Volcanoes of Kamchatka (1996,
2001)
Russia
Камчатcкая Областъ
This is one of the most outstanding volcanic regions in the world, with a high density of active volcanoes, a variety of types, and a wide range of related features. The six sites included in the serial designation group together the majority of volcanic features of the Kamchatka peninsula. The interplay of active volcanoes and glaciers forms a dynamic landscape of great beauty. The sites contain great species diversity, including the world's largest known variety of salmonoid fish and exceptional concentrations of sea otter, brown bear and Stellar's sea eagle.
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The diversity of the spectacular landscapes is well described in this nice block of four from Kamchatka, containing geysers, mud caldrons and crater lakes.
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The Kamchatka Volcanoes contain an especially diverse range of palearctic flora (including a number of nationally threatened species and at least 16 endemics), and bird species such as the Stellar’s Sea Eagle (50% of world population), white tailed eagle, gyr falcon and peregrine falcon, which are attracted to the availability of spawning salmon. The rivers inside and adjacent to the site contain the world’s greatest known diversity of salmonid fish. All 11 species coexist in several of Kamchatka’s rivers.
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The webmaster being Danish, I find the Bering Island in this area a special point of interest. The island was named after the Danish seafarer and discoverer, Vitus Bering, who was the first to cross the narrow strait that separates Asia and the North American continent, today known as the Bering Strait.
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Bering was also the first discoverer to land in Alaska,
which subsequently originally belonged to Russia.
Alaska has belonged to the United States since 1867, when it was bought from Russia by Secretary of State William H. Seward.
Vitus Jonassen Bering (1680-1741) was born in Horsens, Denmark. He entered the newly formed navy of the Russian tsar Peter the Great and in 1724 was appointed to conduct an expedition to explore the water routes between Siberia and North America. |
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Having taken supplies across the continent, Bering sailed from
the Kamchatka Peninsula in 1728. He passed north through the Bering Strait into the Arctic
Ocean, (see map above), but because of bad weather he did not sight the North American continent; he did prove, however, that the Asian and North American continents are not joined. Returning to Saint Petersburg in 1730, he sought another expedition to explore northeastern Siberia.
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Denmark 1941. Commemoratives. Bicentenary of Vitus Bering's death.
In 1733 Bering assumed command of a much larger and more ambitious undertaking, which eventually was responsible for the mapping of large areas of the northern Siberian coast. In June 1741 Bering set sail from Petropavlovsk (which he had founded the previous year) for the North American continent.
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He sailed into the Gulf of Alaska and sighted the continent north of what is now Cape Saint Elias, Alaska, on July
29, 1741, and shortly afterward landed on Kayak Island (in the Aleutian island
group). During the return voyage Bering and most of his crew were ill with scurvy, and his ship, encountering storms and fog, was wrecked on an uninhabited island, subsequently named Bering Island in his honor. Bering died there of exposure one month later, but a few survivors built a vessel in which they returned to Kamchatka in 1742.
Read more about Cape Saint Elias
here.
Sources and links:
Microsoft Encarta 2002.
Other World Heritage Sites in Russia (on this web site). Inactive links are not described on stamps. Please refer to the UNESCO-listing, Russia-section, for further information on such sites.
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Revised 21 jul 2006 |
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