2-day Chernobyl tour from Kyiv: Reactor No. 4 and exclusion zone

The Zone still holds thousands of workers and a functioning town behind the checkpoint.

A 2-day group tour from Kyiv into the Chernobyl exclusion zone with a live English or Russian guide, overnight hotel stay in Chernobyl town, all meals, permits, transport and insurance included. The itinerary covers Reactor No. 4, abandoned villages, the unfinished cooling towers, the secret military radar installation Duga, and the working administrative center where staff still operate. Minimum age is 18. Passport required for border crossing.

Step-by-step itinerary

Chernobyl Zone exploration and hotel stay

• Passport check at Dityatki checkpoint
• Cross into Chernobyl exclusion zone
• Check in at local hotel
• Visit museum of robots and equipment
• Walk around central square and memorial
• Visit alley of memory of abandoned villages
• Visit kindergarten in Kopachy village
• See graves of houses in Kopachy
• Explore central square and city buildings
• See amusement park and medical-sanitary unit
• View pool of Azure and high school
• Visit unfinished units 5 and 6 cooling towers
• Enter cooling towers and see graffiti
• Visit abandoned radiobiology base
• See artificial pond NPP cooler
• Visit villages of Kupovatoe, Red, Opachichi
• Interview with Institute of Nuclear Safety staff
• Tour Chernobyl-2 military town and administrative building
• Walk along cooling pond at Chernobyl NPP
• See observation site of shelter object "Arch"
• Visit park and memorial at NPP administrative building
• Feed fish (seasonal)
• Visit inactivated Red Forest
• Explore secret USSR object ZGRLS "Duga"

The experience

The tour starts at checkpoint Dityatki, where you pass through security screening and cross into the exclusion zone. From there you head into Chernobyl town itself, not a ghost settlement but a functioning administrative center where several thousand people work shifts. You'll check into one of three hotels operating there and spend the first afternoon walking the central square, visiting the museum of robots and equipment used in the cleanup, and seeing the memorial complex "Star Wormwood" dedicated to abandoned villages. The alley of memory marks where entire settlements once stood before evacuation.

Day two focuses on the reactor complex and the surrounding sites. You visit the village of Kopachy, buried underground after the accident, where only small hillocks mark where houses once stood. The unfinished cooling towers for reactors 5 and 6 are enormous (their volume so vast it's hard to believe they were built by hand), and you walk inside to see the graffiti left by artist Guido van Helten. You also see the abandoned radiobiology research base on the cooler pond's bank, where equipment and drugs remain exactly as researchers left them. The tour includes an observation point for the Shelter Object "Arch" covering Reactor No. 4, a walk through the NPP park and memorial, and a visit to Chernobyl-2, the secret military town that once housed a thousand people on a single street. The tour ends at the Duga radar installation, the over-the-horizon system built to detect missile launches. Throughout both days, a guide shares current facts from the Institute of Nuclear Safety about what the Zone is today.

All permits, transport escort, accommodation, and meals are arranged. You bring your valid passport, wear long sleeves and full-length pants, and pack drinking water. The program adjusts for weather and daylight hours. Some stops like Kopachy are skipped in wet conditions to avoid tracking radioactive particles. Photography and video are permitted.

What’s included

• Local guide in English or Russian.
• all permits and border crossing authorization.
• accommodation at a Chernobyl hotel for one night.
• lunch twice, dinner and breakfast.
• transport throughout the Zone.
• insurance.
• permission for photography and video.

Before you book

Days and timesSaturdayDeparts at 07:20

AgesAdult (18 to 80 years) · Under 18: can't be booked

GroupUp to 16

Live guideEnglish and Russian

Meeting point and pickupNo hotel pickup: you go to the meeting point. Ends back at the starting point.

Cancellation and refundsFree cancellation up to 24 h before the start. After that, no refund.

Prices and times updated yesterday

Good to know

Low physical effortNot recommended during pregnancyNot recommended with heart problems

Is this one for you?Choose this overnight version if you want a guide interpreting the site's history and decay across both daylight and after-dark hours, when the atmosphere shifts entirely.

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Top questions

What languages is the tour guided in?

Live guide in English and Russian.

What is the town of Chernobyl actually like now, three decades after the accident?

Chernobyl town functions as a working administrative center with several thousand shift workers, a prosecutor's office, police, post office, shops and a cafeteria. Three hotels now operate there. The brand of "ghost town" is misleading: the settlement runs daily operations, though the surrounding Zone remains abandoned and reclaimed by nature.

Can I get close to Reactor No. 4 itself?

You see Reactor No. 4 from an observation point near the Shelter Object "Arch," the structure built to contain it. You don't enter the reactor building, but you walk the NPP park and memorial at the administrative building and pass along the cooling pond road that runs near it.

What are the unfinished cooling towers, and do we go inside them?

Units 5 and 6 of the power plant were never completed: Unit 5 was 80% finished when the explosion happened. The massive cooling towers built for them stand empty. Yes, you walk inside these structures, which are so large their scale is hard to grasp in person.

What is Duga, and why is it part of the tour?

Duga was a secret Soviet over-the-horizon radar system designed to detect intercontinental ballistic missile launches early. It sits in the Zone as a relic of Cold War military infrastructure and is now a major landmark within the exclusion area that the tour visits.

Are there people still living in the Zone who refused to leave?

Yes. Despite government evacuation orders and high radiation, some people called "self-travelers" never left or returned to their homes afterward. The tour includes optional visits to villages like Kupovatoe, Red and Opachichi where you can meet residents and hear their stories directly.

What should I pack and wear for the two days?

Wear comfortable walking shoes and long sleeves from shoulder to wrist, with full-length pants. Bring drinking water. Your passport (the same one you used to enter Ukraine) must be with you for the Zone border crossing. Alcoholic drinks are not permitted, and anyone under 18 cannot enter the Zone.