Blog about Urals

We all know that the history is cyclic and is used to repeat. People should know where some events will lead us to, based on a huge experience of mankind.

One of the most terrible pages of newest history of Russia is the repression period, the time of GULAG. We decided that for better understanding of this period we have to merge into the atmosphere of that time. That’s why we went to the unique GULAG museum, which was founded by people who were convicted in political crime and exonerated after the USSR destruction.

The museum was founded on remains of the prison camp Perm-36 for political prisoners. This prison camp was founded in 1940 during the GULAG period and was closed in 1988, when “perestroika” started in USSR. The camp was designed to hold 1000 prisoners and contained few barracks, auto repair shops, depots and administrative buildings. Prisoners worked on logging and small technical works which didn’t require professional skills.
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Today, in one of sunny spring days we want to tell you how russian people greet spring.
Since earliest times the Shrovetide is celebrated in Russia in honour of spring coming – a holiday week with pancakes baking and street festivities.

The tradition to bake pancakes came to us from slavs. They took spring as a source of new life and hallowed the sun which gives light and warm for everything alive on the earth. First they baked unleavened cakes in honor of the sun, and when they learnt how to make a batter they baked pancakes. Pancakes were considered as a symbol of the sun, because they are also yellow, round and hot. Slavs believed they ate a piece of the sun, its heat and power.

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On the 30th of January we went to Nevyansk – the oldest city-plant in the Urals. The weather forecast was good enough for that day, so early in the morning we began the journey. Our goal was to see how the Demidov’s empire began, and to hear one of the most interesting pages in the history of the Urals.
Nevyansk was founded by a decree of Peter I in 1701 in connection with the foundation of ironworks. This was the first city-plant in the world. One year later Peter I granted the plant to Nikita Demidovich Antufiev together with new surname “Demidov”. That’s how the Demidov’s dynasty appeared.
Nevyansk is located in 80km from Yekaterinburg and it took us about an hour to get there. The road to Nevyansk comes through the foothills of the Middle Urals and is like russian roller coaster.
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If you arrived in Yekaterinburg the best thing to start with is an acquaintance with the city. Currently I’m preparing this excursion and would like to share this info.

The historical centre of the city is the dam situated on Lenina avenue. The route I suggest starts near it – from central subway station called the square of 1905 (Ploshchad 1905 goda), on the picture attached it is the point number one. The route finishes in the point number 18 – here is the house of officers and a restaurant with traditional russian cooking, named USSR (CCCP).
So let me describe other points and directions briefly.
1 – you are standing near central subway station and the street you are at is called “8 marta”. In google maps it’s “ulitsa 8 marta” cause ulitsa means a street. Let’s go to the parallel street called “Vaynera”.
2 – you are on Vaynera street, it’s the favourite place of walk for many citizens. This street is an analog of Moscow’s arbad. Let’s cross Lenina avenue (“prospekt Lenina”) and go to the embankment of the city pond.
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Last week we decided to go to Ganina Yama – that particular place where the Bolsheviks tried to hide dead bodies of Tsar Nicholai II and his family, leaving them in an abandoned mine. These events gave ill fame to new soviet authority and are related with one of the most frightening pages of russian history.

The mine is located in a pine forest and is now called Ganina Yama (in translation Ganya’s Pit). «Ganya» -  is the short name for Gavriel. In the era of the Urals “Gold Rush” (the middle of XIX century) a contractor Gavriel bought this plot of land hoping to find a gold in it. Soon it became clear that the mine doesn’t contain gold, but it contains iron ore. By the beginning of 20th century the mine got abandoned and became overgrown with a forest.

Early on the morning of July 17, 1918, Ganina Yama met remains of the Tsar, his family and their faithful servants. The bodies were thrown into the mine, after a while got dismembered, and then within two days destroyed by fire and sulfuric acid.

As we arrived at the place, we were amazed – how many people came here from different parts of Urals and Russia, despite the inclement weather. We left the car, took a breathe of the fresh crisp forest air and went to the very complex.
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The second place visited that weekend (see the previous post) was the village Nizhnaya Sinyachiha famous for the outdoor museum of wooden architecture located in Urals.

The museum is a result of hard work of Russian engineer and collector Ivan Samoylov devoted his life to recreation of historical treasures. During his trips over Russia Samoylov often saw old historical buildings which went to waste in economically unviable villages. His idea was to create a culture preserve with all these architectural sights. For the preserve he chose a wonderful russian village fouded in 1680 year.

In this place Samoylov and his team of restorers revived Spaso-Preobrazhenskiy Cathedral – nine-domed, 64 meters high monument in “Tobolsk’ baroque” style. Inside of the cathedral there is a museum of folk art. Right here we started our acquaintance with the preserve.

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This weekend was very rich in regard to impressions, because we visited at once two interesting places. The first one was the border between Europe and Asia – one of famous places in Urals and Russia.

The idea to part Europe and Asia was first time suggested by sweden scientist Stralenberg in 1730. But there were a lot of disussions on where exactly to place the border. It was difficult to determine because there is no clear transition between these two parts of the world and geologically they are alike. Finally scientists agreed to consider Urals (Ural mountains) as natural border.

There are several monuments set on the border.  We went to the nearest and the most popular, situated in 17 km from Ekaterinburg city. Usually there are weddings’ photo sessions near this monument on Friday and Saturday, but this Saturday there were almost no people and we successfully took photoes there.

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