What to photograph when traveling in Russia: we go to shoot far away | Articles | Photo, video, optics

Sum­mer is on the way, and trips abroad are still quite a steamy (some­times sim­ply unsolv­able) quest. But it doesn’t mat­ter, because in Rus­sia there are a lot of beau­ti­ful places where any pho­tog­ra­ph­er should vis­it. In this arti­cle, we have col­lect­ed five points on the map of our coun­try that can give you not only an unfor­get­table expe­ri­ence, but also cool work for your port­fo­lio. At the same time, every­one can get there with­out spend­ing fab­u­lous mon­ey on the trip (hel­lo, Kam­chat­ka!).

Pho­to: pixabay.com

All these places stand out, first of all, for their nat­ur­al land­scape, so they will be of inter­est main­ly to land­scape painters and trav­el pho­tog­ra­phers, although wildlife lovers will not remain indif­fer­ent either. We have cal­cu­lat­ed for you the approx­i­mate costs of trav­el (we took Moscow or St. Peters­burg as the start­ing point) and accom­mo­da­tion (we used the cur­rent book­ing prices for June-July), and also indi­cat­ed the most com­fort­able sea­son for the trip.

Karelia: Ladoga Skerries

The col­or of moss­es and lichens (from pink to pur­ple) dif­fers on dif­fer­ent islands depend­ing on their prox­im­i­ty to the coast. Pho­to: Mari­na Tsel­ishche­va / commons.wikimedia.org

What to shoot

Lado­ga is the largest lake in Europe. It is here that the famous Kizhi and Valaam are locat­ed, but the Kare­lian part of Lake Lado­ga can give pho­tog­ra­phers not only excel­lent shots of his­tor­i­cal mon­u­ments and the orig­i­nal archi­tec­ture of these places. Skhera is a word of Scan­di­na­vian ori­gin, which lit­er­al­ly means “rock in the sea.” The Lado­ga sker­ries are an arch­i­pel­ago con­sist­ing of rocky islands, which are sep­a­rat­ed by nar­row straits, and cov­er a sig­nif­i­cant part of the coastal strip of the lake, bor­der­ing the fjord-type shores.

How to get there

To get to the sker­ries, you first need to get to the boat sta­tion in the vil­lage of Lakhden­pokhya or in the city of Sor­tavala (from Sor­tavala it is con­ve­nient to get to Valaam). It is eas­i­er to go on a trip not from Moscow, but from St. Peters­burg: by car or by the high-speed train “Las­tochka”. Then you can rent a boat (do not spare mon­ey and take a motor boat) and trav­el around the islands on your own (you will have to spend the night in a tent), or book a boat tour there. For those who do not like camp­ing, there is an option to stay in one of the guest hous­es near the coast and go on a trip to the sker­ries from there.

When to go

June to August. It is also very beau­ti­ful in win­ter, but you can no longer live in a tent.

What is the price

• Train St. Peters­burg — Sor­tavala (round-trip): 2000 rubles
• Rent a motor­boat: 2–3 thou­sand rubles per day
• Accom­mo­da­tion in a guest house near the lake: from 2000 rubles (or in a tent on the sker­ries them­selves — price­less)

Baikal: coast and Olkhon

Olkhon is the sacred island of Bury­at shamans. Pho­to: Vic­to­ria She­ri­na / commons.wikimedia.org

What to shoot

Con­tin­u­ing the lake theme, let’s climb a lit­tle to the south and east. Lake Baikal is one of the old­est geo­graph­i­cal fea­tures on Earth (the lake was formed 25–30 mil­lion years ago) and one of the points on the map that attracts wildlife and land­scape pho­tog­ra­phers from all over the world.

In sum­mer, you can cap­ture breath­tak­ing views of the deep­est blue of the water, with high moun­tain ranges on the oppo­site bank. And in win­ter, always remem­ber the snow-white sur­face, hard as steel, lined with icy roads.

You can swim in Baikal, drink from it, trav­el around its south­ern coast by train, ride a dog sled across it in win­ter, or sim­ply admire the ancient lake from any­where along its 2,000-kilometer coast­line.

Olkhon Island, locat­ed in the cen­tral part of the lake, deserves spe­cial men­tion. This sacred cen­ter of the shamans of the north­ern world is known not only for the most pow­er­ful ener­gy of a real place of pow­er, but also for its harsh, but at the same time breath­tak­ing nat­ur­al land­scapes.

How to get there

A pop­u­lar start­ing point for a trip to Lake Baikal (west coast) is the vil­lage of Listvyan­ka. A minibus runs from Irkut­sk to it. You can get to Olkhon by bus both from Listvyan­ka itself and direct­ly from Irkut­sk.

When to go

From July to August. In win­ter, Baikal is also cool, but be pre­pared for cold weath­er (often below ‑15 ° C dur­ing the day).

What is the price

• Plane Moscow — Irkut­sk (round-trip): an aver­age of about 14,000 rubles
• Bus Irkut­sk — Listvyan­ka: 150 rubles
• Bus Irkut­sk — Khuzhir (this is the cap­i­tal of Olkhon): 750 rubles
• Accom­mo­da­tion in Listvyan­ka: a bed in a shared hos­tel room — from 800 rubles, a sep­a­rate room — from 2000 rubles

Mountain Altai

View of Mount Belukha. Pho­to: Dukvink / commons.wikimedia.org

What to shoot

In this vast and sparse­ly pop­u­lat­ed region you will find many lakes, snow-capped moun­tains, includ­ing the high­est peak in Siberia — Belukha (its height is 4506 m above sea lev­el), shady forests, seething rivers. And wildlife pho­tog­ra­phers are expect­ed by bears, wolves and even the leg­endary snow leop­ard.

In Altai, there are almost lim­it­less oppor­tu­ni­ties for hik­ing and pho­tograph­ing moun­tain ranges, and trav­el pho­tog­ra­phers will be able to cap­ture the (unfor­tu­nate­ly grad­u­al­ly dis­ap­pear­ing) tra­di­tion­al life of the Alta­ians, but for this you need to pre­pare in advance and find a suit­able guide.

Hik­ing will require a high degree of self-suf­fi­cien­cy and auton­o­my: even the most pop­u­lar trails may lack sign­posts, vil­lages, and rest areas. In addi­tion, it is not always easy to find guides and pack ani­mals on the spot (most like­ly, there will be no such prob­lems only in the vil­lages of Tun­gur and Chemal). On the oth­er hand, in Gorno-Altaisk and near it, the tourist infra­struc­ture is quite well devel­oped: beau­ti­ful views are with­in walk­ing dis­tance. Even if you don’t want to prac­tice long hikes and spend the night in a tent, you will have some­thing to impress.

How to get there

Altai con­sists of two admin­is­tra­tive units — the Altai Ter­ri­to­ry with its cap­i­tal in Bar­naul in the north and the Repub­lic of Altai with its cap­i­tal in Gorno-Altaisk in the south. It is the Repub­lic of Altai that is most inter­est­ing in terms of tourism and pho­tog­ra­phy, and Gorno-Altaisk is a log­i­cal start­ing point for vis­it­ing most of the sights. It’s eas­i­er to fly there.

When to go

It is bet­ter to plan a trip for the peri­od from June to Sep­tem­ber.

What is the price

• Plane Moscow — Gorno-Altaisk (round-trip): an aver­age of about 10,000 rubles
• Accom­mo­da­tion in Gorno-Altaisk: a bed in a hos­tel dor­mi­to­ry room — from 500 rubles, a sep­a­rate room — from 1200 rubles

Caucasus: Elbrus and Elbrus region

Elbrus at sun­set. Pho­to: Alexan­der Horoshilov / commons.wikimedia.org

What to shoot

Con­tin­u­ing the theme of moun­tain beau­ties, of course, one can­not ignore the Cau­ca­sus. Most tourists flock to the amaz­ing moun­tains of the Greater Cau­ca­sus. Here are the high­est peaks in Europe: 200 peaks over 4000 m high, 30 over 4500 m high, sev­en over 5000 m, includ­ing Elbrus (5642 m).

But all these sta­tis­tics do not con­vey the beau­ty of these places, where pas­toral green foothills coex­ist with impreg­nable walls of stone spiers, glac­i­ers and awe­some rocks ris­ing miles into the sky. The Cau­ca­sus is a real gem for adven­tur­ers, as well as land­scape and trav­el pho­tog­ra­phers.

Climb­ing Elbrus, Europe’s high­est peak, is option­al: there are dozens of much more gen­tle routes that will take you to the per­fect frame for your new cal­en­dar. Here you can go ski­ing, and on some slopes this plea­sure is avail­able all year round.

How to get there

It is more con­ve­nient — from Nalchik or Min­er­al­nye Vody (a plane flies from Moscow to both points). Then by trans­fer or by taxi to the vil­lage of Ter­skol or glade Cheget.

When to go

For sum­mer land­scapes — from July to August. For win­ter — from Novem­ber to April.

What is the price

• Plane Moscow — Nalchik (round-trip): an aver­age of about 10,000 rubles
• Trans­fer Nalchik — Ter­skol: 2500 rubles (car for three pas­sen­gers)
• Accom­mo­da­tion in Ter­skol: a sep­a­rate room — from 2000 rubles

Kaliningrad Region: Curonian Spit

Ready-made scenery for the Blair Witch Project remake. Pho­to: Alek­san­dr Cha­zov / commons.wikimedia.org

What to shoot

Tall dunes, vir­gin beach­es and dense pine forests teem­ing with var­i­ous wild ani­mals — this is all about the Curon­ian Spit, a UNESCO World Her­itage Site. It stretch­es for 98 kilo­me­ters and sep­a­rates the Baltic Sea in the west from the calm waters of the Curon­ian Lagoon in the east. 50 km of the spit is locat­ed on the ter­ri­to­ry of Rus­sia (the rest is in Lithua­nia), this is the Curon­ian Spit Nation­al Park. There you will see sand dunes (there are more than 60 meters high), which are in con­stant motion, dri­ven by the wind. The spit com­bines a vari­ety of land­scapes — from desert (dunes) to tun­dra (moun­tain swamp). The east coast is dot­ted with vil­lages and towns (Lesnoy, Rybachy, Morskoye) — there are no prob­lems with the tourist infra­struc­ture.

One of the main attrac­tions of the Curon­ian Spit is the Danc­ing For­est. Here you will find a whole array of mys­te­ri­ous­ly curved pine trees, as if frozen in a dance. This place is per­fect for an atmos­pher­ic pho­to shoot. 3 km south of Morskoye there is a pho­to­genic hik­ing trail that stretch­es from one side of the spit to the oth­er. On the way you will see Orekho­vaya, the high­est drift­ing dune in Europe, whose peak, the height of Efa, reach­es 62 meters.

How to get there

You can get to Morskoy by bus from Kalin­ingrad, on the way there are stops in Rybachy and Lesnoy.

When to go

The best time is from April to Octo­ber.

What is the price

• Plane Peters­burg — Kalin­ingrad (round-trip): an aver­age of about 5,500 rubles
• Bus Kalin­ingrad — Morskoe (both ways): 500 rubles
• Accom­mo­da­tion in Morskoye: a room in a guest house — from 2000 rubles (or a tent is price­less, but it can only be set up in spe­cial­ly des­ig­nat­ed places, while open fires are pro­hib­it­ed)