On the portage of Yerofey Khabarov. The expedition will be set off from Krasnoselkoup after the ice motion

The press-conference of the participants of the expedition “The Mysteries of Mangazeya - 2019” was held in Noviy Urengoy in the Museum of fine arts within the action “Night of museums”. According to the travelers, they do not know the exact date of the start, but they are sure in achieving the goal.

The expedition “The Mysteries of Mangazeya” will go along the ancient portage, on which the domestic pioneers of the 17th century reached the Yenisei River, having opened Eastern Siberia for Russia. In the opinion of the travelers, famous Yerofey Khabarov, who added vast territories of the Amur River region to Russia, used exactly this portage.

The travel is officially registered by the regional branch of the Russian geographical society in Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Okrug. 6 people from Noviy Urengoy, Moscow and Bakhchisarai will go to the expedition. They dedicated it to the 35th anniversary of “Gazprom dobycha Yamburg”, the company that is the main sponsor of the project.

On the helicopter the participants of the expedition will go to Krasnoselkoup - the settlement situated closest to the ancient Mangazeya. From there by motor boats they will go on the rivers Taz, Khudosey and Pokalky to the portage and Lake Perevalnoye. This information was given to the news agency “Sever-Press” in the service on public relations and communication with mass media of “Gazprom dobycha Yamburg”. Then along the rivers Pokotylky, Verkhnyaya Baikha and Turukhan they plan to reach the Yenisei River and to complete the travel in Turukhansk. In total, the travelers will have to overcome more than 500 kilometers.

Nobody knows the exact date of the start — it depends on the ice motion. The experience makes the travelers go on the big water immediately after clearance of rivers from ice. In summer of 2018 the reconnaissance stage of the expedition took place. That time the explorers reached the mouth of the river Pokalky, but were not able to go further - rapids on the river that became shallow prevented.

On Lake Perevalnoye the travelers hope to find artifacts confirming historical existence of the portage and to describe them for introduction into scientific circulation. In addition to the scientific purpose of the expedition there are some others. They want to reveal the forgotten pages of history of the Russian Arctic, to popularize the most interesting geographical, natural and tourist objects of Yamal. For this purpose during several months preceding the expedition they held presentations in Noviy Urengoy, Moscow, St. Petersburg, told schoolchildren about the expedition. Before they leave for the travel they plan to tell about Mangazeya and expeditions in the school of Krasnoselkoup.

Also on their way the explorers dream to meet representatives of an ethnic minority - Ket people, the number of whom, judging by the last census of population of Russia, makes slightly more than one thousand. The Ket language is the last living representative of the Yenisei language family. Other related languages — Pumpokol, Arin and Assan (Kott) disappeared in the XVIII-XIX centuries.