Sovetskaya Gavan has one of the best natural harbours on the Pacific coast of Russia, which is why it has been fought over, fortified and renamed. It sits on a deep bay on the Tatar Strait, reached through a narrow entrance, and in the 1850s the explorer Gennady Nevelskoy's party gave it the name Imperial Harbour. The Soviet authorities changed it in the 1920s, and today about thirty thousand people live here, a mix of dockworkers, sailors, fishermen and the families of naval personnel, since the Pacific Fleet maintains a presence in the area.
The ride in is a long one, either down from Komsomolsk across the mountains or along the coast from Vanino. The road crosses ridges covered in larch and spruce and drops to the sea through wet, mossy valleys, and conditions are unpredictable. Expect some asphalt, some gravel and a lot of trucks, and keep the weather in mind, because rain and fog are frequent and winter closes some sections. Autumn, when the air is clear and cold, is the best time to see the bay at its sharpest.
Services are good by local standards. There are fuel stations, supermarkets, banks, restaurants and a couple of hotels, and the nearby settlements of Lososina and Mayskiy fill in the gaps. For anything serious you would go back toward Vanino or Komsomolsk. Take a walk along the waterfront: the old harbour buildings, the naval vessels in the distance and the boats unloading fish give a very good picture of what life here is about. Seafood is the best bet at lunch, particularly salmon, crab and fish soup, which is usually warm, generous and cheap.
This end of Khabarovsk Krai feels like a different country from the Amur valley. The climate is damp and cool, shaped by the cold sea, and fog rolls in on summer mornings. The forest comes right to the water, and in autumn the hillsides blaze with maple and birch among dark conifers. It is also an area of bears and tigers, though both are rare to see. Be careful on the wet bends, enjoy the sense of being at the extreme eastern end of mainland Russia, and take an hour with the harbour before turning around.