History of the fur trade by the Sea of Okhotsk
Once knowledge of ship building and navigation was slowly moved across Siberia they advanced to Alaska.
It runs northeast about 700 km (430 mi) from Uda Bay to the town of Okhotsk.
About 260 km (160 mi) up the coast is Ayan with its good harbor but poor communications inland.
Near the northeast corner is the good harbor of Nagayev Bay where, in 1929, the Nagayevo settlement was built which grew into a GULAG city of Magadan with its road north to the Kolyma gold fields.
240 km (150 mi) east of Magadan the east-west section ends at the P'yagin Peninsula and the Yamsky Islands.
The western section of the continental part of the Sea of Okhotsk Coast is backed by the Dzhugdzhur Mountains which reach 600 to 1,000 metres.
On the east side numerous short, swift rivers cut valleys down to the sea.
From May to July damp air blows landward bringing a cold foggy drizzle.
This and the poor soils meant that the Russians had to import food despite the abundance of Salmon.
Like most coastal Siberians, they were reindeer herders in the interior with a few semi-sedentary fishers and sealers along the coast.
The summer shipment left Yakutsk in mid-June after the rivers had gone down and the spring mud dried and reached Okhotsk in mid-August.
Yakuts and their hardy breed of horses were required to serve the route and were paid.
The numerous fords became impassable during the spring melt and were difficult until the mud dried or refroze.
A winter non-freight route went from Yakutsk east to Omyakon and then directly south to the upper Okhota River.
In 1646 Vasili Poyarkov sailed north from the Amur and re-used Moskvitin's huts on the Ulya.
In 1651-57 Mikhail Stadukhin made a poorly documented journey along the whole coast from Penzhina Bay to Okhotsk.
Kamchatka Opened: Russian attention was concentrated on the Amur until they were driven out by the Manchus.
Northward, in 1697-1699 Vladimir Atlasov went south from Anadyrsk and explored the Kamchatka Peninsula.
[1] There was no sea route but a very difficult coast trail was used mainly to send messages.
George Kennan (explorer) gave a hair-raising account of his journey along this coast in 1867.
Adam Johann von Krusenstern (1805) may have been the first Russian to reach the area by sea from European Russia.
This led to a great deal of building and brought in large numbers of people and the first scholars and competent sailors.
Over the next hundred years many attempts were made to find a better port with a better route over the mountains.
Russian America was sold to the United States in 1867 and from 1870 Okhotsk was supplied from Nikolayevsk-on-Amur.
Twentieth Century: The last battle of the Russian Civil War was fought at Ayan.
