SoloEast Blog

by Julie McDowall, The Guardian …Meet the dogs of Chernobyl – the abandoned pets that formed their own canine community  Hundreds of stray dogs have learned to survive in the woods around the exclusion zone – mainly descendants of those left behind after the nuclear disaster, when residents were banned from taking their beloved pets to safety We are in the woods behind the Chernobyl plant when the dog... Read more

The last fall days in Pripyat are awesome. Winter is on it’s way which means more beauty to come & less people will be there. So it all can be yours 🙂 As an example – there can be up to 1000-1500 visitors per day in summer time and only 2 people sometimes in winter. Get warm clothes and get ready for the adventure 🙂 Read more

By Cheryl L. Reed The button that could have started a nuclear holocaust is gray — not red. I learned this after climbing into a nuclear rocket command silo, 12 floors below ground, and sitting in the same green chair at the same yellow, metal console at which former Soviet officers once presided. Here, they practiced entering secret codes into their gray keyboards, pushing the launch button and turning... Read more

Visiting Chernobyl is high on anyone’s list who is interested in dark tourism, but with its uniqueness and haunting images, it is drawing increasing curiosity among all travelers visiting Ukraine and nearby. In 1986, the Chernobyl power plant disaster was the largest nuclear disaster in the world, killing and affecting the health of thousands (to millions – the data vary wildly) and creating a 19 mile exclusion zone that... Read more