Qualla: Krokhino, Vologda Oblast

Krokhino, Vologda Oblast: Introduction

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. A church stands in the water. Not on an island, not on a pier -- in the water itself, its lower walls submerged, its southern face crumbling faster than its northern one because that is the side the current strikes. The Nativity Church at Krokhino, built around 1790 in the Baroque style, was never meant to be a waterside ruin. It was built on solid ground, in a settlement that had existed since at least 1426. Then, in the early 1960s, the Soviet government raised the water level of Lake Beloye to guarantee depth for ships on the Volga-Baltic Waterway, and Krokhino -- along with its houses, its history, and its people -- went under.

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Image: Unknown author | Public domain

Krokhino, Vologda Oblast: Six Centuries at the Source of the Sheksna

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Thierry.ptz, CC BY-SA 4.0. Krokhino first appears in the written record in 1426, in the books of the Kirillo-Belozersky Monastery. It occupied the same ground where the medieval city of Beloozero once stood before relocating 17 kilometers west in 1352. The village was owned by a boyar's son named Gavrila L...

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Image: Thierry.ptz | CC BY-SA 4.0

Krokhino, Vologda Oblast: The Canal That Passed Them By

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Thierry.ptz, CC BY-SA 4.0. Krokhino's first death was economic. In 1846, the Belozersky Canal was built to bypass Lake Beloye entirely, starting 9.5 kilometers below the settlement. The wharf closed. Trade dried up. Local legend holds that the surveyors planning the new channel asked Krokhino's residents f...

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Image: Thierry.ptz | CC BY-SA 4.0

Krokhino, Vologda Oblast: The Waters Rise

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Krokhino's second death was literal. In the early 1960s, the construction of the deep Volga-Baltic Waterway required raising the water level in Lake Beloye. Krokhino, Kargulino, and other settlements in the Belozersky District fell within the inundation zone. Residents disassembl...

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Image: Unknown author | Public domain

Krokhino, Vologda Oblast: A Ghost That Refuses to Disappear

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. Tourist boats on the Sheksna River pass the Nativity Church regularly, and it has become one of the most photographed ruins in Vologda Oblast -- a spectral presence rising from the water where a village used to be. The famed Russian photographer Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky captured th...

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Image: Unknown author | Public domain