Desert landscape attracts tourists

(October 18, 2018) LEADIN: Facts have proved that an unusual sandy desert near the Black Sea coast of Ukraine is very popular with tourists. Oleshky Sands is a barren land, but tourists are now drawing this spectacular landscape on the map. Storyline: In southern Ukraine, large tracts of sand cover a large area. This huge desert in the center of Eastern Europe is called Oleshky Sands, about 30 kilometers from the coast of the Black Sea. Hundreds of years ago, it was a grassland, but in the 18th and 19th centuries, sheep farming caused the grass to wither. The root system combined with sandy soil disappeared, the soil turned into sand and began to engulf the area. In recent years, the barren landscape has become a popular tourist attraction. “Our desert is one of the largest sandy areas in Europe. Like other deserts, we not only have crescent-shaped dunes (a crescent-shaped mobile dune) and landscapes. We have plants, trees, shrubs. There are also many animals— —Wolves, hares. There are even fish in the lake. This distinguishes us from other deserts. We not only have sand,” said Yana Demydova, inspector of the National Park “Oleshky Sands”. Olexander Khybenko, a tour guide for a travel company, explained its appeal: “This phenomenon can only be seen abroad, as many people think, such as in coastal areas such as the Sahara, Turkey, and Egypt. This phenomenon is important for Ukraine and At the same time it is very beautiful. That’s why people visit us to appreciate this beauty.” Tourist Mykola Fisayuk said it is beautiful: “There is an incredible beauty here. My first thought when I came here was how could Ukraine, known for its black soil, be located in such a huge sandy area? But the forest on the skyline is pleasing to the eye. And there are more and more plants growing in the desert. “Oleshky Sands has crescent-shaped quicksand dunes, which are up to 20 meters high in some places, and are also the birthplaces of oasis and sandstorms. In summer, the highest temperature can reach 45 degrees Celsius, and the sand surface temperature can reach 75 degrees Celsius. The area became in 2010. National parks, so far in 2018, about 2,600 tourists have visited the desert in organized guided tours, according to Yana Demidova, the national park “Oleshky Sands” inspector. But these numbers are not accurate. Because there are many places where people can enter the area on their own. About 70,000 people live in villages and towns on the edge of the desert. The nearest city, Kherson, is 30 kilometers away from the Oleski sandy land. The main regional industry is fruit and vegetable production. Planting, and tourism. In order to prevent the spread of sand, pine forests were planted in the 20th century.” This was the edge of the desert at that time. The huge sand dunes are moving. Since there were no houses at the time, they kept moving, getting closer and closer to people’s settlements. The sand buried them. So people came to this area and planted these trees. It took them some time to take root. Pine trees in some places now hold the sand and soil together like real people,” ecologist Volodymyr Sheludko explained. More trees are planned to be planted in early 2019, and 30 hectares of pine trees will be planted to prevent sand tides. The sandy area is 161,000 hectares ( 1,610 square kilometers). The entire area including forest and sand is 210,000 hectares and 2,100 square kilometers. More information about AP Archive: Twitter: Facebook: Instagram: You can get permission for this story through AP Archive:.

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