Achinsk

About Achinsk

Founded as a fortified outpost in the 17th century, Achinsk is one of the oldest towns of central Siberia and a stop on the Trans-Siberian Railway about 160 km west of Krasnoyarsk. The city spreads along the right bank of the Chulym River, a tributary of the Ob, and today has roughly 100,000 people, many working at the big alumina plant and oil refinery that drive its economy.

The first fort went up in 1641; the official founding date, 25 July 1683, marks its move after a fire, and Achinsk became a town in 1782. Its most precious building is the Empire-style Kazan Cathedral of 1832, and the town honours its own saint, Daniel of Achinsk, a veteran of Borodino who became a hermit here. Merchant mansions, a regional museum founded in 1887 and a drama theatre add to a compact historic core.

Visitors come mostly on business or as a break on the long rail journey across Siberia, but summer days on the Chulym beaches, lilacs on Bogatkov Square in May and the old wooden houses reward a slower look at a working Siberian town.