Ukraine is one of those countries which, when visited, leaves you in awe. We went to Kyiv, Odessa and Chernobyl and most of these images are from the latter. The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear accident that occurred on Saturday 26 April 1986, at the No. 4 reactor in the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, near the town of Pripyat in the north of the Ukrainian SSR in the Soviet Union. Pripyat is a ghost town in northern Ukraine near the Ukraine–Belarus border. Named after the nearby river Pripyat, the town was founded on 4 February 1970, as the ninth "atomgrad", a type of ‘closed town’ in the Soviet Union to serve the nearby Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. It was officially proclaimed a city in 1979 and had grown to a population of 49,360 by the time it was evacuated on the afternoon of 27 April 1986, the day after the Chernobyl disaster. I have had a desire to visit Chernobyl and Pripyat for some time and the reality exceeded all expectations. We had to get special permits, as do all visitors, and book it well in advance. It’s a two hour drive from Kyiv and on approach it is a desolate but thickly and naturally re-forested with silver birch and other deciduous species. Even the wolf and lynx have returned. This arboreal and biodiversity rejuvenation has enveloped the city of Pripyat and enhanced its ‘ghost’ status.