Is situated 10 km away from Yalta near the village Nikita
It was found in 1812
Near the pool you can get a picture of
you with a peacock. Not for free of course.
The birds are not treated
well: to make them spread their tails the owners breech them.
Then the peacock are given water
Something like a strobile. Grows right
from the ground.
A lot of trees, bushes and flowers that
can't be seen in our north-west region, grow here.
For example, sequoia, cork tree, whangee, palms, cypress.
This tree is a tree without bark. If you
touch it, it will leave marks like a burn injury on your skin. Many
people do touch it :)
Palms
Also on the territory of the garden there
is a cactus greenhouse with many different cacti.
Near the cacti, a choir of a dozen of copulating frogs sang bloating out
their cheeks. The clamorous choir was very popular among visitors of the
Nikitensky botanic garden.
Small and fragile cacti are in the
greenhouse while huge and thick are in the open air.
Silent Yalta street.
But it's an
exception. Everywhere we went we saw traffic jams that were worsened by
the narrowness of streets.
There are many posh cars with local identification numbers.
It might be to know where you are when
you crawl home.
(The note says: "We do. tel. 34 11 27")
Brevity is the soul of wit
Judging by the fact that only one piece of paper with a telephone
number is left, many people want to know what "they do".
We almost ignored the beach.
It was too
cold to swim (April-May), more over there were many dead jellyfishes.
We threw pebble in the sea for awhile and than went along the Black Sea
quay.
There were a lot of people at the quay at
evening, more than in Nevsky prospect. I cannot imagine what it's like
in the summer.
There are a lot of entertainment for
tourists. We bought some souvenirs (there were a lot of), rode
rollercoaster, eat shashlik and went to sleep because next morning we
had to go to the Bahchisarai.
We went to Bahchisarai by serpentine road
through the Ai-Petri, right through the tableland on which we climbed by
feet a day ago.
The road was dangerous in places, especially when
oncoming cars went without thinking what the next turn can bring. Having
climbed up we stopped for a lunch. We ate pilau watching Yalta and than
went on to Bahchisara.
In the picture there's mountain stream, we came across on our way.
It is said that near Bahchisarai some of
episodes of "Kavkazskaya plennitsa ("Caucasian captive", famous Russian
movie of 60s) were shot.
Apricot or peach or other garden
In Bahchisarai
The Khan Palace is very
distinctive, but we, spoilt by St Petersburg palaces, were not much
impressed.
The guide said that a part of showpieces was previously taken to
Hermitage.
Bahchisarai street
But I have to
mention that there are many new buildings in Bahchisarai
Now we're going to see a monastery.
Svyato-Uspensky Orthodox monastery in
rocks.
I nearly fell three times on the stairs and felt myself an
ateist. Than I saw that the steps are of different height and their
edges projected.
The icons are painted right on the rocks.
Previously there was a spring with clear
water.
Now it's situated a bit lower and decorated more modest.
The monastery is a working one
Inside
there are stacks of plastic bottles with branded label "Blessed water".
Everything has been restored.
It's senseless to describe the beauty. It's better to see it with
your own eyes.
It's interesting that churches in Crimea belong to Russian Orthodox
Church while churches of other part of Ukraine belong to Ukrainian
Orthodox Church.
I'm thinking of making an
album about the St Petersburg - Moscow - Voronezh - Energodar -
Yalta highway.
