Orthodox Religious Tourism

This is an amazing land during the pilgrimage season when still quite hot there. The first Orthodox devotees came to the islands in the middle of the fifteenth century. A century later, Abbot Philip (who later became Metropolitan of Moscow and the only man with influence on Ivan the Terrible) transformed the northern region. Cathedrals were built, dozens of lakes on the main island joined kilometres of canals and a dam was built. A tragic page of history was written Solovki in the 20s, when the islands have become special fields. Today, in addition to the monastery and church on the Big Island Solovetsky, you can visit the monasteries on the island of Anzer and the Great Zaitskom Island.

In the middle of Lake Ladoga you can find Valaam, where visitors can see a monastery that was founded several centuries ago. Most of the stone buildings that survived were created in the nineteenth century. In the last century, after the revolution, the monastery was closed and only revived in 1989, when six monks settled. Tourists can get a boat trip to the second largest city in Russia: St. Petersburg, and then be able to visit not only to Balaam, but also to the reserve of Kizhi.