Travel company offers: Vacation and camping in the abandoned gulags of Russia

The infamous concentration camps, which operated in the middle of the last century, have become a tourist attraction for adventurous tourists looking to get to the more remote and rugged places of Russia.

Some are so remote that they have remained intact for decades

Walla!

Tourism

29/12/2021

Wednesday, December 29, 2021, 8:30 p.m.

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Russia is a huge country that boasts a vast history and an abundance of things to see and do.

However, only a few tourists explore this great country in depth.

Most of them perform regular and tiring familiar routes, including the city of St. Petersburg, Moscow and an experiential ride on the well-known Trans-Siberian Railway.

However, there are much more hidden places.

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Gulag in Siberia in the 1950s (Photo: GettyImages, Laski Diffusion)

Millions of prisoners in three decades

Everyone knows that during Stalin's cruel and paranoid rule, life in Russia was notorious around the world. From the 1930s to the 1950s, millions of people perished directly and indirectly by the regime. In this context, the cruel concentration camps of the former Soviet Union are especially well known: the Gulag.

In fact, Gulag is not the name of a forced labor camp, but an acronym in Russian for "the chief executive of labor camps for repair." It was a division of the Internal Security Services of the Soviet Union, which was in charge of the penal system. Method of execution: Remote labor camps, where political rivals and other opponents of the regime were oppressed. Conditions in the Gulag were unbearably difficult, and alongside the political prisoners, they also housed criminals who committed such and such crimes.

An estimated 18 million people were sent to the Gulag. Of these, about 1.7-1.5 million never returned from them. This horrific system of punishments came to an end in 1960.

The Travel website reports that today it is possible to visit many of the abandoned camps in Russian territory (a large part of them are in countries that were once part of the Soviet Union).

One way or another, it turns out that even about six decades after they stopped operating, there are still many tourists who believe that the Gulag is still active.

Today, a visit to Russia is safe from this danger, and of course there is no need to worry.

A botanical prison in Moscow that used to be a gulag (Photo: GettyImages, Mikhail Svetlov)

Camping in the Gulag and fishing in the middle of the sea

The Magadan Tourist Company: Soviet Gulag Tour, now offers tourists tours to some of the infamous Gulag in Magadan Province and the Kolima region of northeastern Siberia. This is a rigid and remote region that is definitely not welcoming in terms of weather. In this space is also stretched "through the bones", a highway for thousands of kilometers. Prisoners who worked in forced labor, built the road decades ago. Some of them died in the development and paving work, were buried on the spot and actually became part of the road.

The tour offered by the company visits a number of remote gulags, as well as ghost towns and other abandoned remains from the Soviet period. This is a particularly adventurous vacation, which includes a camping experience in the abandoned Gulag areas, away from any locality. In addition, hikers will experience fishing in the cold waters of the Okhotsk Sea and other field adventures.

For those interested, the trip will take place July 31-25, 2022 (six nights).

Price: $ 2,240 per person.

The price includes accommodation in hotels and sites, breakfasts, entrance fees and an English-speaking guide.

For details.

Testimony from the days of the Gulag in the Moscow Museum (Photo: GettyImages, Wojtek Laski)

Three days of gulags in the Yakutsk area

Another, shorter option awaits tourists in the Yakutsk region of Siberia.

Here are gulags that have been given the local nickname YanStroi, and have been characterized by extremely harsh conditions.

The prisoners were tasked with paving roads in high and remote mountain passes.

Due to the great distance from civilization, most of these camps were left unharmed, making the tour a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

In this case, the tours can also be booked in the winter season, with the best time being from January to April.

The trip lasts three days (two nights), and the costs vary depending on the size of the group and other factors.

For details.

And there is also a virtual tour

Those who want to experience the visit to the Gulag without giving up leaving the house, are invited to take a virtual tour with "Gulag Online".

for further details

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