Exploring the Oredezh river and the surrounding area of Vyritsa market town

This Wednesday, my family decided to take a break from the dull village lifestyle. We boarded the train and went to the nearest market town, Vyritsa. We wanted to unwind, dine at a restaurant, reminisce about Italian cuisine and pizza, and do some shopping. (We bought a gadget for drying vegetables and fruit: this season promises a huge apple harvest, and we're getting ready.) Vyritsa is a major railway hub (six lines pass through the station).

This house looking ruined and abandoned -- its located just three steps from the center, on the way from the rail station to the more industrial/warehousing area of the town. The sight is quite spectacular. I have to say we noticed during the walk a lot of residential mansions which look abandoned and sometimes ruined. A lot of them are located in courtyards overgrown with weeds, shrubs, and trees, making it impossible to take clear pics; one can only conclude that their inhabitants have stopped caring... we didn't enter any of the abandoned buildings; not this time.

The town has two big bridges, one for pedestrians and one for trains to cross the river. The river is called 'Oredezh'. It flows among pine trees and sand, and has brown water (due to a lot of peat). It's very picturesque, one of our favorite places to stroll when we find ourselves in Vyritsa. There's no embankment with comfortable benches here... But that's not to say there aren't any benches at all; at least we found one -- @mipiano, look.

Passing another building materials warehouse, I was surprised to discover the widespread use of ancient manual techniques: a man was cutting firewood for a wood-burning stove using an axe! The scale of his work was simply titanic (considering the amount of wood he had to process). I'm frankly surprised and don't understand the lack of mechanization. While I certainly enjoyed this scene as a photographer, it didn't evoke any tenderness in my heart: after all, it was hard manual labor.

This is what the area around the train station looks like. This was the last shot I took before boarding the train home. My 70-200mm telephoto lens is actually well suited for street photography, but not for architecture or landscapes; here, it managed to capture the entire perspective—simply because the necessary zoom was achieved with my feet. Let me wrap up this post here. Thanks for walking with me!