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CRIMEA

Simferopol - the Capital of Krym Yalta Alushta Phoros Hotels Restaurants Keep Me Posted

Simferopol - the Capital of Krym

Built on the site of the 15th-century Tartar settlement Ak Masjid (White Mosque), the city was granted a charter in 1784. The main tourist attraction is Neapolis archeological excavation site, the ruins of the capital of the Scythian state in the 2nd century B.C. It was destroyed by the Huns some 600 years later. Excavations started there in 1827; they revealed many marble and bronze statues, and a large burial ground with stone mausoleum and the graves of 72 Scythian noblemen with gold ornaments and weapons.

Crimea is included in: "Super Grand Tour of Ukraine" (brief description, detailed program), "Black Sea" (brief description, detailed program). In standard versions tourists are usually accommodated in Yalta. Please, note that other famous resorts (Alushta, Phoros) can be included instead of Yalta. 

Yalta

The city is ideally located and has an excellent climate. There are practically no north winds. The winters are extremely mild (roses often bloom in the open at Christmas) and the city is rich in acacia, laurel, magnolia, and palm trees, and is surrounded by orchards and vineyards. The mountains are covered with oak and beech forests. The heat of the summer months is tempered by the sea breezes. The annual sunshine hours equal those of Nice in the south of France. The bathing season lasts from June till the end of September. 

Included in: "Super Grand Tour of Ukraine" (brief description, detailed program), "Black Sea" (brief description, detailed program). Please, note that other famous resorts (Alushta, Phoros) can be included instead of Yalta. 

Yalta: Places of Interest and Side Trips

If time permits, the "Swallow Nest" - a tiny palace, looking like a medieval castle with bastions and battlements, located on the cliffs of Ay-Todor Cape right over the sea, - can be included. From Ay-Todor the whole Bay of Yalta opens out to the viewer. There are also the ruins of a 2,000-year-old Roman fortress nearby.

Tour of the Vorontsov Palace in Alupka. The Palace used to be the residence of Count Mikhail Vorontsov. Designed by a well-known British architect Edward Blore, one of the fathers of "romanticism in architecture". The construction began in winter 1832-33. It has 150 rooms and took 18 years to build. Its northern elevation is in Tudor style and recalls a medieval castle, while the southern front has distinct Moorish elements.

During the 1945 Yalta Conference of "The Big Three" it was the residence of the British delegation. Today it is a museum, including an art gallery of Russian and Western art.

The 120-acre estate is one of the finest on the Southern Crimean coast, with over 200 exotic plants and trees. In the Upper Park is the "Alupka Chaos", the quarry from which the material for the Palace was taken; it is now a picturesque and romantic labyrinth.

If not included in the Yalta orientation tour, on way back from the Vorontsov Palace sightseeing of the "Swallow Nest", Ay-Todor Cape and the old Roman fortress can be done.

Day trip to Bakhchisaray. 

In Massandra (5 km from Yalta) the Central Research Institute of Viticulture and Viniculture is located, which has worked to improve some 800 varieties of grape and several thousand hybrids from Algerian, French, Italian, Hungarian and Syrian vines.

Massandra Wine Factory is closely connected with the Institute. Its cellars hold some wine bottled in 1775 - not for general consumption, of course :-). It has a special wine-tasting place, visit to which can be arranged on special order for groups. 

Another attraction of Yalta is the Nikitskiy Botanical Garden located 6.5 km east of the city.

The garden was founded in 1812. It rises in terraces from the seashore mountainwards and covers some 500 acres. There are 7,000 trees and plants there, both native - some of them endemic - to the Crimea and imported from the five continents.

The stay in Yalta can be substituted by the stay in Alushta or Phoros, in which case the program is slightly modified. 

Alushta

It is less sheltered than Yalta because the mountains are some 8 km from the shore; and in summer the heat is tempered by the mountain breezes. But sunshine hours are very high there and the sea is even warmer than at Yalta. 

Alushta: Places of Interest and Side Trips

Tour to Mount Demerdzhi (1,219 m above sea level) and the Dzhur-Dzhur Waterfall near the Village of Generalske [Generalskoye], the finest waterfall in the Crimean Mountains. 

Tour of Gurzuf, the town where Alexander Pushkin, Adam Mickiewicz, Fyodor Shaliapin found artistic inspiration. 

Alushta's biggest attraction is the Crimean National Nature Preserve. The preserve covers well over 70,000 acres - it is a huge open-air museum with ancient trees and a variety of Crimean animals (moufflons, gazelles, foxes, etc.). It can be visited only with a special official permit. Available for groups on advance request!. 

Phoros

Phoros: Places of Interest and Side Trips

The most interesting is undoubtedly the visit to another place, barred until recently for foreigners and even local people, - Sevastopol, the base of the Black Sea Fleet built on the site of the Hellenic city of Khersones [Chersonesus].

The main attractions are: the circular panorama painted by Roubaud of Munich and depicting the Defense of Sevastopol in the Crimean War (1855) with the panorama lot and Bastion IV, where young lieutenant Leo Tolstoy started writing his first stories in the intervals between fighting, nearby; the Art Gallery, housing a collection that includes works by outstanding Russian (Repin, Levitan, etc.) and Western (Raphael, Giordano, Rubens, Sneyders, Ruysdael) painters; the Museum of the Black Sea Fleet; the Archeological Museum of Khersones.

Crimea: Hotels

YALTA HOTEL *** +

Crimea: Restaurants