Vyshny Volochyok Waterway
Coordinates: 57°35′57.3174″N 34°32′45.9882″E / 57.599254833°N 34.546107833°E Vyshny Volochyok Waterway (Russian: Вышневолоцкая водная система) is a waterway connecting the basins of the Baltic and Caspian Seas, or, more specifically, the Msta River and the Tvertsa River, around the town of Vyshny Volochyok of Tver Oblast, Russia. It was constructed in the 1700s and became the first waterway to connect the basins of the two seas. The waterway is still in operation, though it was superseded by the Volga–Baltic Waterway and cannot take big ships. The Vyshny Volochyok Waterway is one of the three canal systems connecting the Neva and the Volga, the other two being the Volga–Baltic Waterway and the Tikhvinskaya water system.
The waterway from Lake Ilmen upstream the Msta and the Tsna Rivers, followed by a portage to the Tvertsa and downstream to the Volga River existed from the medieval times, as is evident from a large amount of archeological sites in the area. The name of Vyshny Volochyok is derived from Russian: волок, which means portage. On January 12, 1703 Russian Tsar Peter the Great signed a decree which ordered a canal to be built instead of the portage. Prince Matvey Gagarin was appointed the supervisor of the construction, and Adriaan Houter, a Dutch water engineer from Amsterdam, was hired to perform the construction. The waterway was opened in 1706 and became the first waterway connecting the basins of the Neva and the Volga. The canal, known as the Gagarin Canal, and later as the Tvertsa Canal, was 2,811 metres (9,222 ft) long and 15 metres (49 ft) deep. However, the construction project contained a number of mistakes, and as a result the canal decayed and some point the navigation became impossible.
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