Monthly Archives: February 2023

Made in Kaliningrad Exclusive Badger Underpants

I’m badgered if I know!

Published: 24 February 2023 ~ Made in Kaliningrad Exclusive Badger Underpants

I can honestly say, hand on heart, that I have never had the urge to focus on a gentleman’s underpants, for whatever the reason and whatever that reason may be. Even my interest in vintage clothes has not yet impelled me to research or wear undergarments that could be described as anything more than wholesomely traditional.

Now, what have I done with my badger?

For this reason and this reason alone, it is with curiosity regarding your reaction that I place before you photographic evidence of a truly remarkable pair of pants, the beastly likes of which I have never beheld before.

No, your eyes do not deceive. You are actually witnessing what in all likelihood may well be the world’s one and only pair of pants with a badger’s head for its codpiece. You have to admit, ladies, unless you have lived a far more adventurous life than your neighbour’s suspect, that it’s not every day that you come across a man with a badger concealed in his underpants!

Modelling the animal-lover’s pants that he designed himself is the inimitable Aleksandr ‘Chimney Sweep’ Smirnov of Badger’s Club fame (see earlier post). Not that he feels the need to defend his creation, in fact he’s rather proud of it, but if he did, he could argue that if the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes (RAOB) can adopt a buffalo’s head as their fraternal motif then why not a badger’s head for Kaliningrad’s Badger Club?

Quite so, but whilst the Buffs, as the RAOB are colloquially known, display their animal namesake on blazer pocket patches, lapel badges and so on, there cannot be many among their number who have, or who are willing to admit they have, buffalo horns in their underpants.

The question is, will this example open the floodgates for variant animal codpieces, such as goats, pussies, kippers, beavers, rhinoceroses, hippopotamuses, absolute impossibilities, moles, rabbits and unicorns?

The eel or elephant’s trunk might be overstretching it a bit, and really gilding the willy (Gates’ spellchecker is too ‘inclusive’ for its own good) would be the python or green anaconda, and should your reputation not extend to the American Eagle, and naturally Biden’s doesn’t, you could always hedge your bets ~ remember, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush ~ and settle instead for a Jenny Wren. The possibilities are endless (no pun intended).

On the subject of all things compromising, imagine an irate country gentleman of the shooting, hunting and fishing fraternity, catching his wife in flagrante and promptly shooting her lover who happened at the time to be wearing a pair of badger-head pants. Could such a man resist having the pants he had bagged stuffed and mounted on his living-room wall? Probably not. But in the same way that one swallow doesn’t make an Ann Summers, a one-night stand is nothing to boast of. In order to add more trophies, the wife would need to horn her skills and train herself to become a much more prolific hunter. What animal rights activists will make of all this, your guess is as good as mine, but as most of them are meat-eaters, which makes them also hypocrites, whatever they think is irrelevant anyway.

Made in Kaliningrad Badger's Head UNderpants

It is a sobering thought, however, that should such bestial practices be performed on British soil, you could in theory run foul of the law and be brought before the beak for violating legislation under the 1992 Protection of Badgers Act. (How this came about was that back in 1992 a lot of English country gentlemen apparently began to exhibit the embarrassing evening-dress tendency of loading their pants with badgers, and urban liberals did not like it, since they had failed to think of it first. Their reaction was similar to the way they reacted to the first female UK prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, and the first prime minister ‘of colour’, Rishi Soonout, since in both of these woke respects the Tories beat them to it. The last vestige of hope for liberals now is that they install in Number 10 something veiled from head to toe and of dubious gender extraction that claims itself to be both feminist and lesbian. I think I’d rather vote for a pair of badger underpants.

At the risk of sounding too liberal for my own good and becoming as a result a source of inflammation for my conscience, I hear myself philosophising what goes on in one’s underpants is entirely one’s own affair, subject to the qualification that it does not offend to any degree a reasonable sense of personal dignity. It should be noted that in the UK it is an offence at common law to outrage public decency, although to succeed in this worthy cause the act must be committed at such a time and in such a place that at least two members of the public ~ two or more ~ must have gathered there to witness it. English law is most precise on this point* {*The Ethnic Minorities Guide to Flashing, Vol 45,756, 2022; Dover Publishing Unlimited}

For example, The Royal Antediluvian Order of Flashers’ Charter and Code of Conduct calls upon its members to expose themselves only in those locations where the audience is guaranteed to be no less than 2 and no more than 10, coupled with an exit strategy of an unapprehendable nature. The problems that this poses for the mathematically challenged, especially those who can’t read the language, possibly explains why newly arrived ethnic flashers, defined as those who docked in the UK 25 years ago and who are longing to be deported because they are tired of living in free hotels, choose to go it alone. Whilst none of these have been spotted actually wearing a badger, there have, however, been rumours of acts involving goats.

We would like to assure the public that where such incidents do occur they are rare and we also keep them secret and that the wearing of pants of an animal orientation can lay no claim to mainstream practice, although who can say without convictions when fads and fashion may take a turn for the worse and lead us up the woodland path?

Made in Kaliningrad Exclusive Badger Underpants

Take Y-fronts, for example, once the must-have accessory for people from all walks of life, perhaps including Jimmy Saville, but which to the entitled youth of today are as passé as flared trousers and as offensive in their non-mediocrity as the shimmering outsized shoulder boards worn by Gary Glitter.

Whilst such exclusive examples possess an underlying value of no small proportion, we must be careful not to suggest or infer that the wearing of strange underpants is the sole province of much-loved celebrities. For whom amongst us can claim without fear of contradiction and more of rank hypocrisy that we have not, at one time worn, myself of course excluded, pants which, though not deserving of the epithet shameful, have filled our introspective moments with disquieting thoughts of daring-do verging on impropriety?

Speak for yourself is your first reaction, but for the same reason that people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones, neither should people who wear glass underpants throw them, nor, I might add, should the latter attempt to go horse riding.

At times like these, befuddled and confused, I often defer to my brother’s opinion. “What do you think of the badger’s head pants?” I asked.

Studying the photo provided, I heard him mutter something, which may or may not have been, ‘where does he find those horny women?’ And then I thought I heard him say something about it could be worse, that at least it was only a badger’s head and not a full-sized badger standing proud and erect on its hind legs.

The motto of the Royal Antediluvian Order of Buffaloes is ‘No Man is at all Times Wise’ (Latin: Nemo Mortalium Omnibus Horis Sapit). I wonder what the Latin is for ‘No Man is at all Times Wise when it comes to the Choice of his Underpants’?

Please note: No badgers were harmed in the making of these underpants, but one or two were extremely embarrassed.

Where is the Kaliningrad Badger Club?

Badger ( Barsuchek) Барсучёк club
Sverdlova, 33, Kaliningrad, Kaliningrad Oblast, 236006
Tel: +7 909 777‑97-75

I have it on good authority that entrance to the Badger Club will not be dependent on flashing your badger ….

Image attributions
Moose’s Head: <a href=”https://www.freepik.com/free-vector/vector-vintage-moose-hand-drawn-clipart_34100758.htm#query=moose%20head%20drawing&position=4&from_view=keyword&track=ais”>Image by rawpixel.com</a> on Freepik; : https://www.freepik.com/free-vector/vector-vintage-moose-hand-drawn-clipart_34100758.htm#query=moose%20head%20drawing&position=4&from_view=keyword&track=ais

Wooden sign board: https://publicdomainvectors.org/en/free-clipart/Wooden-sign-post-vector-image/26059.html

Is the Königsberg Amber Room still in Kaliningrad?

… and if not, where is it?

Published: 15 February 2023 ~ Is the Königsberg Amber Room still in Kaliningrad?

Last seen in Königsberg Castle before the end of the war, ever since the Amber Room went missing ~ missing presumed dead by some, missing presumed purloined by others ~ historians and treasure hunters alike have turned the search for the Amber Room into a latter day Holy Grail that has kept them guessing and occupied for more than three-quarters of a century.

We don’t all love mysteries, but we sure do like to solve them, and so it is with the Amber Room, which disappeared from Königsberg Castle in the final months of World War II. The search for what was once described as the Eighth Wonder of the World has become an historians’ and treasure hunters’ Holy Grail. Numerous theories abound regarding the room’s vanishing act and its whereabouts today.

Recently, my wife Olga attended a lecture delivered by one of these Argonauts, a man who has spent considerable time and energy researching the history of the Amber Room and most of his ambition engaged in a quest to locate it.

Unlike a good many historians, the gentleman in question does not hold with the popular conviction that the Amber Room was destroyed either as a result of the RAF’s bombing raids or by the artillery fire of the advancing Soviet army. Neither does he hold with the myriad theories that would have the room plundered and shipped elsewhere. In his opinion the Amber Room that was, is the Amber Room that very much is. Furthermore, he believes not only is it alive and kicking but kicking about in Kaliningrad.

Is the Königsberg Amber Room still in Kaliningrad?

For those of you unacquainted with the story of the Amber Room, it goes like this:

The Amber Room was a chamber richly decorated with ornate amber panels, elaborately highlighted with gold leaf, complemented by magnificent baroque-framed mirrors and illuminated with flickering candles. Those who had the privilege of beholding it in person were overwhelmed by its singular beauty.

Amber Baltic Coast Kaliningrad from an exhibition in the old Königsberg Stock Exchange

Amber: What it is and why is it so precious?

In order to protect themselves from parasites, harmful insects and to act as a restorative for external damage, trees produce a protective resin. This substance exuded through the bark of the tree, eventually hardens, forming a seal, against which the gnawing activities of harmful insects are rendered inoperable.

Extinct, fossilised tree trunks from primordial forests produce fossilised resin, and this is the substance we now call Amber. The Kaliningrad region on the Baltic Coast contains the world’s largest amber reserves; more than 90 per cent of the world’s amber is located in this region.

Amber has been appreciated for its natural beauty and colour for thousands of years. Its tactile quality and variation in hues from light yellow, dark brown, green, blue and white, the latter referred to as milk amber, make it the perfect gemstone for jewellery and for use in the creation of a wide variety of decorative and functional objects including framed art, vases, paperweights, plaques, pens and elaborate clocks.

Naturally sticky, in its mobile state amber resin would sometimes entrap plant life as well as small insects. Known as inclusions, amber containing organic matter from times of antiquity often command higher prices than pieces that are clean.

The three photographs above are from the 2020 exhibition, Rhythms of Kaliningrad.

The Amber Room was designed and crafted by the German sculptor Andreas Schlüter and the Danish amber artisan Gottfried Wolfram in the early years of the 18^th century and completed from 1707 by Gottfried Turau and Ernst Schacht from Danzig (now Gdańsk).

Originally part of the Berlin City Palace, in 1716 the Amber Room, then considered the Eighth Wonder of the World, was gifted by the Prussian King Frederick William I to Peter the Great of the Russian Empire. It was reassembled, renovated and expanded in the summer residence of the Russian tsars, the Catherine Palace, a grand Rococo edifice approximately 30km south of St Petersburg. By the time the room was completed, it is said to have contained over six tonnes of the precious resin, amber.

Amber Room is it still in Kaliningrad? — **Hand-coloured photograph of the original Amber Room, 1932**

Following the invasion of Soviet Russia in WWII, the Amber Room was swifty removed by the Germans, taken to Prussian Königsberg and reconstructed in Königsberg Castle. In early 1944, as Königsberg braced itself for the inevitable Allied onslaught, it is alleged that the Amber Room was dismantled and its components stashed away in the castle basement.

In August 1944, Königsberg came under heavy bombardment by the Royal Air Force (RAF). A large percentage of the munitions used were incendiary by nature and in the conflagration that followed the city was all but consumed.

Extensive damage was further inflicted by Red Army artillery fire in the days and hours immediately preceding Königsberg’s capitulation on 9^th April 1945.

Photographs and ciné films taken shortly after the Soviet victory document the extent of Königsberg’s destruction. Both city and castle were gutted, and the Amber Room was never found.

Whilst the simplest and most credible explanation for the disappearance of the celebrated room is that like the rest of the castle and most of the city it had gone up in smoke, absence of hard evidence to nail this theory firmly to fact sparked a plethora of alternatives whose versions of the room’s fate live on to this day. So far, however, none of these would-be explanations have come up with the goods, and thus the Eighth Wonder of the World is currently having to bide its time as one of the world’s enduring mysteries.

It is well to remember, however, that mysteries rarely live alone; they tend to cohabitate in tormented sin, in a hotbed of rampant reveries, many of which over time turn radical or romantic. And the Amber Room is no exception.

Of course, there are conspiracy theories. It is far more palatable to indulge the notion of the Amber Room spirited away, living the life of privileged ease in some Oligarch’s chateau or other, than to accept the unthinkable thought that this irreplaceable work of art has been indifferently obliterated. Nevertheless, the official position seems to endorse this postulate.

This is because once Königsberg had fallen, Soviet soldiers were dispatched post-haste to investigate the castle ruins for the presence of the Amber Room. It is a matter of public record that their report concluded ‘Amber Room not found’, from which intelligence it was inferred that the Amber Room had perished.

However, drawing a line under the mystery with no hard evidence to back it up was and continues to be a red flag to more bullish minds, which persist in bringing into the field of debate alternative theories, speculation and hope.

For example, eyewitness reports place the missing room’s whereabouts in at least two underwater locations: one, that it went down with the Wilhelm Gustloff, a German ship sunk by a Soviet submarine on 30 January 1945; two, that it lies in part at the bottom of the sea, put there by Soviet aircraft when they attacked and destroyed the SS Karlsruhe, a German evacuation ship that sailed from Königsberg in 1945.

Such theories, which provide the basis for the ongoing search, gained particular impetus from the 1997 discovery of one of a series of four stone mosaics, ‘Feel and Touch’, which, once an integral part of the Amber Room, turned up in the family home of a former German soldier, who claimed that he acquired the mosaic whilst helping to pack the dismantled room in crates for transportation. As far as I am aware, however, he did not recall, or did not name, the final destination for which those crates were bound.

A year later, two unrelated teams, one German and the other Lithuanian, stated publicly that they had found the Amber Room. The German team alleged that it was secreted in a silver mine; the Lithuanian team that it was immersed within a lagoon; neither were correct.

Although a detailed assessment of the evidence such as it was, as undertaken in 2004 by two British journalists, concluded that the Amber Room may not have survived the combined devastation of the 1944 air raids and subsequent shelling by Soviet artillery, which was also the official Soviet line, not everyone is convinced.

Amber Room last seen in Konigsberg — **The Amber Room in the Catherine Palace, 1917**

One of the most enticing theories, by virtue of its ongoing nature, is that the Amber Room never left Kaliningrad. This theory postulates that it is either squirreled away in one of the many tunnels that are alleged to form a labyrinth beneath the Royal Castle or is safe and secure in secret rooms beneath the bunker of Otto Lasch, the general who was tasked with the unenviable responsibility of commanding the defence of Königsberg in 1945.

Otto Lasch’s command bunker survives to this day. Known simply as the Museum Bunker, it is situated at the front of the Kaliningrad State University, a few minutes’ walk from Victory Square and likewise from Königsberg Cathedral.

From what I can gather, the theory that the last resting place of the Amber Room is but a short distance away from the place where it was last displayed, namely Königsberg Castle, is not new. It has been in circulation for years.

Indeed, in a news report published on 5 December 2022*, it was made public that surveys of the bunker of the last commandant of Königsberg, Otto Lasch, had been resumed ~ resumed meaning that the latest investigations were a continuation of those last undertaken in autumn 2009.

The 2022 resumption, which was supervised by the head of the bunker museum, as well as local historian Sergei Trifonov, used echo radar in an attempt to penetrate the voids behind the walls and the ground beneath the bunker.

“Trifonov himself said that the researchers ‘found what they were looking for’, but the press service of the museum noted that the survey report is not yet ready and will be published in the near future.”*

We wait with bated breath.

I hear tell, but don’t quote me on this, that what they found was a considerable depth of concrete, so considerable that anything that might be concealed beneath it fell outside the range and spectrum of the electronic equipment used.

Apart from being a historic treasure, and one of the most beautiful and awe-inspiring interior works of art that the world has ever known, the estimated value of the Amber Room in strictly material terms was quoted as $500 million in 2016. One presumes that in the past eight years its value has appreciated.

The decision to excavate the historic Königsberg bunker presumably rests on the presentation of sufficient credible evidence to justify the disruption and ultimately the cost of the amount of work involved. It is by no means an easy decsion to make. On the one hand, it might unearth a unique historical legacy immense in artistic and material value; on the other, a whole lot of concrete, half a dozen incumbent worms and the odd German helmet or two.

Until that decision is taken of one thing we can be sure, the search for the Amber Room goes on.

Image attributions

Amber Room 1932: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Catherine_Palace_interior_-_Amber_Room_(1).jpg
Amber Room in Catherine Palace: By Андрей Андреевич Зеест – http://igor-bon.narod.ru/index/avtokhrom/0-106, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=36742083
Cardboard box empty room:
https://publicdomainvectors.org/en/free-clipart/Cardboard-box-on-a-wooden-floor-vector-illustration/20718.html
Baroque mirror:
https://www.freepik.com/free-vector/picture-frame-sticker-home-decor-vintage-gold-design-vector_20775420.htm#query=vintage%20mirror%20frame&position=5&from_view=keyword&track=ais
Spiral: https://publicdomainvectors.org/en/free-clipart/Spiral-black-and-white-image/52695.html

Reference
*In Kaliningrad, the survey of the voids of the bunker of the last commandant of Königsberg was resumed – Kaliningrad News – New Kaliningrad. Ru

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

Some call it Nemetskoe of Bochkarev; I say euk!

Published: 10 February 2023 ~ Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

Mick Hart’s totally biased review of bottled beers* in Kaliningrad (or how to live without British real ale!)

Article 23: Hemeukoe Pils

Illustrations of classical architecture attempting to convey the innate quality and time-honoured grandeur that we associate with ancient Rome, together with heraldic symbols are not necessarily the certified hallmark of either a good or barely drinkable beer that we might be beguiled into thinking it is. And thus, we have a case in point: Hemeukoe Pils.

The packaging of Hemeukoe (Nemetskoe) Pils reminds me of a house I know in Northamptonshire made singularly unmissable by a pair of concrete horse’s heads squatting on its gate posts. Are such embellishments an admission of, or indeed an admission to, the aristocracy of quality? No, and they never have been. But from their ostentatiousness you do get a whiff of something else.

That whiff, once the top has been removed from the Hemeukoe Pils’ bottle, reminds me of a lot of things, none of which belongs to beer. I am not going to tell you what it is exactly, because exactly doesn’t come into it, but try to imagine something pungent strained through a pair of unwashed gym shorts.

Urban gentlemen of the road, those who doss down on the forecourts of London’s mainline stations, could feasibly conclude that the smell is not unlike that damp sheet of cardboard they rescued from Asda’s bin last month and on which they have slept every night since.

The smell improves in the glass but doesn’t become a bouquet of roses. It is rather like opening the window of a sleep-in-late hormonal teenager’s bedroom. And that’s as good as it gets.

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

It does say ‘Pils’ on the bottle, but very soon I got to thinking that perhaps they spelt it wrong, when what they intended to print was not exactly ‘Pils’ but ‘Really Peculiar’.

Ambiguity in the smell was repeated in the colour. At arms length, it looked yellow and slightly hazy in the glass, but on closer inspection neither here nor there nor even anywhere. It was as it was and what that was, was strictly not what I thought it would be: Pils.

The colour was like nothing I had ever seen; the taste like nothing I have ever tasted, wished I hadn’t and would never want to again. In both respects, it even excelled the Baltika 3 taste problem. And that ~ as The Velvelettes once warbled ~ is ‘really saying something’!

Sweet and buttery with a chemical twist, the latter usurping the former and occupying the aftertaste like 1940s’ Germans in Paris, this was my first taste of Hemeukoe Pils; was it trying to tell me something?

For a moment I thought that this something had something to do with identity and was something to do with Kvas, but before I could completely trash the dynastic reputation of a soft drink which in Russia is regarded as a national institution, the taste had turned to strong, rank tea, heavy on the tannin.

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad

Whatever you may say about its taste, there is a lot going on in Hemeukoe. It is just not going on in a very complementary or remotely satisfactory way.

There is an ascending scale of sourness in the aftertaste, which in its unexceptional way hangs on the back of your throat and leaves you wondering, anxiously, whether come the morrow, you will still be on good terms with your digestive system and bowels.

Hemeukoe Beer in Kaliningrad is not good

It was late at night when I was drinking Hemeukoe. It was the only beer that I had in the house, so even had I spotted the clue secreted in its name ~ Hemeukoe ~ the anagram would not have, could not have, saved me from indulging in what was without exaggeration quite simply the most appalling brew I have ever had the misfortune to sabotage my vitals with, and one which I ardently hope I will never experience again.

I am tempted to say that you could do worse if offered a glass of this than to politely refuse and remain an onlooker. Never mind the prejudiced cliché that innocent bystanders always get hurt, refusing to drink Hemeukoe Pils might well just prove to be the exception to the rule.

A friend of mine who considers himself to be something of an expert where beer is concerned disputes the taxonomy of Hemeukoe Pils, claiming that HP is not so much a beer as an alcoholic infusion, and it is this that makes it taste like nothing on Earth and more like something imported from the planets Heavy and Oily.

Even without empirical evidence I might be inclined to agree, but I was busy jotting the name of the beer onto a piece of paper and committing it to memory in order to ensure that even if my life depended on it, I would never make the mistake of buying Hemeukoe Pils again.

TRAINSPOTTING & ANORAKS
Name of Beer: Hemeukoe Pils (Nemetskoe ot Bochkarev
(German from Bochkarev)
Brewer: Heineken
Where it is brewed: Saint Petersburg
Bottle capacity: 1.35 litre
Strength: 4.7%
Price: It cost me about 137 roubles (£1.54) [at time of writing!]
Appearance: A washy brown colour
Aroma: It doesn’t smell like beer
Taste: It doesn’t taste like beer
Fizz amplitude: 4/10
Label/Marketing: Bold to the point of misleading
Would you buy it again? Read the review!
Marks out of 10: 2

*Note that the beers that feature in this review series only include bottled beer types that are routinely sold through supermarket outlets and in no way reflect the variety of beer and/or quality available in Kaliningrad from speciality outlets and/or through bars and restaurants.

Zalivino Lighthouse Restoration Reaches New Heights

Return to Zalvino Lighthouse

Published: 5 February 2023 ~ Zalivino Lighthouse Restoration Reaches New Heights

Returning to Zalivino lighthouse last month, it was remarkable to see what progress had been made since we first explored the site in 2021. Let’s start with the cosmetic improvements first and then proceed in order of importance:

{Links to previous posts can be found at the end of this article}

1. The grounds of the lighthouse have been tidied

2. The weather mast has been painted

3. A new addition is the weather vane, with the intricately designed rotating ornament and stained-glass inclusions

Ornate weather vane at Zalivino Lighthouse

4. The compound has been enclosed with a new fence and a gate at either end, the effect is both cosmetic and security oriented

5. The boardwalks laid down last year from the sandy cove to the compound perimeter have been extended into and across the site

6. The outlying buildings have been reroofed

7. The outlying buildings have been given new wooden doors; good solid stock, with a vintage chevron and diamond-pattern finish

8. Three solid-state buildings constructed from red brick have been added to the site. They consist of a utilities building, ticket office and the now completed tearoom, which on our last visit was at a functional stage minus proper windows.

Zalivino Lighthouse Restoration: the lighthouse keeper’s cottage

The most significant development is the structural renovation and the complete interior restoration of the former lighthouse keeper’s cottage.

The first photograph below denotes the condition of the cottage in 2021; the photograph beneath it, how the cottage appears today.

Zalivino Lighthouse before restoration — BEFORE

The restored keeper's cottage at Zalivino Lighthouse — AFTER

The following account of our latest visit to Zalivino lighthouse is an extract from my personal diary:

Zalivino Lighthouse Restoration

At last, numb and red nosed, we reached the perimeter, by way of the coastal route, of Zalivino Lighthouse. Outside the lighthouse grounds, the old German buildings lining the water’s edge facing out across the Curonian Lagoon appear to have been given the once over, either that or I missed this fact on my previous visit. The brickwork looks cleaner, and the lovely wooden doors and window shutters strike me as being recent installations along with the terracotta-modelled roof.

German barns restored on Curonian Lagoon

Inside the compound, everything looked immediately more presentable. To the left and right are single storey buildings, red brick with Georgian-style roofs. One, I imagine, is the toilet block; the other the ticket office and, next to that, the completed tea and loitering room, which on my previous visit had thick translucent polythene sheeting where windows were wanting but wanting no more.

Olga Hart outside ticket office Zalivino Lighthouse — Olga Hart in proud receipt of her ticket from the ticket office

The former lighthouse keeper’s cottage, which had been nothing more than a shell, ravaged by time and cannibalised by thieves when the site fell derelict after perestroika, has been renovated to such a high standard that had I not witnessed the dereliction with my own eyes and taken photos to prove it, I would have scarcely believed it was the same building.

Although the museum it would like to become has a long way to go, for those interested in marine life, the old keeper’s cottage contains an interesting display of marine paraphernalia and artefacts associated with lighthouse history.

The two rooms of the cottage also contain some rather fetching reproduction antique furniture and other curios. For example, a not-for-the-squeamish stuffed and mounted seabird and a round-shaped Deco-style early plastic radio that may or may not be original but is endowed with vintage appeal. There is also a Vienna-style wall clock, two hefty wagon wheels and, in the centre of the room, a polished wooden dining table and corresponding chairs.

I think it is safe to say that this level of homeliness is not the one that the lighthouse keeper would have been accustomed to, and yet the warmth transcending the basic need for warmth on a bitterly cold winter’s day would have probably been no stranger to him.

What also affected me was the solidity of the building which, considering its exposed location, was reassuring indeed, since no amount of huffing and puffing was about to blow this house in. Strong, solid, durable and intuitively enriched, the lighthouse keeper’s cottage could hardly have been more welcoming.

Zalivino Lighthouse tower

A visit to Zalivino Lighthouse without climbing the tower would be like going to the pub and ordering an empty glass. Thus, even on this coldest of days, off and up we went.

At the time of our ascent, or rather a few minutes before, Zalivino suffered a power outage, so we had to climb the tower without the aid of electric lamps. The first few steps were enveloped in darkness, but the windows in the tower walls, as small as they are, are sufficient to light the way and as you reach the base of the lamp room the light pours in from the dome above.

The elevated view from the lighthouse window reveals the extent to which the outlying buildings and the site in which they stand have been improved and whilst up there in the Gods, we got to gaze across and enjoy the scene of the winter landscape complete with icicle-petrified coastline.

As stimulating as these prospects were, there were two impressions from the top of the tower whose tenacity cannot be equalled. The first was the sound of the wind, rushing across the lagoon, curling around the lamp room like the giant tentacles of a phantom sea squid.

The second was that of Olga daring to step outside onto the wind-swept lighthouse’s viewing platform so that I could take a photo of her. Of course, I was champing at the bit to get out on the ledge myself, make no mistake about that! But someone had to cower inside in order to take the photo.

The renovation and refurbishment of Zalivino lighthouse has come on in proverbial leaps and bounds in a relatively short space of time. If you are not personally acquainted with the near demolition site that it was in 2020 at the outset of the project, the photographic collage within the keeper’s cottage will give you a good idea of just how bleak the damage was, as will the photographs used in my earlier post.

You will also find in the keeper’s cottage a framed composition of images depicting where the restorationists want to be with the project by 2024. Unfortunately, the photograph that I took of the wall-mounted display is not good, as my hands were in need of a warm cup of tea and the light from the window reflected badly into the lens of the camera.

Comparison of the photographic evidence of the condition of the lighthouse, its ancillary buildings and site as they appeared in 2020 with the photos taken this year (2023) demonstrate the achievements to date, making the 2024 target a less ambitious objective than might otherwise be supposed.

Without a shadow of a doubt, a lot of work, care and attention has been invested in the project, not to mention wonga. The results so far are superlative, returning the lighthouse to its historical origins and turning it, metaphorically speaking, into a restoration beacon for other projects across the region to follow.

Visitors aloft Zalivino Lighthouse tower

Support the project

Raising funds for the restoration of the lighthouse is an ongoing process, and any donation that you would care to make would be greatly appreciated. Your generosity will help to preserve an important element of marine cultural heritage and if that’s not reward enough, your part in the preservation will be forever a part of the lighthouse’s history.

For further information, please click on the link: Old Lighthouse Zalivino