Arkhangelsk Pomorie: the land of severe taiga, wooden masterpieces and sea romance

The first day we'll be completely on our way. On the way we'll stop at the Prophetic Oleg's mound, have lunch in the real royal chambers, sit in silence next to a wooden church near Lake Yuxovsky. We'll meet in Vyterga and spend the night in Kargopol. Yay! More than halfway through!

After breakfast, you'll go exploring the town of Kargopol, famous for its snow-white temples and painted clay toys. We'll have lunch in the town of Plesetsk, you might say, right at the cosmodrome gates. Then we will wander around Yemetsk, a historically important village on the bank of the Northern Dvina River. We'll come to Arkhangelsk in the evening - here you'll have an hour and a half of gastronomic hedonism and good sleep.

In the first half of the day we will be walking around Arkhangelsk. It's a lively, atmospheric port city. Among multi-storey houses there are sea gulls circling, and the Dvina looks not like a river, but like an endless sea (to which, by the way, 30 km). In the afternoon we go to the Museum of Wooden Architecture "Little Korels", where we will stay till dark. Evening we will meet in an Argentinean restaurant and jazz bar - a drop of fun before bedtime will not hurt!

In the morning we will go for a water walk - we will ride on the waves of the White Sea, try to catch a cod or herring on the fishing rod. Then we'll study Severodvinsk. This is a young city - it was founded in 1936. Severodvinsk played a major role during the Great Patriotic War: here were brought the cargoes of the allied countries on the Land-Lease. After the war, the city became the main Soviet center for the production of submarines and began to develop rapidly. We will spend the evening beautifully: on the lake shore, in a real Russian steam room, drinking tea from a samovar.

In the morning we will go to the village Kholmogory - once the main city of the whole Dvinsk region. From there we will take a ferry (which is an adventure in itself!) to the village of Lomonosovo - the birthplace of the famous scientist and the center of bone carving. After that we start our way back home - we'll spend the night in Kargopol.

It is advisable to leave at 6:30 a.m. in order to have time to visit the beautiful places on the way and deliver the car on time. In the main Vytegra museum we will try on the role of a submariner in a real submarine. Then we'll admire the Svirya River - it originates in Lake Onega and flows into Ladoga. For dinner we'll have a look at a good farm restaurant where we'll taste dumplings with bears and other exotic dishes of Russian cuisine.