Photo release from Kamchatka

Our regional correspondent has visited recently Russia's Kamchatka.

It was rainy over there, with the entire region enveloped by clouds, clinging around the tops of famous snow covered Kamchatka's volcanoes. Alas, we could not make good pictures.

The port of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky is located deep in the Avacha Bay, guarded by three huge rocks, aka Three Brothers. Actually, one can see lots of small rocks sticking out the water off the coast of the Kamchatka Peninsula. The beach itself is very picturesque, with numerous caves.

The sea port, founded in 1943, is located right in the heart of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. The port is accessible year-round but can accommodate only shallow-draft vessels, up to 9 meters.

There are two active volcanoes near Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, 3,456m-high Koryak and 2,751m-high Avacha and one extinct volcano Kozelskiy (2189 m).

Because of the bad weather we could not see the volcanoes from the port waters, so we had to travel on off-road vehicle 40 km deep into the peninsula. The only road runs along the river bed and the ash-covered slope.

The volcanoes and hills area is colonized by curious gophers (the locals call them evrazhka) examining the tourists.