That "leica glow" he talks about does get a different meaning near Chernobyl 🙂
I read a lot about Chernobyl and saw a lot of pictures and in my opinion it's overrated though. First of all it's definitely not untouched. Three decades of poverty in the area have meant that despite any radiation, anything that was left there has been stolen...
It appears not to be too dangerous if you follow the tour, but that is because you cannot enter a lot of areas. In other words, you won't exactly be strolling around, exploring the town, if I understand it correctly: you need to take a tour leading you over some roads, seeing those buildings (see pictures) that everyone sees.
In my opinion, I think you can find better "abandoned" places. Villages and towns have been abandoned for various reasons over the year. One example, not very big, that comes to mind is the village of Doel in Belgium. Due to the expansion of the harbour, it was officially said somewhere before the year 2000 that the village would be completely demolished. It's 2012 and nothing of the sort has happened yet (two financial crises have something to do with that), but the village has been almost completely depopulated for 15 years now. As an added bonus you get to walk around in the streets, houses...
Coincidentally, there is also a nuclear powerplant in Doel, but that one has not melted down yet 🙂
Just saying. Doel is very small and probably not worth coming over for, I just happen to know it because it's close. But what I'm trying to say is that I bet there are more interesting places than Chernobyl.
