Bowermaster’s Adventures — Overfishing the Galapagos Islands

by Jon Bowermaster on

The equation is straightforward: Too many people attempting to live permanently in the Galapagos + too few jobs to go around = a percentage are resorting to illegal economies to survive. Shark finning is one of those illegalities, and still growing. Financed by mafias based in mainland Ecuador, fins are taken – hacked off, the useless carcasses tossed overboard – and sent abroad for shark fin soup. Japanese are the biggest culprits though there are restaurants as far away as Norway and Germany, which sell the soup as well. The sad reality is that not only is it a complete waste of the shark but the fins have absolutely no taste, no nutritional value. It’s all about the show. If you can afford shark fin soup – at a business meeting, wedding, anniversary – it means you’ve got the bucks to spend on a frivolity.

You’ve seen the television ads recently promoting various shark weeks? Fear continues to sell mediocre TV, thus the boom of such shows. Another statistic: How many people are killed by sharks each year worldwide? On average, four or five. How many sharks does man kill each year, some for food, others for showy displays of money? More than seventy million. It’s the sharks that should be swimming away from us as fast as they can.
Over fishing around the globe is a huge problem. The over fishing of sharks, especially the big ones, known as “apex predators” (including the great white and reef sharks) is particularly damaging to the marine cycle since sharks maintain the populations of smaller fish that in turn feed on smaller fish that people consume commercially. Minus the predators, these sub-predators run rampant and decimate smaller fish stocks. While we may think there are unlimited numbers of fish in the sea, the more we rapaciously take the fewer species will live on into the coming decades. One more statistic? The World Wildlife Fund expects all of the fish that we know today to be gone by 2050. That’s what we should be scared of, not the very slim potential of becoming lunch while enjoying a sunny holiday at the beach. (To find a detailed chart and database of the world’s endangered sharks, visit the Shark Foundation.)

%Gallery-77072%Recent attempts to bolster international fishing laws may be getting an extra push in the U.S. pending the passage of legislation now being considered in the Senate (and recently passed in the House). The legislation is designed to close most of the loopholes in the current ban on shark finning in American waters. Hopefully other nations will follow suit.

In the Galapagos we spent time with Godfrey Merlen, who represents San Francisco-based Wild Aid there. A twenty-year resident, he leads the group’s local efforts against illegal wildlife trafficking. Small groups of paid informants keep him alert to who in the relatively small community are shark finning (as well as poaching sea cucumbers and other at-risk species). Unfortunately once the fins are back in mainland Ecuador, even when seized by officials they often end up back in the illegal markets. Corruption is a boom business in Ecuador too.
“Over fishing of a number species is a reality in the Galapagos and in some ways – for some species, like lobsters – it’s a little bit late to talk about. We also know that thousands and thousands of sea cucumbers are recovered from illegal fisheries every year, which has had a depressing effect on the remaining population and makes management of it near impossible.

Bowermaster’s Galapagos — Chapter V from gadling on Vimeo.

“Still, even though we know it’s going on, illegal sea cucumber gathering is an active component of the fisheries here and brings in considerable money. Just recently, at the end February, there was a capture of thirty sacks of cucumbers on the mainland, about 3,000 pounds, with an estimated value of about $200,000. This is a lot of money and a lot of sea cucumbers. Most of them came from right here in the Galapagos Marine Reserve. Local fishermen say, What are we supposed to do, what are we supposed to fish? Lobster and grouper are nearly gone. So they get into the illegal market very, very simply and easily. Though the national park has patrol boats and keeps up vigilance the area is enormous and enforcement is difficult. As a result it’s been extremely easy to export illegal produce from the Galapagos.

“It’s exactly the same with the shark fin. Sharking finning, the removal of the fins and leaving the bodies to rot either in the ocean or on the shoreline, has become very common in Galapagos. Again, the fishermen say, “I have a lot of debt, I need to buy a new motor for my boat, and I don’t have any money.” Then someone comes along and says, Well, okay, I’ll lend you money but what I want is sea cucumbers, shark fins, sea lion penises, seahorses, whatever is the going mode especially in the far eastern countries where money is not a problem. Huge sums of money can be poured into a place like the Galapagos to fuel an illegal fishery. In the long run of course things can only go from bad to worse for the fishery.

“As resources decline whether through legal or illegal fisheries the resource is the basis of the fisherman’s economy. As those resources decline, incomes decline too and the cost of living keeps going up. Sooner or later the price of fuel will jump back up; currently it’s a very false $1 a gallon for diesel. What the fishermen fail to understand is that ultimately all these illegal activities combined with the lack of a sufficiently strong fisheries management, at a certain point the fishing sector of the economy will collapse.

“At the moment the fisherman finds himself in a really hot spot, partially through his own failure to appreciate the risks he’s running. He may make money today but tomorrow he will not make money. He’s already discovered that with the sea cucumber. Basically the fishermen have very little money because the resource is disappearing.”

Bowermaster’s Adventures — Kamchatka v. Kodiak, What a Difference 225 Years Makes

by Jon Bowermaster on

We sailed into Kodiak on a somewhat rarified day for this part of the world, one filled with sunshine rather than rain. The weekend just past had been its annual Crab Fest, an event dampened by typical summer weather: horizontal rain and temperatures just above freezing. But on a big, blue, sun-shiny day you’d be hard-pressed to imagine a more beautiful place, the entirety of Kodiak Island and the snowcapped mountains that rim it wrapped beneath an indigo blue sky.

Ironically, the place it reminded me of most of was Kamchatka, where we’d been a week before. Both are spectacular lands of active volcanoes and hot, spurting geysers. The seas that surround both are the same steel-blue, the volcanic mountain ranges similarly tall and foreboding, with fishing boats moving in and out of the bays. Both regions share physical turmoil as well as beauty, visited frequently by earthquakes, volcanoes and tsunami waves. Rain is a constant for both (Kamchatka, 110 inches a year, Kodiak, 68).

Though separated by one thousand miles of Bering Sea they started out with similar human roots as well. The very first Russian colony in North America was founded in 1784 at Three Saints Bay on southeastern Kodiak Island and until 1804 it was the center of Russian activity in Alaska. Russians are responsible for the name “Alaska,” derived from the Aleut alaxsxaq, meaning “the mainland” or more literally, “the object towards which the action of the sea is directed.”

%Gallery-69645%In the mid-1800s Russia, worried that the expanding U.S. and Canada would usurp its Alaskan territory without paying, attempted to play one against other in a bidding war, which proved unsuccessful. Ultimately, in 1867, the U.S. bought Alaska from the Russian Empire for $7.2 million (two cents per acre) and would become the 49th state on January 3, 1959.

Today both economies are driven by fishing. Kodiak is consistently one of the U.S.’s top three ports, with 750 fishing boats working off the island profiting from a wealth of Pacific salmon, Pacific halibut and crab. One thousand miles west, biologists estimate that a sixth to a quarter of all Pacific salmon originate in Kamchatka’s highly productive waters, including all six species of anadromous Pacific salmon (chinook, chum, coho, seema, pink, and sockeye).

But that’s where the comparisons come to a screeching halt. The state of the local economies and the health of the natural environments couldn’t be more different. The air and sea around Kodiak are nearly pristine; in Kamchatka, far from it, impacting the quality of life for all. Per capita income is widely different too (Alaskans, $33,000 a year; Kamchatkans, less than $7,500) and, no matter what you think about Alaskan politicians (Ted Stevens?), those in Kamchatka win the prize for blatant corruption.

How did these two regions, so similarly blessed by nature, turn out so differently? Two words: Soviet Union. During the Soviet era, Kamchatka was closed to outsiders for decades, for military reasons; today half of the territory of the Peninsula is still controlled by the Army. The result has been hard on both man and nature.

One of the first things you notice in Kamchatka is that there are very few old people. The harsh climate is partly to blame, but it is human influence, rather than natural forces, that shortens the lifespan of local residents. Despite its unspoiled appearance, the peninsula is filled with toxic pollutants, the most frightening aspect of which is that no one is really sure just how contaminated it is.

Until 1990 Kamchatka was home to the Soviet Pacific Submarine Fleet, several major airbases and is still an important testing ground for ICBMs. This substantial military presence has contaminated the landscape with heavy metals, radiation and other pollutants. The large naval base across from the capital city of Petropavlovsk bobs with poorly maintained nuclear submarines.

The decrepit capital appears to have been forgotten by time. Crumbling, Soviet concrete-slab buildings line the once-lush hills dropping down to the water. The once-bustling port is now mostly idle and crammed with rusting ships and scrap metal. Poaching – mostly illegal caviar, but also whales – are big economies and locals blame the intense poverty. It is estimated that criminal gangs poach at least half the fish sold from Kamchatka; when we were there twenty fishing trawlers were moored out at sea, impounded for poaching

While I met some beautiful and incredibly gracious individuals in Kamchatka, I couldn’t help but think that their situation was desperate. The few I met who would talk openly admitted that the corrupt bureaucracy that continues to oversee the plundering of the region’s unique natural resources cannot be – or at least should not be — continued. For their sake I hope big changes come. Soon.

Bowermaster’s Adventures — Dutch Harbor

by Jon Bowermaster on

Birthplace of the Winds, 10 Years After

During the past decade I’ve been to Dutch Harbor on the island of Unalaska – one of America’s last frontiers, potentially the planet’s next Singapore, home base for the loved-and-hated “Deadliest Catch” – seven times. Much has changed during the years, for me and for the place.

I first came this far west with close friends (Barry Tessman, Sean Farrell and Scott McGuire), three years later with French filmmakers (led by French television and political star Nicolas Hulot) and most recently as a visiting lecturer. I’ve arrived by ferry, small fishing boat, big fishing boat, small plane, helicopter and cruise ship; I’ve also kayaked along Unalaska’s rugged shores and climbed a handful of its volcanic peaks.

Dutch Harbor is annually the nation’s number one or two fishing port (trading off with Gloucester and followed closely by Kodiak). When I first came there was barely a bridge in town; today the town’s center has gravitated to a couple strip centers across from the airport. Its most famous bar and brawling center – the Elbow Room – is long closed. Yet its future looks oddly bright, and not because of the success of the Discovery Channel show, but because of the Arctic Ocean’s disappearing ice. As the Arctic’s ice lessens each year – some suggest it will be gone for good in another ten years – it makes the Northwest passage a much more commercially viable shipping route from Europe, Africa and the U.S. cutting thousands of miles off each trip, saving hundreds of thousands of dollars and gallons of diesel. The main port west of Canada? Dutch Harbor. There are many who believe the towns biggest boom is on the horizon.

When I arrived in 1999 it was on the strength of a first grant from the National Geographic Expeditions Council; six grants since have helped take my teams and me around the world. That first trip took Barry, Sean, Scott and I further west, to the Islands of Four Mountains, by kayak. Since then I’ve traveled literally around the world by kayak. Then my biggest corporate sponsor was Mountain Hardwear and my favorite jacket was its Windstopper Tech fleece (black/black). Today my biggest corporate sponsor is Mountain Hardwear and my favorite jacket is its (brand new) Windstopper Tech fleece (black/black).

From all the adventures I’ve had during the past decade some from that first expedition are still among my favorites. We arrived in Dutch by ferry from Homer, having slept on its deck for four wet, cold nights. And we still needed to get another 150 miles to the west before we could start kayaking. Unfortunately when we arrived we discovered that the guy we’d arranged to carry us the last leg (Scott Kerr) didn’t actually have a boat. I’d spent an anxious half-day walking the fishing docks before finally convincing Don Graves and his Miss Pepper to carry us another fifteen hours, in exchange for a sizable wad of cash. The night that followed was one of the hairiest we’d experienced then or since:

(From BIRTHPLACE OF THE WINDS, my book about that 1999 adventure …) “We had convinced Scott Kerr to meet us off Nikolski and accompany us aboard the Miss Pepper out to Kagamil, where we would be dropped off. (Don) Graves had no idea where he could safely drop anchor and unload us. We had leaned on Kerr to make the crossing, point us to the best drop-off point, then return to Nikolski with Graves.

“He’d agreed, in return for us bringing him $88 worth of groceries, Purina dog food and Red Man chewing tobacco. Just after midnight Graves calls out to me, saying we were nearing Nikolski … I grab the VHF radio and try to raise Kerr. No response. I try again. ‘Miss Pepper to Scott Kerr. Come in, Scott Kerr.’ After several tries he finally picks up. Groggily, he asks, ‘What’s your intention?’ as if we hadn’t explained it to him a dozen times.

“I shout over the roar of the boat and the sea that we are near Nikolski and that we’ll be offshore within a half hour. Then we lose communication. I can only assume he is on his way. (He later admits that when he heard the radio, he was very tempted to ignore it, roll over, pull Agrafina closer to him, and go back to sleep.)

“At 1 a.m. we pull into a wave-socked bay; a half-dozen lights a mile towards shore indicated Nikolski. Because Graves doesn’t know the entry through the rocky bay, it is too dangerous at night to get any closer. Soon we spot a giant, single headlight coming at us through the sea – Kerr in an 18-foot metal skiff. He pulls alongside, trying desperately not to bang into the Miss Pepper in the heavy seas. He is not alone. As he headed down to his boat, he’d knocked on the door of a sleeping neighbor – introduced as Rex – saying he needed help. Rex was barely awake; he thought he was coming out on a grocery run.

“Once they are aboard, it takes several passes to safely tie the skiff off the back of the boat. Empty .410 shells rattle around on its floor, making me wonder, what had these boys been hunting? We would be pulling the skiff behind, through the heavy seas, and Kerr is concerned that it not end up upside down, being dragged. Though he made the rendezvous, he doesn’t appear happy to be here. When he pulls back the hood of his forest green sweatshirt, wild, long, unkempt hair billows from beneath his ball cap. Around his waist he wears a rope belt loaded with knives and a heavy flashlight. He smells of wood smoke and tobacco.

“After brief introductions, he returns to his earlier question: ‘What are your intentions?’ Apparently Kerr has still not gotten the message. He thought we were bringing him his groceries and then crashing on his floor. Unrolling our maps, I focused on getting as much information out of him as possible in the limited hours we have together; first we tackle the question of the initial landing. Graves’ navigational system says we were 43 miles away from a sand beach on the north end of Kagamil, where Kerr says we’ll have no problem getting ashore. It will take us another three to four hours. In the dim light of the boat’s interior we study the maps together, us asking questions, him giving back little more than grunts.

“The final few hours of the fifteen-hour, 150-mile trip are spent trying to stay seated and picking up maps, coffee makers, donuts and rain gear as they fly around the cabin. The metal skiff tied to the back of the boat kept banging dangerously in the rough seas.

“I try to sleep sitting up. Scott Kerr admits to feeling slightly seasick and lies down on a bench. So much for our expert guide.

“Rex, dressed lightly considering the conditions, in blue jeans, hooded cotton sweatshirt and a Carhart vest, complains it is too hot in the cabin. For the bulk of the ride he stands on the back deck. I stand with him for a while and ask what it is that motivates him to live way out here. ‘Oooh, I been in some sit-eee-ations, that’s for sure, some real sit-eee-ations,’ was all he would say. Turning away he mutters, ‘It’s hot out here, ain’t it? Just like Florida.’ ”

Within a couple hours everything had gone awry; we’d lost the hatch cover to one of our big kayaks, Kerr’s metal boat was swamped and filled with sand and seawater on the beach at Kagamil and Rex was nearly hypothermic, smoking what might have been his last cigarette ….

Bowermaster’s Adventures — Russia’s nuclear legacy

by Jon Bowermaster on

Just around the corner from Petropavlovsk, ten miles by land or sea, located across Avachinskaya Bay on a small peninsula called Krasheninnikova sits Russia’s largest nuclear submarine base. It is off limits to outsiders and a shell of what it was during the Soviet Union’s heyday. Today – judging by a simple Google map search – there are just a half-dozen active nuclear subs sitting at its docks. Worrying to those who pay attention to such things are the shadows on the far edge of the docks on the same map, indicating somewhere between a dozen and twenty subs piled up next to each other. They are said to be at varying degrees of decommissioning.

For decades the submarine station and a couple nearby support bases provided good jobs for locals and drew many Russians and Ukrainians to live in this easternmost outpost. They are also the reason that until the end of the Cold War Kamchatka was off-limits to the rest of the world. Even today, twenty years later, Russia continues to maintain a heavy military presence here.

The operation of nuclear-powered submarines generates considerable amounts of nuclear waste. Liquid and solid radioactive wastes need to be removed from submarines and stored. In addition, periodically the submarine needs to be refueled, thus spent fuel needs to be removed from the submarine and also stored. Decommissioning a nuclear submarine generates these streams of waste and in addition, the refueled reactor compartment must be dealt with.

It is a little worrying to me, an outsider, that the region’s two biggest industries overlap: Nuclear sub decommissioning and fishing. If the same worries locals, I can’t get it out of them during my day wandering the streets of Petropavlovsk. Most likely they are concerned too but are not going to share their feelings with a stranger.

Occasional testing of local air and water for radiation is done and recent tests suggest levels of both near the Rybachiy base had “slightly-elevated-levels. How much radioactivity is too much? One expert told me a story of some smalltime crooks who broke into the subs waiting to be decommissioned to steal gold used in their construction; stashing the goods under their beds was apparently not a very wise thing to do, given their radioactivity, which extracted the ultimate payback.

There are other concerns. In recent years there have been a handful of accidents involving Russian subs, fires, mostly and a couple very publicized sinkings. The Russian Northern Fleet’s main storage for nuclear waste at Kola Peninsula is reportedly leaking radioactivity. During 1997 all spent nuclear fuel, which was sent to Andreeva Bay, was stored in the open, without protection. At other big submarine bases, including the big one at Murmansk, there have been reports of nuclear subs being scuttled – sunk to the bottom of the ocean – without proper clean-up of the nuclear reactors aboard. Russians have previously admitted to dumping nuclear waste at sea, off the coast of Japan. The future of Ribachiy remains a big question.

This is from a U.S. State Department report: “In Russia every step of the process is facing problems. The support complex which was already in poor shape and accident-prone during Soviet times has been particularly burdened in the last few years. Shore-side waste sites are full of low-level radioactive waste and spent fuel. Shipments of the spent fuel for reprocessing have been delayed due to lack of funds and equipment. The service ships, which unload the spent fuel from submarines, are also full and in poor shape (and some have suffered accidents). The shipyards where the work is done are facing financial shortages, power blackouts and strikes. There are no final land-based storage sites for decommissioned reactor compartments removed from submarines, so they are being stored afloat in bays near naval bases. Finally, contamination is widespread at waste storage sites in the North and Far East due to accidents. Lower-level contamination is thought to plague virtually every support facility for the fleet. In addition, accidents on submarines have lead to contamination of the surrounding area.

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“The massive retirement of nuclear powered submarines has further aggravated this problem. The number of nuclear-powered submarines has declined substantially since the end of the Cold War as many first and second-generation nuclear powered submarines have been decommissioned. Also, due to lack of financing and arms control treaties, even third generation submarines are being removed from service. The Soviet Union/Russia constructed some 248 submarines by 1996 and some 150-170 have been removed from service. Only some third of these have had their spent fuel removed. Of the fifty or so submarines that have had their fuel removed only some 20-25 have been partially scrapped and their reactor compartments removed, sealed up, stored afloat. A particular problem is that at least one submarine in the Northern Fleet and three submarines in the Pacific Fleet were retired due to nuclear accidents. They have damaged spent fuel on board and the Russian Navy is uncertain about how to decommission them.

“Another concern with decommissioned submarines which still have their spent fuel onboard is accidents. Naval officers fear another major accident could occur, like what transpired on 10 August 1985 when an Echo II nuclear-powered submarine reactor exploded during a refueling at the Chazhma Bay shipyard. Another worry is that a decommissioned nuclear submarine could sink at dockside. On 29-30th May 1997, this happened when a decommissioned submarine sank at the submarine facilities in Kamchatka. Reportedly a vessel collided with the moored submarine, and it sank. The Russian Navy claimed all fuel had been offloaded from the submarine, and it posed no environmental hazard. However, such reports are not reassuring.

“The most acute problem today is that of the decommissioned submarines and the shore-side support facilities and maintenance ships. Little thought or planning had gone into what to do with retired submarines prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Since 1991, a lot of thought has been devoted to this problem, but the absence of finances has meant serious environmental problems continue, and will probably continue for a decade or more to come. The Russian Navy and surrounding countries remain concerned that a major accident could ensue.

“In March 1993, after several years of revelations about the dumping of radioactive waste at sea, the Russian government released a White Paper describing some 30 years of the dumping of radioactive waste at sea. The so-called Yablokov report detailed how 18 damaged naval nuclear reactors and two internal reactor screen assemblies were dumped in the seas around the Soviet Union. Sixteen reactors were dumped in the Kara Sea and 2 in the Sea of Japan. One reactor screen assembly was dumped in the Kara Sea and one off Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky in the northern Pacific Ocean.

“Several scientific expeditions to the dump areas in the Arctic found local contamination from dumped materials. But there is no evidence of migration so far. However, all dump sites were not found and fully investigated.”

After reading various high-level reports, and looking out over what would appear to be a beautiful northern Pacific seascape from the hills above Petropavlovsk … I don’t think I’ll be buying second-home property here.

Bowermaster’s Adventures — Kamchatka, Russia

by Jon Bowermaster on

This land of volcanoes and earthquakes — the western frontier of the literary “Ring of Fire” — is still a month away from true spring. Dirty, crusted snow lies beneath the leafless trees and in the gutters along Petropavlovsk’s main streets, which already look pretty grim, lined as they are by Soviet-era buildings. The only hints of color in town are the red-and-yellow hot dog-beer-and-coffee stands across from Lenin Square and the colorfully painted walls of a local gym. Otherwise, from the bottle-strewn banks of the fishing harbor to the top of the hills looking out over Avachinskaya Bay, the operative description of this city at the tip of the Kamchatka Peninsula is … grey.

Long a place shrouded in secrecy, Kamchatka was until recently known to Westerners only as a closed military region or as a name on the Risk board. We are at the very edge of the Russian Far East, a region known locally as “the back of the beyond.” The seven hundred and fifty mile long peninsula is lined by a pair of mountain ranges – the Sredenny (Central) and Vostochny (Eastern) – and from the air looks like a big fish. The Kamchatka River fills the trough between the two ranges. Encircling the city are snow-capped volcanoes, nearly 300 dot the peninsula, a tenth still active. When I ask the first people I meet — two young journalism students, Victoria and Ivan – if they remember the last eruption they smile, wracking their memories.

“I think it was like two weeks ago,” says Victoria. “But they happen so often, it’s hard to be sure. And earthquakes, too. But we are used to them. Why do you think the buildings are so … solid?”

Three-quarters of the peninsula’s 400,000 people live in Petropavlovsk, the capital city founded by Russian explorer Vitus Bering and named after his two ships, the St. Peter and St. Paul. The Russians and Ukrainians here mostly came to work at its once-booming navy station; ten miles across the bay sits Russia’s second largest nuclear submarine base. The indigenous Itelmen and Koryaks are still mostly nomadic reindeer herders. Judging by the attire of the locals waiting in long lines at bus stops, the biggest imports are patent leather jackets and boots with spiked heels (for women) and camouflage (for men).

The peninsula is known for an amazing diversity and abundance of wildlife: Sable, ermine, Siberian bighorn (or snow) sheep, the Kamchatka brown bear, crab and, of course, salmon in large quantities. Today it’s said that Kamchatka’s industries can be divided into two categories: fishing and those that support fishing, though some are at risk of being over-fished. At the dock I eat thick slabs of brown bread slathered with red caviar.

As I munch at the dock I watch big fishing boats readying to head back out to sea. When I ask what they fish, the answer is simple: “Whales.”

“But isn’t whaling illegal?”

“Listen,” says a fisherman in blue rubber bibs hosing down the back ramp of one of the gunmetal grey boats. “I know in Alaska it is illegal to shoot even a bird. But here, this is Russia. Nothing is illegal.”

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Fish are ninety-three percent of Kamchatka’s exports, particularly salmon and king crab (though after walking the city for a day, I have to say it was very, very difficult to find either … or even a restaurant to ask for them. “Eating out is not popular,” admits the only guidebook reference to food I could find). Kamchatka’s biggest import is fuel, which in the recent past led to some trouble. I ask why there appear to be so many burned-out homes along the main hills. “About ten years ago we did not receive enough coal,” says a man drinking coffee across from Lenin Square. “People were using open fires to heat inside. Obviously there were some … problems.”

The fall of the Soviet Union in 1990 opened the region to the outside world and there is something of a tourist industry here, though small. A land still being born, thanks to the near-constant volcanic activity, Kamchatka can be a place of breathtaking beauty and unique wildlife; this afternoon when the sun pops out and the sky clears a perimeter lined with snow-capped mountains is revealed across the wind-swept bay.

There is a saying here which loosely translates as, “In the winter it’s not too cold, but in the summer it’s not very warm!” Pharmacologists are on record that a cup of fresh Kamchatka water drunk in the morning heals the liver and stomach, cleans the blood vessels and prohibits bacteria. Other scientific studies detail increased levels of radioactivity in both air and water, thanks to the decommissioning of nuclear subs taking place just across the bay. Which makes me somewhat reluctant to drink from its taps or, if I could find one, eat one of those giant king crabs.

The only Russian phrase I pick up during a day of wandering PK? “Kamchatka, ehto strannoe mesto” (It’s a strange place).