How much does it cost to see walruses and whales in the Arctic region of Russia?
In Svalbard, tourists ride inflatable boats on the ice floes of Spitsbergen.
The Russian government welcomes more tours to Novaya Zemlya and the Franz Josef Islands, but not all tourists can enjoy travel by helicopter and nuclear-powered icebreaker.
Russia is preparing to implement large-scale tourism projects in the Arctic to attract more domestic and foreign tourists.
In recent years, the Russian government has planned to establish tourist facilities and visitor centers in the Franz Josef Islands and Novaya Zemlya Island, where the Russian Arctic National Park is located.
Russian Environment Minister Sergei Donskoy told reporters that the Russian government estimated that the measures would cost 700 million rubles (about $12 million).
Russian Arctic National Park
The Russian Arctic National Park, Russia's northernmost and largest natural ecological reserve, was established in 2009 as the true "end of the earth".
Covering 21.75 million acres, the national park is home to many endangered species such as polar bears, Atlantic walruses, bowhead whales, Novaya Novaya reindeer and white-beaked dolphins.
Tourists on a boat off the coast of Franz Joseph.
Individual tours are not allowed in the Russian Arctic National Park and can only be grouped with the prior approval of the park administration.
Visiting the Arctic National Park costs up to $45,000. Visitors can travel to the Arctic on a nuclear-powered icebreaker from Murmansk (the largest ice-free port outside the Arctic Circle) and certainly get you great value for money.
If conditions permit, Arctic visitors can walk on the ice, enjoy barbecues, and even swim.
On the way back, the icebreaker will take the tour group to visit the islands of Russia's Arctic National Park, where visitors can enjoy picturesque scenery and glaciers, as well as see a variety of local birds, walruses and polar bears.
Tour durations range from 11 to 15 days.
A holiday paradise for the wealthy in China and Germany
Russia is very interested in developing Arctic tourism. Currently, there are only a few islands on Novaya Zemlya and the Franz Josef Islands that are open to visitors.
Tourists on an island in the Franz Josef Archipelago.
According to the official portal of Russia's Arctic National Park, nearly 1,000 tourists visit the park every year.
Of these, 28 percent Chinese, 17 percent Germans, and only five percent of tourists come from Russia.
The park's acting director, Alexander Kirillov, said in an interview with TASS that he hoped the number of visitors to the park would increase by at least fivefold.
Kirillov told news agencies that the main advantage of Russia's Arctic National Park over other protected natural areas is that the pristine is not damaged, "tourists usually want to see the unspoiled natural environment, not the helipad or the hotel." ”
Tourists take an icebreaker to the Russian Arctic and can soon take a plane into the park.
Kirillov added that recently in Franz Josef, a year-round military airslide was put into operation, and this narrow strip may also be used by civilian aircraft, which will help reduce tourism costs.
The high cost of tourism has hampered the growth of visitors to the park, and Lake Baikal is the deepest lake in the world and the largest lake in the world, and the cost of traveling to Lake Baikal is less than one-fifth of the cost of Arctic tourism.
Tourists observe a bird habitat in Franz Josefland.
In addition, it will be opened to the public after the cleanup of the Arctic (removal of oil barrel products and other metal scrap) the Ernst Krenkel Observatory, located on Hayes Island in the land of Franz Josef.
The Observatory has been in operation from 1957 to 2004, and about 200 people live there in a village near the observatory, where there is also Russia's northernmost kindergarten.
In 2015, the Franz Josef Islands set up a special checkpoint for foreign passenger ships, which shortened the cruise route from Svalbard to Franz Josef land by three days. The establishment of checkpoints has also reduced the cost of these trips.
Environment Minister Donskoy said in an interview with Ognonyok magazine that the time factor is important because the arctic tourism season is short.
Soviet remains of Svalbard
Although Svalbard belongs to Norway, Russia still carries out economic activity in the archipelago and has three settlements in the Spitsbergen Archipelago. The Spitsbergen Archipelago is the largest and only permanently inhabited island in the archipelago.
Pyramid Village looks like a typical Soviet town with a Lenin monument on the main street.
Visitors to Svalbard, in addition to enjoying the natural beauty of the Arctic, can plunge headlong into the dusty past of the Soviet Union. In the former mining town of Piramidan, which was abandoned in 1998, this town retains all the flavors of the Soviet Union and visitors can get a glimpse of the Soviet era in the past.
The local museums, libraries, palaces of culture and sports center still look the same as they were 40 years ago, as well as the statue of Lenin at the northernmost point in the world.
The price of a 5-8 day tour of Svalbard is around $20,000.
Banio, only 100 km from the Arctic
Another tourist attraction is Barneo, an annual drifting ice floes camp set up by the Russian Geographical Society. It is a major base for ground travel on the way to the Arctic.
Bagno is a research camp that is currently open to visitors.
There is only one and a half months a year suitable for travel, and between mid-March and late April, the camp can see the polar day phenomenon of the Arctic, but the sun still can't melt the ice, and the rest of the time it is full of polar nights.
Establishment of a drifting ice camp for the Bagno Expedition near the North Pole.
Tourists from Svalbard to Bagno were on an AN-74, the only large cargo plane in the world that could land on ice floes.
Tourists take half an hour to travel from Bagno to the North Pole by helicopter.
The distance from the camp to the North Pole is only 100 km.
In the heart of Bagno, visitors enjoy different activities such as snowmobiling, dog sledding and arctic diving.
However, visiting Bagno is not cheap in any way. Two nights at camp costs about $20,000.