Valley of Geysers
Interesting facts
- When the valley was found in 1941, geysers were known only in Iceland, the United States and New Zealand; none had ever been recorded in Asia.
- Tatyana Ustinova made the discovery in April 1941 on a dog-sled trip with the Itelmen guide Anisifor Krupenin, while tracing where water from the Uzon caldera drained.
- The very first geyser the pair saw was named Pervenets, the Firstborn; it is the only geyser lying outside the Geysernaya River valley itself.
- On a return trip in July 1941 Ustinova and Krupenin timed and named the vents, choosing names like the Crack and the Triple for the shape of their jets.
- The outbreak of war that summer halted the research: Moscow ordered the work stopped and Ustinova was dismissed from the reserve.
- Rains from Typhoon Elsa in 1981 raised the river by several metres, rolling three-metre boulders down the canyon, and the geyser Bolshaya Pechka disappeared for good.
- The 2007 landslide moved roughly 20 million cubic metres of rock and threw a dam some 50 to 60 metres high across the river.
- The Bolshoy geyser spent about three months underwater after the 2007 slide, then came back to life on 20 September 2007, erupting much as before.
- The landslide struck while a crew was filming the documentary Wild Russia, which ended up with footage of the valley both before and after.
- In 1972 the valley served as a location for the Soviet adventure film Sannikov Land, and in 2008 it was voted one of the Seven Wonders of Russia.
Why it is worth it
The Valley of Geysers in Kamchatka is a six-kilometre gorge on the Geysernaya River where some ninety geysers and many hot springs break out of the slopes, making it the second-largest geyser field in the world. The water is heated by the young stratovolcano Kikhpinych; hundreds of metres below the caldera floor it reaches temperatures of 250 °C. Most of the vents lie on the left bank of the river, and the whole basin steams.
The field was found only in 1941, by the geologist Tatyana Ustinova, who published her discovery fourteen years later. Systematic study began in the 1970s, and more than thirty geysers received names; the best known, Velikan, the Giant, can throw a jet of water up to about 40 metres high. From the 1980s the valley became one of the great natural attractions of the Soviet Far East, and foreign visitors were admitted from 1991. It lies within the Kronotsky Nature Reserve, part of the Volcanoes of Kamchatka World Heritage Site.
On 3 June 2007 a huge mudflow swept down into the valley and buried about two thirds of it, and a lake formed behind the debris. It seemed at first that one of the world's natural wonders had been lost, but the damage proved less permanent than feared: Velikan remained active, and after heavy rains in 2013 a new landslide breached the natural dam, the water fell, and buried springs began to erupt again. The valley is a living landscape that continues to rebuild itself.
Getting there
The valley is about 180 km north of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. It has no road, and helicopter is the only practical way in; Yelizovo Airport (PKC), the region's main airport, is about 179 km away.
On these lists
From the encyclopaedia
The Valley of Geysers is a geyser field on Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia, and has the second-largest concentration of geysers in the world. This six-kilometre-long (3.7 mi) basin with approximately ninety geysers and many hot springs is situated on the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far East, predominantly on the left bank of the ever-deepening Geysernaya River, into which geothermal waters flow from a relatively young stratovolcano, Kikhpinych. Temperatures have been found to be 250 °C (482 °F), 500 m (1,640 ft) below the caldera ground. It is part of the Kronotsky Nature Reserve, which, in turn, is incorporated into the World Heritage Site "Volcanoes of Kamchatka". The valley is difficult to reach, with helicopters providing the only feasible means of transport.
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