Russia is home to the world’s coldest town, where people endure temperatures of -50C and get by trading fur and reindeer meat. Could you put up with life in freezing Oymyakon?
Fancy a trip to the world’s coldest town? You will have to endure Vladimir Putin’s Russia and blisteringly chilly temperatures of -50C.
Oymyakon is in Russia’s Sakha Republic, a beautiful but sparse chunk of land in Russia’s far east. The region is home to just under 1 million people but is larger than countries like Argentina, Kazakhstan and Algeria.
Oymyakon’s dwindling population has seen it fall to under 1,000 inhabitants and the climate is exceptionally cold. The coldest months of December, January and February see temperatures fall to an average of around -48C. There are even record lows of -67C, while the summer months are also a bit bracing, with temperatures ranging from anywhere between 6C to 22C.
According to TripAdvisor, things to see in the town include a small Culture House and the Pole of Cold Monument, which commemorates an unofficial record low temperature of -71C. One review for the Culture House said that “Oymyakon does not get much tourism”, but that a “performance by the cultural group in Oymyakon was one of the highlights of our visit”.
The visitor added: “It was arranged as part of our tour of the village, but it seems that most guests were welcomed this way… The leader of the group, played the ceremonial drum whilst the children chanted. A female shaman was also present and her native outfit really stood out, as did her chanting.
“The children all had Khomus (mouth harps) and they played a few local songs to the beat of the ceremonial drums. The fire was “fed: by the leader of the group, and they prayed for our health and safety. After the ceremony, we were invited to participate in local games which included dancing in a ring, and playing games with sheep bones.”
In an article in 2018, Conde Nast Traveler said Oymyakon dates to the 1920s when “winter herders would water their reindeer at a thermal spring there”. Temperatures and life is so cold and hard there that “your eyelashes and saliva will freeze into painful little needles on your face as you walk down the street… Even vodka will freeze if a bottle is left outside”.
In the winter, most nights last 21 hours while tourists may find it hard to get to the town due to it being a two-day drive from the nearest airport in the Russian city of Yakutsk.
A Wired article in 2015 said: “Here arctic chill is simply a fact of life, something to be endured. People develop a variety of tricks to survive. Most people use outhouses, because indoor plumbing tends to freeze. Cars are kept in heated garages or, if left outside, left running all the time. Crops don’t grow in the frozen ground, so people have a largely carnivorous diet—reindeer meat, raw flesh shaved from frozen fish, and ice cubes of horse blood with macaroni are a few local delicacies.”
