Vyshny Volochyok

Vyshny Volochyok takes its name from the upper portage between the Tvertsa and the Tsna, across the watershed separating the Volga from the Baltic drainage. Boats and their cargoes once had to pass overland here before continuing toward the Msta, Lake Ilmen and Novgorod. The crossing made the settlement an important point on a much longer route between central Russia and the north-west.

In 1471 the army of Prince Obolensky-Striga passed through on its campaign against Novgorod, leaving devastation in its wake. By the seventeenth century the settlement served as a postal station. Peter I ordered a canal between the Tvertsa and Tsna in 1703, seeking a water route to supply his new capital at St Petersburg. The first works proved inadequate, and the merchant Mikhail Serdyukov improved the canals and water controls to regulate the supply of water. The resulting system joined the Volga to the waterways leading to Lake Ladoga and the Neva. Boats still faced the difficult Borovichi rapids on the Msta, but the watershed itself could now be crossed by water. Vyshny Volochyok received town status in 1770, its growth closely bound to the traffic passing through the canals.