The Wonders of Kamchatka

I cringed at each bump as we drove down an endless washboard of gravel road – the main north-south highway to the interior of Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula. Perched in the front seat of a 10-seat minibus, I cradled my right arm in a cast, which rested on an oversized pillow. I was dreading the 300 mile trip ahead – from Bystrinsky Nature Park to the capital city of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. Ten hours and three flat tires later (and filled with admiration for the driver with enough foresight to haul four spares) I arrived in the city, where I received antibiotics for my bite wounds and treatment for my dislocated elbow. Despite the injuries, I was thrilled by positive sentiments from my two-week adventure living in the park’s remote mountain wilderness, among Kamchatka’s native Koryak and Even (pronounced e-VEN) peoples. 

Three months earlier, I had moved to Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky (so named to distinguish it from the Petropavlovsk in Kazakhstan) to work on a biodiversity monitoring project for the United Nations Development Program (UNDP). My husband, photographer Igor Shpilenok, had secured a job as a ranger for Kronotsky Nature Reserve (Zapovednik). This allowed him access to the reserve – a 90 minute helicopter ride from the city – for his wildlife and nature photography. Unfortunately, I saw him infrequently, as helicopters were sporadic and return flights to the city depended on the number of tourists and the weather, which was often foggy and overcast any day a helicopter flight was planned. 

Excited to finally experience the wild Kamchatka I had heard about since coming to Russia in 1993 to work for World Wildlife Fund (WWF), I found myself disappointed with the peninsula’s largest city. Petropavlovsk had squandered its potential to become a city benefiting from an unparalleled scenic setting. Hugging the northeastern coast of Avacha Bay and rimmed by snow-capped volcanoes reflecting in the bay’s glistening waters, views from Petropavlovsk were marred by crumbling Soviet-era buildings, unsightly jumbles of metal car garages, and scruffy greenways filled with trash in summer and edged with blackened snowbanks in winter. Beyond, in the cold, deep waters of Avacha Bay (said to be the largest in the world) lurked hoards of submarines – relics of the former Soviet Union’s largest naval base. Across the bay was their home port of Vilyuchinsk, beneath the volcanic cone of the same name, where foreigners dared not set foot for fear of grave punishment or deportation. 

Petropavlovsk owes its roots to maritime navigation. In the late 18th century, its tranquil harbor served as a stopover point for international research expeditions, including those of the famed nautical explorers Bering, Clark (Captain Cook’s successor), and La Peruse.

Ships still play a major role in Kamchatka’s economy. The port is the most prominent feature of the city center, with its large metal cranes and shipping containers. Fishing supports a major part of the region’s population, and each summer, when salmon run from sea to rivers to spawn, equally imposing droves of fishermen harvest them, scooping caviar out of pink bellies and salting the meat. 

Kamchatka is one of the richest centers of salmon diversity in the world; nearly a quarter of all the world’s Pacific salmon come from the peninsula. The recent boom in fishing has heightened concern of international conservation organizations such as UNDP and WWF. Other than the naval base and Petropavlovsk, there are no significant sources of pollution on the peninsula. The air and water are pure and clean, despite a low level of heavy metals occasionally belched from volcanoes. Recently, however, gold and platinum reserves in the northern part of Kamchatka have been tapped and exploration for oil and gas on the continental shelf has been discussed.

Since the opening of the region to foreigners in 1991, nature tourism has gradually gained a foothold in Kamchatka’s economy – with about 8,000 tourists visiting annually, most in the summer season. Over 80 official tour agencies (and many unofficial ones) serve these visitors – about one agency per 100 visitors. 

For such visitors, Petropavlovsk is merely a staging area for the peninsula’s outlying wilderness. Outside the city and a handful of small towns, Kamchatka is largely undisturbed backcountry. A full quarter of its area is protected in nature preserves. The oldest – Kronotsky Zapovednik – encompasses the world-renowned Valley of the Geysers. The Southern Kamchatka Sanctuary protects the southern tip of the peninsula and Kuril Lake – the largest sockeye salmon spawning lake in the world. Four fledgling nature parks and a number of smaller sanctuaries and natural monuments protect a diversity of other habitats – from coastal areas along the Pacific and Sea of Okhotsk, to the headwaters of pristine salmon streams, to the conifer and birch forests and alpine meadows of mountains and valleys inland. 

After the snowbanks in the city reluctantly melted in June, it became possible to finally visit the “real” Kamchatka that had lured me from my village home in western Russia. I leapt at the chance to take part in an ethnographic camp with 12 foreigners and as many Evens and Koryaks, located in Bystrinsky Nature Park in central Kamchatka.

Created in 1995 to protect natural and cultural treasures, Bystrinsky Park encompasses over a million hectares of wilderness, volcanoes, hotsprings, and pristine salmon rivers, as well as the indigenous villages of Esso and Anavgay and dozens of native fishing camps. Alpine crests of mountain ranges, lusciously forested valleys of larch, pine, and birch, and cascading rivers beckon visitors into the wilderness, where hundreds of miles of rough trails lead deep into the backcountry to encounters with brown bears, sable, black-billed capercaillie, and spawning salmon. Rafting, horseback riding, hiking, fishing, skiing, and snowmobiling are all on offer for adventurous travelers willing to camp miles from hotels and hot water. Those wishing to experience the park without leaving the comforts of civilization generally stay in small bed and breakfasts in the town of Esso, taking day hikes on surrounding trails. The park’s visitor’s center is located in the town, as well as an impressive cultural museum with artifacts and dioramas from the lives of indigenous Even, Itelmen, and Koryak peoples.

Our group was headed 11 miles up the road from Esso to the Menedek Reindeer Herders Camp, near the village of Anavgay. The mock Even reindeer herding camp was set up in 2004 with help from UNDP to allow visitors to experience that lifestyle. Even reindeer herders and fishermen first settled Kamchatka 150 years ago, after being forced out of Yakutia. Yet they are not Kamchatka’s first inhabitants – the Itelmen (traditional fishermen) and the Koryaks (reindeer herders and hunters) can claim that honor.  

With my two boys (aged 4 years and 14 months at the time) and nanny in tow, I was psychologically prepared for the 8-10 hour drive from Petropavlovsk to the park. But nothing could have prepared me for the bus that pulled up to fetch us. It resembled a big metal box painted a grey camouflage color that failed to hide its age. There were 16 participants traveling to the camp, most of them foreigners and one of whom was pregnant. The bus seated 12. We crammed in. When the temperature began to rise on that rare, sunny day, we discovered that the windows did not open. Intense heat coming from the engine under a hood in the driver’s cabin did not help. 

Pavement covered the first 80 miles of the highway. We crossed a low mountain pass edged with dwarf pine and alder thickets and dipped into the broad, forested valley of the Kamchatka River, which flows north up the center of the peninsula. Then we launched onto a dusty road that grew dustier still as the sun dried the morning dew. We stopped briefly at the Malki Mineral Water factory, which produces the most popular mineral water on Kamchatka, to sample a bit of the “natural” water flowing out of a rusty pipe. We looked in at Malki hotsprings, a series of hot pools along the Bystraya (Fast) River – one of several with the same name on Kamchatka. People were bathing in the natural springs and sunning themselves in the July sunshine. As I re-boarded, our driver crawled out from under the front of the bus, his hands covered with black grease.

An hour later, and still hundreds of miles from our destination, the bus driver pulled to the side of the road to attend to a “minor” electrical problem. Relieved for the break from the unbearable heat in the bus, we piled out, only to be attacked by swarming mosquitoes and then coated in dust by passing cars. Three hours later we were still there.

We eventually jerked onward, only to stop every hour for further repairs. Darkness overcame us and the heat thankfully subsided. Our leader announced that we were passing an intended stop, where in daylight and clear weather one could see the perfect cone of the Klyuchevskaya Volcano – the highest volcano in Eurasia and centerpiece of Klyuchevsky Nature Park. 

We pulled into the Menedek Reindeer Camp in pitch darkness, 17 hours after our departure from Petropavlovsk. The camp consisted of some 10 tepee-like yurts spread under a coniferous canopy along the bank of another Bystraya River. The international participants were to stay in yurts with the local Even and Koryak participants. I would have liked to join them, but, for the benefit of my children and nanny, I had arranged a two-room apartment in Anavgay for $8 a day.

The next morning, I secured a wobbly bicycle from a kind neighbor and teetered the mile to the camp to join the others. The sound of drums reached my ears as I rode up. The opening ceremony involved a traditional Even dance. Eight young dancers, beautifully clad in long, beaded leather dresses trimmed with reindeer fur, danced and hooted on an outdoor stage in a small forest clearing, to the delight of onlookers seated on logs and benches. The ensemble performed a number of dances, each with a theme related to the Even’s traditional lifestyle, from herding reindeer to hunting bears to netting fish. The rhythmic beating of the large drums – made of skins stretched over wooden rings – resounded in the background. The dancers uttered grunts, hoots, and clucks. The costumes, choreography, and music created an impressively orchestrated and inspiring performance.

The rest of the week was similarly enjoyable. I found I had a previously undiscovered talent as a weaver of birch bark baskets and maker of bead and leather ornaments. We learned to make herbal teas from wild rose shrubs. We made red paint of crumbled alder bark and used it to dye leather we had helped to cure. We participated in traditional sporting events, such as lassoing a set of reindeer horns as it swung around a tether pole. We followed bear trails up a steep mountain. From the summit, views of the surrounding ridges and valleys opened before me. Uninhabited valleys and forest-covered mountain ridges alternated as far as I could see. The only sign of human habitation was the tiny village of Anavgay on the riverbank far below. Wild Kamchatka surrounded us, and descendants of its first human inhabitants stood among us. 

Our Even counterparts, most in their late teens and early 20s, compared to the mainly 30-something foreigners, were quite shy at first, not willing to initiate conversation. Gradually, while lounging on reindeer skins and spruce bows in the smoke-filled yurts, we got to know each other. Their bright eyes and broad smiles revealed an intense curiosity about life back in our home countries. I also inquired about their lives and families. Most were from Anavgay, though a few lived in Esso. Three of the dancers were sisters, while others were cousins. They had learned the dances from their mothers and grandmothers. The grandmother, a small, brightly clad woman in her 80s with dark eyes and skin, performed spiritual rituals with smoking branches for occasional passing tourists. Her three-year-old great-great-granddaughter watched and sometimes joined in the dances, donning a beaded headdress and ornamental leather dress. 

By entertaining occasional tourists at the reindeer camps with traditional dances and rituals, the young Even men and women earn money to support their siblings and parents. Many dream of going to college in the city, or traveling to Moscow and abroad. As members of the famed Even Dance Ensemble, they had a fighting chance. Other youths in the villages were not so lucky; more often than not, they were destined to become victims of alcoholism or tuberculosis, or would unwittingly become parents at the age of 15. 

The inspiring dances, beadwork, and lifestyle in harmony with nature made me contemplate becoming a reindeer herder, though I had yet to see a reindeer. Then I was told that I couldn’t become a reindeer herder, but only a reindeer herder’s wife, sitting around the fire in a smoky yurt with my beadwork, chatting with the other women, waiting anxiously for the men to return with the herd. Wife or herder, it would clearly be a hard life, with its back-breaking work, constant fear of starving or freezing, and gathering or making everything you wear, eat, or sleep on.

At the end of the week, we were scheduled to spend two nights in Esso – the usual destination for visitors to northern Kamchatka, with its quaint houses and large swimming pool of therapeutic thermal waters. Ready at the appointed time, we waited hours for the bus to Esso provided by the local administration. Transportation, it seemed, was not the local organizers’ strong point. From Esso, we traveled on foot and by horseback to Lake Ikar, about five miles from town. I left my nanny in town with my younger son. As there were not enough horses for everyone, I offered to walk. I put my older son Andrei on a horse after he grew tired and led him for a mile or so. Being familiar with horses, I was struck by the danger presented by hikers weaving in and out of protective mares with foals.

We reached the lake after an easy hike and enjoyed a refreshing swim in the cool waters. After lunch, we started back to Esso to spend the night in villagers’ homes. I sent Andrei ahead in a car that was shuttling those too tired to walk back. I hiked the rest of the way at a quick pace with two of the young Even women. About two miles from town, a group came galloping up. They stopped and asked if we wanted to ride. We climbed into the saddles. My horse was in the lead, so I nudged him into a trot, and the others followed. We cantered a short way. About five minutes into the ride, I heard someone call for me to stop. I reined in my horse and turned in my saddle. The cinch had come undone under one of the horses bringing up the rear. I looked around for the woman who had provided the horses (and arranged the ill-fated bus from the city), but she was nowhere in sight. I dismounted and looked for a place to tie my horse. As I turned my back and headed for a tree, reins in hand, the horse grabbed my arm in his powerful jaws. His teeth crunched down hard as he lifted me in the air before dropping me to the ground and bolting.

I crumpled in the dust. I knew from the pain my arm was broken. Blood seeped through my fleece. The other riders looked on in horror from their mounts, apparently afraid to get off their horses lest they also be attacked. A young French woman ran to my aid. Gritting my teeth, I asked her to remove my jacket and fashion a bandage and a sling. I stood up, my only thought to get back to town. I started down the trail, then sank back to the ground, my head spinning. “The car, the car!” someone called. “It went back to the lake for another group and will be here in a minute.”

The car finally appeared and all the passengers bailed out, making room for me. Nikolai Shishkin was behind the wheel. I had been his model apprentice as a birch bark weaver. His wife Ludmila sat in the backseat and consoled me through every painful bump on the dirt road. We arrived at dusk at the Esso hospital, a one-story wooden building on a hill overlooking the city. Nikolai drove off to find the town’s only surgeon, while a gruff nurse gave me a shot of painkillers and an elderly lady took x-rays. Ludmila remained at my side. 

The surgeon finally arrived, a tall handsome man of about 50. After studying the x-rays, he informed me that both my forearm bones had been dislocated and a small piece of bone had chipped off near the elbow. He injected more painkillers into my arm, rounded up two nurses and instructed them to pull. With the nurses tugging my hand and the doctor at my elbow, my bones slipped back into their socket. I screamed. Patients two wards down surely recoiled. The doctor sewed up three gashes in my forearm from the horse’s teeth and made a half cast that would hold my elbow in place but allow the wounds to be treated. 

The camp participants, including my kids and nanny, left for Petropavlovsk the next day. I spent the next five days lying in a dreary room on torn sheets in the Esso hospital. What I saw and heard there is another story. My arm swelled up like a balloon from the bite wound, and I was put on two kinds of antibiotics. When the danger of infection passed, I walked around Esso with my encased arm in a makeshift sling. I skirted puddles in the muddy streets and peered into the murky thermal pool. The town calls itself “Kamchatka’s Switzerland,” but, aside from the beautiful flowers in cottage gardens and mountainous backdrop, I failed to see the resemblance.

In the hospital, I learned that the horse that attacked me was a stallion, and that another stallion from a different herd had been among the group. Hence his agitation. The operators of the horse excursion had commandeered two stallions plus mares and foals to carry visitors (most of whom were beginners) without even accompanying them the entire way. Such is the way of tourism on Kamchatka. Wild people in a wild country. 

Once discharged, I was whisked back to civilization in the front seat of the well-functioning van with an experienced driver. Even with the setbacks, I felt richer for the experiences. Kamchatka had made its mark on me, and not only through the scars on my arm, which, when connected in dot-to-dot fashion, form an imprint not unlike the outline of the peninsula itself. Soon I was making plans to return to the unspoiled land of hotsprings, volcanoes, and bears.  RL