Murmansk, Russia
Kola Bay meets us with grey, low sky and drizzle… Nevertheless, many people were up on the bridge well before breakfast observing rocky shores and taking pictures of diverse family of vessels inhabiting a long fjord. Kola Bay is a typical fjord cutting into the land 57km with 7km wide at the entrance. It is home to a large Russian fleet including naval ships and submarines, fishery boats, cargo vessels and icebreakers. We encountered several nuclear icebreakers and the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Admiral Kuznetsov, oil storage ship and tankers, as well as Marine Ice Resistant Platform recently built at Severodvinsk naval shipyard for the Prirazlomnoe oil field in the SE Barents Sea.
At the pier next to the city center we met icebreaker Kapitan Dranitsyn, the one used during a Lindblad Expedition cruise to Franz-Josef Land in 2004. Seven years later, after a long work through Russian bureaucracy, National Geographic Explorer managed to get permission to enter the Russian Arctic as a foreign-flagged vessel. We all were waiting, and to be honest, concerned about coming meeting with Russian authorities and realities. A local pilot took us to the fishery port where we docked at 8 a.m. Passport clearance went well and about quarter to 9 four buses took us for the city tour. Most of the guests chose a full day program including city tour and marine museums, while one bus made only city tour. Weather was warm (up to +18C in the noon), calm and rainy at the start, but improved by lunchtime.
Murmansk is the largest city above the Polar Circle with ca. 307.5 thousand people as of 2010. It was founded in 1916 as a seaport, the only unfrozen port along the vast northern shores of Russia, and the last city founded by the Russian Empire, so it kept its original name, after the tsar family, Romanov-on-Murman for only 6 months.
We visited several remarkable sites ranging from Palace of Culture named after the Bolshevik Sergey Kirov to the recently (2004) erected Russian Orthodox Church. Murmansk stretches along the Kola Bay for some 20km and climbs up hillsides for more than 300m. We came to a hilltop to visit a great statue of Alyesha – the memorial to all defenders of the Soviet North during the Great Patriotic War (the Russian part of World War II). Murmansk experienced one of the greatest destruction among Soviet cities during the war and was later designated as a Hero City.
Part of the city tour was a brief visit to the regional natural and cultural history museum, where we made several jumps between old Russian icons, unique Kola minerals, stuffed birds and animals, pomors, sami and Soviet people… By the way, learnt that Capercaillie – deaf bird in Russian –in spring is sitting in front of ladies and singing his songs.
Finally, all four buses gathered in restaurant of Polyarnye Zori hotel for the lunch. Waiting in the long queue for the meal solaced a vocal quartet in traditional costumes singing beautiful Russian songs.
After lunch, three buses continued excursions for an insight into the maritime heritage associated with Murmansk. We visited a museum of the Murmansk Shipping Company, with a rich collection of the unique items, crowding in several rooms of the company’s office, telling about exploration of both Arctic and Antarctic, seamen and ships.
Probably the most exciting attraction was a nuclear powered icebreaker Lenin, now a museum ship, but still afloat. She is the first civil and above-the-water nuclear powered vessel in the world, laid down in 1956, launched in 1959. Besides all technical details about power and ice navigation capability, we were mostly impressed by the gorgeous wooden furniture and interior.
As planned, by 4 p.m., we are back on the ship, and surprisingly in time (5 minutes to 6 p.m.) leaving fishery port of Murmansk. Our way back through the Kola Bay looked like a real tourist cruise with almost full sunshine, light breeze and snack served astern. Another, rather better opportunity to picture various ships and even two subs, surfaced at the bay of Severomorsk city, a headquarters of the Northern Fleet, preparing for the Naval Day parade to be held on Sunday.
Now we are heading east to the real Russian adventure.
