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Vologda Attractions

23.08.2017 10:38

https://www.lonelyplanet.com/russia

St Sofia’s Cathedral

Powerful five-domed St Sofia’s Cathedral has a soaring interior smothered with beautiful 1680s frescoes. The astonishingly tall iconostasis is filled with darkly brooding saintly portraiture.

The massive stone cathedral was erected in just two years (1568–70) on the direct orders of Ivan the Terrible.

Ivan’s ruthlessness at Novgorod (where he sacked his own city and fried citizens alive in large pans made especially for the occasion) was known and feared throughout Russia. So the Vologda workers jumped to it. But haste, of course, makes waste. Local legend has it that Ivan, upon walking into St Sofia’s for the first time, was struck on the head by a tile that had been grouted to the ceiling without due care. Ivan stormed out, never to return, and the cathedral was consecrated only after the Terrible One’s death.

Kremlin

Vologda’s multi-domed, attractive kremlin is the city’s historical centrepiece, a 17th-century fortified enclosure built as a church administrative centre to accompany St Sofia’s Cathedral next door. Peeking into the various museums that surround the crumbling courtyard makes for a good introduction to Vologda's city history, natural history of the region and folk art.

Spaso-Prilutsky Monastery

Painted in circus-tent stripes, the powerful fortress towers of this active 14th-century monastery are photogenically reflected in the river, best viewed from the nearby railway bridge. Visitors may explore the western half of the compound, including a partial rampart walk and the five-domed 16th-century Transfiguration Cathedral (Спасо-Преображенский собор).

The site is 4km north of town. Alight at Priluki (Прилуки) stop or join one of the pleasure cruises from the kremlin pier (R900 return, noon, 3pm and 6pm).

Regional Studies Museum

The natural history section has clearly benefited from the untimely demise of numerous regional species of wildlife, such as the dramatically posed stuffed lynx, wolves, foxes and a tiny cub-under-glass mournfully watching his bear family from across the room. The history exhibition tells the story of the city from its very conception, while star of the rich prehistory exhibition is a 3500-year-old skeleton of a woman clasping at her modesty.

St. John Chrysostom Church

This attractive 17th century church is one of Vologda's oldest constructions and contains some 200-year-old frescoes. Located on the river bank opposite St Sofia’s Cathedral, its picturesque onion domes reflect nicely in the river. It was handed over to the army in the 1930s and used as a warehouse. It was returned to the Russian Orthodox Church at the start of the 2000s.

One of several enchanting old wooden buildings at the eastern end of ul Leningradskaya, this little museum evokes the life of a 19th-century, 17-child middle-class family. Amid portraits of bewigged children and army officers is a very whimsical gramophone that still plays and the beautiful landscape photography on the 1st floor is a definite highlight.

Peter the Great House

Vologda’s oldest museum (1885) is a compact late-17th-century stone house that belonged to the Gutman traders who hosted Tsar Peter I during his March 1724 visit to Vologda. Exhibits include a copy of Rastrelli's death mask of Peter the Great and the tsar's red tunic, underlining his remarkable height (204cm).

Lace Museum

The sparklingly modern Lace Museum, across the square from the kremlin, patches together some great examples of this archetypal Vologda craft, with bizarre communist-era examples incorporating tractors, hammer-and-sickle symbols and an intricate piece celebrating Russia’s exploration of the cosmos.

Art Department

On the eastern side of the main kremlin courtyard, Muppet-style wooden dolls, lacquered wood items and embroidery briefly grab your attention before the Art Department gets down to business with some truly first-class icons and the remarkable abstract wood carvings of local artist Victor Shumilov.

Bell Tower

Climbing the 288 steps of St Sofia’s Cathedral's separate 78.5m-high, gold-topped bell tower offers breathtaking views down upon the cathedral’s grand onion domes. Mind your own dome on the way up: the ceilings were clearly built with gnomes in mind.

Resurrection Cathedral

Just outside the kremlin enclosure, the amply domed 1776 Resurrection Cathedral adds photogenic foreground to kremlin views. It also houses an art gallery of regularly changing exhibits.

Urinating Dog Statue

One of Vologda's more unusual sights, this bronze monument depicts a dog doing what dogs habitually do when they encounter a lamppost. Although the urinating hound gets all the attention, it is in fact a monument to the town's first electric street light, and was unveiled in 2010.

Small Lenin Statue

A mini-Lenin near the Church of St John the Baptist (Церковь Иоанна Предтечи, 1710–17), on grand pl Revolyutsii, was reputedly the first ever erected in the USSR (1924).

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