Pyramiden

On our way back from field work, we took a quick stop to visit Pyramiden, a Russian coal-mining town, abandoned due to being too unprofitable in the distant time of 1998. We were led by a tour guide named Sasha who had a big beard, a rifle, and a stereotypical Russian wool coat and hat. He is one of six people living in the town now to service tourists. They get their food and supplies from Barentsburg by helicopter, can only send letters for communication (though there is a 1 meter square spot near the docks where a faint Telenor signal can be found). The town is tidy and very Soviet utilitarian. It's not that spooky.

Pyramiden was originally a Swedish mining town until the USSR bought it from them in the 1920's. After some initial coal prospecting, the USSR planned to open a mining operation in the 1930's, built some buildings in the 30s and 40s, but were unfortunately delayed by WW2. They didn't start mining again until the mid-50's. The heydey of Pyramiden was the 1970's when there were over 1400 inhabitants, including families, a multi-doctor hospital, and a large athletics hall. 

Below the sign in the ceremonial "Last wagon of coal." Tourists kept taking the coal, so now it's filled with black-painted rocks

For an ugly town, it has an incredible view

Written on the mountain is the phrase "Mira Mir" or Peace on Earth

This is the Pyramiden farm building where a milk-cow, chickens and some vegetables were raised during the town's active period. 

The red window in the picture below is where in 2001, a polar bear broke into the functioning hotel, wandered over to the bar and ate all the beer nuts and drank all the beer. It then wandered out. The people of Pyramiden are very proud of the fact that they did not shoot the bear, even though they had the legal right to.

Me with the Northeernmost Lenin statue in the world

For those of you who haven't heard me blather about it, there is a bust of Lenin here in Pyramiden, the northernmost bust of Lenin, and there is also one at the Antarctic Pole of Inaccessibility, the point in Antarctica that is furthest from the ocean. I was so excited to be able to see the northernmost, and maybe, just maybe, I will one day visit the southernmost bust of Lenin as well.

Inside the athletics center

At the end of the tour, we went into the hotel for, I guess, souvenirs and refreshments. But the only souvenirs were weird expensive Pyramiden collectors coins, and the refreshment counter didn't really have anything. The thing to do, apparently, was to buy shots of vodka. But we were on a school trip and would get in trouble for drinking. The hotel was run-down and pretty sad. The only thing I could think of was how weird the six people who live here must be. What kind of person signs up to live in Pyramiden? All you can do is guide people around the decaying town all day, or maybe drive the bus or service the hotel. Do they take turns with each job? Are there married couples? Or maybe all six are in a large polyamorous relationship together. In any case, we were soon back on the boat, tiredly eating chocolate, waiting to return.

Once we got back to Longyearbyen at 9pm, we then had to unload the ship and were bussed back to the UNIS school building.  For about an hour, we then needed to go through all of our bags, clean the tents, return everything, etc. Which was all fine to do, but all of us were just completely exhausted and wanted to just go home. Finally at 10:30pm, we were driven back in groups to Nybyen, our dorms. I was with the last group, so I didn't get home until 11pm. I immediately changed clothes took a shower and tried to decompress from five days in the field. I had over a hundred emails, and it turns out that I needed to proofread my entire campus literary magazine by 3am. Ugh. So I did.  Went to sleep at 2:30am after being awake since 4:50am the previous day. I was very glad to be back sleeping in a bed. 

Next: Two days of fieldwork at Bolterdalen