Homyel Region

The Homel Region in southeastern Belarus is a landscape of rivers, marshes, and pine forests that ranks among the most pristine parts of Polesia. It is also the region hardest hit by the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. A trip to Homel is not advisable at present: travel to Belarus is discouraged, and the border with Ukraine is closed because of Russia's war of aggression.

Polesia Between the Dnieper and the Pripyat

The region borders Ukraine and Russia. The Dnieper, the Pripyat, and the Sozh flow through a flat lowland shaped by bogs and floodplain forests. Around 1.3 million people live here, a good third of them in Homel, the second-largest city in the country. Other towns include Mazyr with its oil refinery, Zhlobin, and Rechytsa. In the south lies the Polesie State Radioecological Reserve, an exclusion zone created after the Chernobyl reactor disaster that has since developed into a refuge for wildlife.

Sights in the Homel Region

Homel sits on the high bank of the Sozh. The Rumyantsev-Paskevich Palace and Park complex, with a neoclassical palace from the late 18th century, the Cathedral of Saints Peter and Paul, and an expansive landscape park, is the heart of the city; from the tower you can look out over the river. A suspension bridge leads to the opposite bank. Pripyatsky National Park protects flood meadows, oak forests, and oxbow lakes of the Pripyat, home to beavers, elk, and hundreds of bird species; in spring the river overflows its banks for miles. In Mazyr, hills along the Pripyat offer unusual views over the otherwise flat landscape. Zhlobin and Rechytsa are smaller industrial towns on the Dnieper. Inland you'll find villages with wooden houses whose window frames are brightly painted and decorated with carvings, and along the rivers there are still fishermen who head out onto the oxbow lakes in flat wooden boats. Turaw on the Pripyat is one of the oldest settlements in the country and was the seat of a principality in the Middle Ages.

Food and Tips

The cuisine of Polesia is rustic: draniki (potato pancakes), fish soups, and mushrooms and berries from the forests. The region is only partly accessible to travelers, and parts of the south remain closed to this day because of radiation.