Photos of the Day for December 19, 2014

Traditional Polesian marsh boats, Machul’ 2014.  Чаўны, Мачуль 2014 г.

Polesian villages, hamlets, and homesteads were historically dependent on water transportation when the Pripet Marshes, Europe’s largest expanse of wetlands, were still pristine.  The old section of Machul’ retains the feel of such Polesian villages from before Soviet a post-Soviet “amelioration”, a series of drainage campaigns which has degraded the ecosystem of major parts of of the Pripet Marshes.