure is released drives turbines that generate electricity before the steam is recycled for repeated use.

We had to walk past the edge of the geothermal power station to reach Dachnye Hot Springs, which are only about a kilometre further on along a steep dirt track that also traverses a couple of snow fields.  Interestingly, the area around the Dachnye Hot Springs was almost entirely snow-free, the result of the heat emanating from the fumaroles and hot springs.

The fog came and went during our visit, but it was clear enough to see several large, forceful fumaroles and several tiny ponds of boiling water.  The smell of sulphur was reminiscent of Iceland and Rotorua; fog doesn’t dampen that distinctive aroma, it seems.

The original intention had been to bathe in the hot springs, but as the snow was contributing more water to the creek than the fumaroles, the water was close to being ice cold.  Therefore, the bathing plan was abandoned, as was our second stop for the day – the Spokoyny Waterfall could not be reached because the road was covered by too much snow.  So, as an alternative to both the bathing and waterfall, we had lunch, standing beside the road in front of the geothermal power station, surrounded by snowfields and a thick, swirling fog.

As a substitute for the waterfall and the bathing, we made a stop at a different hot spring on the return drive.  The Verkhne-Paratunskie Hot Spring was a small pool less than half an hour’s drive from Paratunka.  Getting there involved a bit of an effort – 200 very steep steps formed by vertical wooden boards holding back sloping earth.

But the effort was worth it!  I had a lovely time sitting in the flowing stream of 37°C water, reassured by the locals that the minerals in the water (including, apparently, arsenic) would be good for my health.  It was unquestionably a more pleasant bathing experience than I could ever wish for in the limited facilities of my hotel room, and so I made the most of it.

I returned to my hotel at a little before 5:00pm, and was delighted to find that my room had been serviced during the day (this had not happened the previous day, nor had I been expecting it).  In this context, servicing the room meant supplying me with a new towel, emptying my rubbish bin and fixing the lights that were not working (which was most of them).  What a pleasant surprise it was to have lights that work in my room to top off the relaxed feeling of having bathed in a hot spring.

Day 15 - Mutnovskiy volcano

Tuesday

15 July 2014