As far as you know, I decided to organize a road trip to Oymyakon, the Pole of Cold, from Jan. 17 till Jan. 21 for my friends. Today we, trip participants, gathered and had lunch in Yakutsk at the Chicago Bar.
There were alll of those mentioned in travellers list, including a German photographer Bjorn Steinz and a US student Tilden Smith. Bjorn arrived yesterday by plane from Vladivostok. Tilden came this morning by a car from Nerungri.
A very good news. I will go with my friends. By the last minute I wasn’t sure, whether I will go. There were a lot of works to be done. Read more…
Amazing! I received questions from an American lady, whose given name is Summer. It’s like “Hello from summer to winter.” She was asking:
I found some amazing stories about people who were there lately as tourists and I was wondering: Somebody on a web site who was there suggested highly the North Face Himalayan suit and couldn’t recommend it enough. But I read a few other things about how high tech parkas just don’t compare to reindeer skins etc…. What would you suggest about how to dress/what to bring if I ever decide to go there? And also any other tips for being outside in the middle of winter?
Read more…
UAZ is the best Pole of Cold Shuttle
A Jordi, of Catalonia, is asking:
I have been reading the last report about Norwegians’ accident [in Yakutia/Siberia], and I want to ask you something… Is this a recent story? I haven’t found the piece of news relating to this.
Nowadays I know some people who want to make the journey to Oymyakon [the coldest place in Yakutia and the whole Siberia], only as a wish, without nothing to take it seriously. I’ve been reading different articles, and AskYakutia’s reports and I think it is not a thing for not taking it seriously. It’s very funny to see -60ºC, but another thing is to go for them.
What do you thing about this journey? It is a little dangerous, isn’t it?
My answer was as follows: Read more…
A few weeks ago I received a question from an UK backpacker, who is coming to Yakutia in January 2010. He asked “Is there an ice road to the Lena Pillars? Is it possible to make it there in January?”
Btw, a request was sent via the Facebook group “Ask-Yakutia-Today,” everyone is welcome to join us.
Frankly saying, the Lena Pillars (located a few hundreds kilometres south off Yakutsk) is visited in winter less than in summer. The main reason is the ice road that was asked about. Read more…
As far as you know, there is no bridge over the Lena River at all. Therefore, to cross the river, locals are forced to use ferryboats from June till October and ice roads in winter, officially from the midst of December till early April.
Late April – May and late October – November are considered to be dangerous periods for crossing the river. Nevertheless, some people take the risk and as result we can periodically read news about accidents, precisely about sunken cars and trucks.
It is a must for local drivers to know ice roads requirements, and travelers are recommended to keep them in mind as well. So… Read more…
That’s what I see on my way home in the evening. In the last Friday evening, Dec. 4, 2009, we had -41ºC and fog and no winds. So the frost was almost dry and burning, and my quickly frozen camera was slow to take pictures. Many unfocused shots were just deleted. See the left pics.
That’s a X-mas tree on the Ordzhanikidze Sq. No garlands and decorations yet. We are promised to see its finished beauty on Dec. 9, 2009. Hope it will be so. Read more…
Yeah, it’s cold, but not so cold as it can be. Waiting for -50ºC.
See more my pics. Some of them are not sharp. My camera got frozen in a moment. The lens were so slow to focus. Read more…
The following post can give answers to many questions regarding Oymyakon, the Pole of Cold in Siberia. The author of the post is Jordi Marqui, a Catalonian cold weather enthusiast, who has its own WP blog AmazingSnow. The article was initially published on my partner blog ColdUnited.com. Thanks, Jordi!
Talking about Ojmjakon involves talking about the cradle of the cold, at least one of the few cradles of the planet. It is known that the -71.2°C is there, like a record, but probably won’t be satisfactorily demonstrate.
I expose a graph below, courtesy of forum collegue (rs), very involved in monitoring global temperatures, which shows us the detail of the number of days (since 1943) per year that Ojmjakon has reached (even exceeded) the -60ºC. As seen at first sight, and within natural variability, the powerful years to achieve this figure are from some time ago, with the decade 1985-95 as the least conducive to these rigors. In recent years, since 2000, seems to appear the 6 again, not with the frequency of periods that are obvious in the graph, but not staying at an impossible figure as in the aforementioned decade.
Read more…
I have a German friend, Bjorn Steinz. He is a pro photographer based in Prague. Two years ago he visited Yakutsk in November. He spent a few days just walking around on streets and taking pictures of people. Since then I promote his works and website oka2 Photography on every occasion, and I am grateful to him for giving such an permission :)
Here are what he came out with.
Read more…
Often asked about the tour to the Pole of Cold, Oymyakon. All the time the question sounds different. Some is interested in transfer rates, others in hotel rates, third persons are just wondering what to do and see in the Pole of Cold. So I decided why not just give away the description of the standard tour to the officially acknowledged coldest Siberian place?!
The Indigirka River, Oymyakon, Siberia/Russia. In some parts it is never frozen, even when the temperature goes below -50C.
The tour description was received from a friend of mine, Semen Baishev, an Oymyakon-based travel enthusiast. Actually it is him, who arranges all the travel program in the Pole of Cold for individual tourists and travel agencies’ groups. Oops, travel agencies might “kill” me for disclosing such an info :) Whatever. So… here we go. Read more…
