Today, Vytegra is a small town (since 1773) with a population of about 10,300 people standing on the banks of the Vytegra River, 337 km north-west of Vologda, the capital of Vologda Oblast.

This is a unique opportunity to see what this place looked like 116 years ago – in 1909. This is possible thanks to the unique color photographs taken by Sergey Mikhaylovich Prokudin-Gorsky, a Russian chemist and photographer known for his pioneering work in color photography. Source.

General view of Vytegra and the Vytegra River.

back to the past

Tags: Russian Empire · Vologda oblast

In Yakutia there is a giant thermokarst depression in the Verkhoyansk ulus (district), 10 km southeast of the village of Batagai and about 660 km north-northeast of Yakutsk. The crater is named after the nearby Batagai River.

Batagaika is about 2 km long, 1 km wide, and about 100 meters deep. Inside, remains of ancient plants, bones and tusks of mammoths, frozen bison and horses are found. This layer of ice is twice as old as the ice of Antarctica. The Batagaika Crater on Google Maps. Photos by: Slava Stepanov.

very picturesque crater

Tags: Sakha Republic · Yakutsk city