The mountain park “Ruskeala” is a tourist complex located in the Sortavala district of the Republic of Karelia, near the border with Finland. The basis of the complex is an abandoned marble quarry filled with groundwater – a cultural heritage site and historic monument.

The park is located near the village of Ruskeala, about 30 kilometers north of the town of Sortavala. The length of the former marble quarry from north to south is 460 meters, the width – up to 100 meters. Ruskeala Park on Google Maps. Photos by: Maria Mitrofanova.

picturesque abandoned quarry

Tags: Abandoned · Karelia Republic · Petrozavodsk city

Ayskiye Pritesy is a unique natural geological object – high limestone cliffs located on the section of the Ay River on the border of the Chelyabinsk region and the Republic of Bashkortostan.

These limestone rocks, picturesque vertical walls up to 90 meters high, consist of two groups – Bolshiye (Large) Pritesy and Malyye (Small) Pritesy. In the local dialect, Ayskiye Pritesy are called “Sybar-kaya”, which in Bashkir language means “varicoloured cliff”. Ayskiye Pritesy on Google Maps. Photos by: Vladimir Lyapin.

amazing natural monument of the Southern Urals

Tags: Bashkortostan Republic · Chelyabinsk oblast

Tutayev is a historic town with a population of about 40 thousand people located on both banks of the Volga River in the Yaroslavl region, about 35 km north-west of Yaroslavl. This is one of the twelve places included in the Golden Ring of Russia – a popular tourist route passing through the old towns of North-Eastern Russia.

The churches of Tutayev, picturesquely scattered on the hilly banks of the Volga, are the main sights of this town and attract tourists and architecture lovers. The photos were taken in March when Tutayev was still covered with snow. Photos by: Roman Smirnov.

fly over Tutayev

Tags: churches · Yaroslavl oblast

Kamchatka is a peninsula stretching from north to south for about 1,200 km in the northeast of Eurasia. From the west it is washed by the Sea of ​​Okhotsk, from the east – by the Bering Sea and the Pacific Ocean. Kamchatka Krai, one of the federal subjects of Russia, is located on the territory of the peninsula.

Kamchatka is a land of contrasts, which looks completely different from Central Russia. This is the land of volcanoes and glaciers, hot springs and boiling geysers, fast-flowing rivers, lakes and waterfalls. There are 414 glaciers and 160 volcanoes, 29 of which are active. Kamchatka volcanoes are included in the UNESCO World Heritage. Photos by: Sergey Makurin.

beautiful natural scenery

Tags: Kamchatka krai

Oleg Dmitriyevich Kononenko is the 102nd cosmonaut of Russia and the 473rd cosmonaut of the world. As of April 2019, he is on the International Space Station and during the three previous flights he already spent 533 days in space.

From the ISS, he took a lot of photographs of various regions of the Earth. Let’s see how the cities of Russia look at night from orbit. Source: Roscosmos.

Moscow – the capital of Russia.

Russian cities from space

Tags: Angarsk city · Astrakhan city · Grozny city · Irkutsk city · Krasnodar city · Moscow city · Novorossiysk city · Orenburg city · Saint Petersburg city · Samara city · Saratov city · Tolyatti city · Tver city · Vladivostok city · Volgograd city