Ukraine 2018 - Day 3: Visiting Pripyat

We got the train back into the exclusion zone from the overnight stay in Chernihiv, this took around 40 minutes. Before eating breakfast we went to the close up viewpoint of reactor 4 to take a photo of the new sarcophagus. This was paid for by many European countries at a cost of €2billion. We then ate breakfast which was at the same place we had eaten lunch yesterday. 

Reactor 4 sarcophagus

We would then head to the city of Pripyat where upon arriving we would take a photo of the welcoming sign. This is on the edge what is known as the red forest, which is the 10km radius zone that surrounds the reactor. It gets the name red forest from the colour of dead pine trees as a result of the accident. We then had an extended period of time out of the minibus seeing the growth of nature in the area of Pripyat and viewing some of the cities important buildings that crumbled and decayed over time. 

Pripyat sign

During the morning we would see: 

• Pripyat Hospital(High levels of radiation in the basement as there are lot of firefighters clothes down there after they were treated).
• Cafe overlooking the water 
• Cinema 
• Music hall
• Police hotel 
• Supermarket 
• Restaurant

Pripyat hospital waiting area

Later in the morning we would visit the famous amusement park with the ferris wheel. This is popular as it is featured in the Call of Duty series. We then moved onto a football stadium where Pripyat FC would play their games. It is completely unrecognisable apart from the stand that remains as the pitch is covered in trees. We then moved onto a school named as 'Middle school 3' which had over 1,000 pupils. We walked through many of the classrooms with text books and equipment scattered all over the place. 

Pripyat amusement park

Just next to the school was a basketball court and the Azure swimming pool. I believe this was also featured in the Call of Duty game. Finally just before taking a break for lunch we would find ourselves getting some rooftop views to get some aerial shots. You can see the sarcophagus in the distance and the ferris wheel was also visible. We took a well earned lunch break where some of the factory plant workers also get food. 

Aerial view of Pripyat

In the afternoon we took a walk to see the under construction reactor 5 that was never finished because of the explosion. It was estimated to be around 70% complete at the time and the cranes used are still there to this day. Our final stop on the tour was to see the former cooling towers. These were also unfinished and we could see them from the inside. After this we would leave the exclusion zone getting a radiation check at the final checkpoint.

Machine used to check for radiation

Video of today can be found here:

In the next post I will be exploring the city of Kiev, so please check it out.