Landing to Barentsburg (original) (raw)

[](3%5F26Harbour1%5FL.jpg)
Barentsburg looking up from the port
(click photo to enlarge)

[](8%5F22Barentsburg1%5FL.jpg) [](8%5F23Barentsburg2%5FL.jpg)
(You can enlarge photos by clicking)
Barentsburg from airplane

Barentsburg, Russian mining settlement, is situated on the sunny east slope of Greenfjorden.
The Russian company " Trust Arktikugol " has been mining here since it bought the settlement from the Netherlands in 1932.
However, the mining seems to have been stopped due to fire on 17th Apr., 2008.
Moreover, Barentsburg feels sorrow for sever reduction in prices of coal as well as oil, drop in the value of Russian currency, and worse relationship with Ukraine, where a majority of Barentsburg's workforce comes from.

Landing to Barentsburg

From the wharf, a charming woman guided us. "Welcome to Barentsburg. Please go up the stairs with 263 steps to the town center."

• [](4%5F28OldHouse%5FL.jpg) (click photo to enlarge)
  MAP between 2 and 3 At the middle of the stairs, there remained four abandoned houses, old miners residences.

• After the ascent of the stairs, I reached a square where I admired a fine view of the port and the fjord.

• A house with a usual appearance for living in was an indoor farm calling "our green house". Vegetables such as tomato, cucumber, and onion were cultivated in it. The guide said the vegitables were expensive.

Pomor Museum (Map 8)

The museum faces to the main street, paved with stone, near the theater.

[](3%5F32PomorFront%5FL.jpg) (click photo to enlarge)
"Pomor" means Russian people living in the White Sea area. "Po" and "more" mean "by" and "sea", respectively.
Our guide told us the people first had discovered Svalbard, not Willem Barents, so the museum was named after them.
The museum is introduced by "Lonely Planet" as "you should rush into the museum during the tour"
Since I could spend only about half an hour at the museum, I was unable to enjoy the articles on exhibition.
You can see the lights in the museum turned off in the above photo. The lights are considered to be turned on only during the guests in the museum. Is it an idea for reducing electric power?

According to the Barents Observer, the museum has been closed to public since 2008 summer.
See also Wikipedia.

The first floor of the museum contained a souvenir shop, a cloak room, and an art room exhibiting pictures.
In the souvenir shop, even post cards sent from the Russian mainland and notes used in Byelorussia were sold.
I could not obtain the commissary note issued by Trust Arktikugol, of course.

The second floor consisted of seven rooms.

Room 1 Nature	Room 2 Geology
[](3%5F34BearCalibou%5FL.jpg) [](3%5F33Bear%5FL.jpg) [](3%5F35Birds%5FL.jpg)(Each photo can be enlarged by clicking.)	[](3%5F36tent%5FL.jpg)(click photo to enlarge)
	There were some mineral samples such as precambrian rocks

Room 3 XVI - XVIII B. B. Spitsbergen	Room 4 Barents expedition	Room 5 Scientific exploration of Spitsbergen
[](4%5F01ArchipelagoModel%5FL.jpg) [](3%5F37Yari%5FL.jpg)(Each photo can be enlarged by clicking)	(no photo)	[](4%5F03Rusanov%5FL.jpg) [](4%5F02Sled%5FL.jpg)(Each photo can be enlarged by clicking)
Fishhook, harpoon, earthen vessel, some pieces of wood, axe, rope, etc. Explanations were Russian only.	In spite of the instruction by our guide, the Russians seems to accept the great work by Willem Barents.	Rusanov is a Russian explorer. (1875 - 1913)Sled and polar bear

Room 6 Barentsburg yesterday and today
[](4%5F05B1941%5FL.jpg)(click photo to enlarge)	[](4%5F07War%5FL.jpg) (click photo to enlarge)
1920 - 41 Russian explanation only.There were many mentions about 1932, which is the year the Trust Arktikugol purchased the mine.Many photos about sea and ship. A ship was surrounded by ice in a photo.	Era of war (WWII)Many photos in the war(The following is the translation of the explanations written in Russian. I am afraid of some misinterpretation since I tried to translate them from the photo shown here, and I do not know Russian.) On 22nd June 1941, the radio at Barentsburg broadcasted the attack of Germany to USSR. The cargo ships left Barensburg to the mainland within the same day. The traffic between Barentsburg and the mainland was interrupted. The explorers worked well to save their motherland. Operations at the mine did not stop even for a little while. The residents at Barentsburg sent their investment about a million roubles. Barentsburg was attacked from sea and air. It was planned explosions of the drift of the mine and the loading machine. All residents ran away to the mountain and received minimum food and fuel, which had been kept for emergency. In autumn (25 Aug.) 1941, the miners and their family were evacuated from Barentsburg to Arkhangelsk by H. M. S. Empress of Canada. On 8th Sept. 1943, the German fleet (D. K. M. Tirpitz, Scharnhorst, and nine destroyers) shelled Barentsburg. All constructions were destroyed within half a day.

Room 7 Mine view
[](4%5F12MineView%5FL.jpg) (click photo to enlarge)
I returned to the room 1 through the passage shown in the center of the photo.

1st floor cloak room, art room exhibiting pictures
[](4%5F13toilette%5FL.jpg) (click photo to enlarge)
Some tourist (almost Norwegian) took videos.

After leaving the museum, I went to Hotel Barentsburg.

Trust Arktikgol

[](4%5F16TrustArktikgol%5FL.jpg)
(click photo to enlarge)
Some workers were waiting (?) in the front of the office. They came here by a vehicle (truck) just before this capture.

Hotel Barentsburg

My visit for 1.5h was over at the hotel.

Valuable informations

• Links about Barentsburg
  News (now, accident of airplane and mine), Coins and notes.
• Icepeople 6th Jan., 2015

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[Travelogue to Svalbard](../index%5FE.html)

bluemt@lib.bekkoame.ne.jp

Last Modified : 8th Feb., 2015