One day in the abandoned village Pyramid (Arctic, archipelago Svalbard) ⋆ Russian Urban Exploration

My name is Vladimir, I’m 33 years old and I’m a guide.

I worked in the village of Pyramid, which is located on the archipelago of Spitsbergen (the Arctic).

The Pyramid was preserved in 1998 and almost for a dozen years stood absolute ghost town. Now – this is a growing item in Norwegian tourist routes.

The pyramid remained the most northerly settlement in the world, but here many things have a prefix in the form of the words “the most northerly”: the world’s northernmost coal mine, the world’s northernmost swimming pool, the monument to Lenin, the working hotel, the world’s most northerly piano (even two) – in a word, a piece of the Arctic, where people miraculously managed to live and work.

The mine as unprofitable closed in 1998, people were taken out, and the outpost of socialism gradually turned into a refuge of arctic foxes and polar bears.

Here is one my working day in the Arctic.

At about 7-30 I wake up.

I live in a hotel Tulip – Soviet hotel, built 9 years before conservation, here is my room.

Teeth cleaning and washing.

Breakfast.

To go out on the street you have to put on all this, this kind of arctic cabbage:)

Carabiners are not for beauty – there are bear trails around the village.

So, we put on two pants, all sorts of thermo-stuffs, an inflated anorak and we take a carbine with a knife.

On the street, my friends, arctic foxes, already meet me. Saigon – so I called one of them. He’s braver than everyone and takes a treat from my hands.

Today I feed Saigon half a potato and a chicken bone.

View of the Pyramid Mountain (the village is named after it). Under the mountain there is a mechanical shop, which is still full of equipment, and to the left – a so-called “madhouse”, a house for couples with children.

This wooden building was called “London”, because there lived single, single men. A kind of arctic Soviet humor. By the way, not far from it is the same 4-storey brick house called “Paris”, once inhabited by single women. And as the best traditions of the genre, there is a dining room between the houses, apparently for secular meetings.

The thermometer at the garage shows in the sun minus 10. But it just seems to him, in the shade about 20 frosts, and every meter per second of the wind cools you by another 2 degrees. This thermometer is the biggest optimist this morning.

In the port there is a huge ribbon, along which coal was loaded on ships sent to the continent.

Nearby there is an abandoned building of the former thermal power station.

I have about an hour and a half before the arrival of a group of tourists, so it’s time to see a couple more sheds, in which there is always something interesting. Go ahead!

At first I thought it was paint or chemical reagents, but then, when I opened one of the boxes, I found inside the contents.

I do not know about you, but for me it’s incredible: all these metal boots and six disks packed in each of them are the films that were shown on the Pyramid!

Okay, let’s go further.

I go further to the barn, in which the sports equipment was stored.

And here is the hit of the season, that is called: a bunch of ski poles made of bamboo! At 78 degrees north latitude, bamboo was actively used.

I return to Tulip, to which a group of guests has already arrived. All Norwegians. After a brief welcome, I lead them first to look at the dining room.

Actually inside, in the dining room. Its worked 24 hours a day and 7 days a week and all food was free of charge.

A traditional photo of the most northern monument in the world to Lenin

We go to the cultural and sports complex. Inside, everything is preserved almost perfectly.

Gymnasium.

Exercise room in the style of Rocky Balboa.

On the second floor there is a library and a room with musical instruments.

View from the second floor.

We go into the pool now. The semi-Olympic standard is 25 meters. While the guys are in shock and wander around the perimeter, I manage to take a photo without them )