Alupka palace and gardens
The most exotic
palace-gardens complex on the entire coast is at Alupka, about 16 km west
of Yalta. Designed and built between 1828 and 1846 by English architects
for the English-educated Count Mikhail Vorontsov, the immensely rich
regional governor, the palace is a combination of Scottish castle on its
landlord side, and Arabic fantasy facing the sea.
Vorontsov brought servants from his estates all over
Russia to create the palace and the large gardens below and above it on
the hillside.
Six gorgeous Italian marble lions flank the staircase outside the palace's seaward front. Highlights of the interior include an 1860 Becker piano, a beautiful sun room, and a main dining room with impressive woodwork and a balcony for musicians.
The gardens is a masterpiece of landscape architecture. It
includes a dense artificial forest, filled with enormous boulders that
during the ages have fallen from the cliffs in odd shapes and lodged in
positions which the landscape artist has utilized in an ingenious and
artistic manner. There are said to be 1,140,000 plants. Every tree was
planted by hand and 127 varieties are represented.
It was Livadia, three km west of Yalta, that put the Yalta area on
the maps of both Russia and the world.
First in 1860 when the imperial family started building
here, then in February 1945 when
Stalin, Roosevelt
and Churchill held their Yalta Conference in the Livadia
palace.
Built in 1911 as a summer residence for Nicholas II, it
replaced earlier royal dwellings and used much white Crimean granite in
the process. It is built in Italian Renaissance style with beautiful
Florentine and Arabic courtyards. After the revolution, the palace became
the sanatorium. Today the palace houses the Historical Museum and Picture
Gallery. The palace has a lovely large gardens, a highlight of which is
the "sunny path", running about a mile west from just below the palace to
a lookout over resort area "Oreanda".
Swallow's Nest is a fairy tale castle, the
glory of a million post-cards, perched at the top of a sheer cliff on Cape
Ai-Todor, about 10 km west of Yalta. Built in 1912 for Baron Shteingel, a
German oil magnate, it's now an Italian
restaurant.
Bakhchisaray palace
The small town of Bakhchisaray brings you face to face with the
Tatar era of Crimean's past.
From the 15th century until 1783, Bakhchisaray was the seat of the Crimean
khans, the last westward bastion of the descendants of Jenghiz Khan
's hordes. From 1475, Crimean tatars were vassals of the Ottoman
Empire.
The Tatar khan's palace was built by Russian and Ukrainian slaves in the 16th century under the direction of Persian, Ottoman, and Italian master builders. Inside the main mosque, which dated from 1740, there is a nice wooden minbar (pulpit) and carved mihrabs (prayer niches facing Mecca).
The carved wooden balcony was for women only. In the back garden behind the palace is the harem, three rooms decorated with cushioned seats and carpets, with prettily painted walls and stained glass windows.
A fascinating historical museum contains 12 rooms with a
variety of exhibits covering Tatar culture and the life of khans,
including textiles, furnishings, glassware, documents and old
photos.
Palace "Dulber" is a
masterpiece of "oriental crimean" style.
Many of
Crimean palaces are built in "Tatar" or "Oriental" style with elements of
oriental architecture.
It was built for Russian Emperor Alexander the III.
After October Revolution Soviet Government used this palace as a summer residence for the head of Government Iosif Stalin and as a place of conferences for heads of governments of foreign countries.
Now the Massandra Palace is a historical and art museum, where you can see a beautiful interior, painting and woodwork.
The Massandra palace is surrounded
with a small, but lovely gardens. It is a masterpiece
of landscape architecture.
Even if you are no gardener or botanist, the Nikitsky Botanical
Gardens, tumbling down three sq. km of hillside to the sea 5 km east of
Yalta, are well worth a visit for their beauty and excellent views.
The gardens, founded in 1812, hold 28,000 species and varieties, including 2000 types of rose.
