Spend the night in Sortavala - Style - Kommersant

Spend the night in Sortavala - Style - Kommersant



The small town of Sortavala on the northern shore of Lake Ladoga often becomes the starting point for trips to Valaam or the Ruskeala mountain park, but it also deserves attention in itself.

For more than 500 years of history, Sortavala managed to be part of Sweden, the Russian Empire, Finland, the USSR, and the Scandinavian influence is still clearly distinguishable. The main architectural monuments - the wooden buildings of the fire station, the former women's gymnasium and seminary, stone houses in the northern modern style, built by Finnish architects - stretched along a couple of central streets. From the pier, "Meteors" depart for Valaam and boats for walks along the Ladoga skerries - many picturesque islands connected by narrow straits.

Due to the proximity to Ladoga, the climate here is quite mild: in summer the temperature fluctuates around +20°C, in winter -6–8°C. Therefore, people come here not only for summer, but also for winter holidays.

The journey by car from Moscow takes more than ten hours, from St. Petersburg - about four. Those who are not ready to spend so much time behind the wheel choose the railway. The Lastochka departs from the Finlyandsky Station twice a day (travel time is the same four hours). A train to Petrozavodsk departs from Moscow via Sortavala every day: in addition to double-decker cars, several retro cars and a restaurant car designed in the style of the 19th century run in the train. In Sortavala, they are attached to a real steam locomotive, which is sent to Ruskeala. On the way, you will have to spend the evening and all night: from the capital to Sortavala - 15 hours 30 minutes, to Ruskeala - 3 hours more. Ruskeala Express also runs from Sortavala to Ruskeala, another steam-powered train with retro cars.

It makes sense to book both tickets and hotels in advance. In the high summer season, the prices at Winter's Dacha, the most famous (and expensive) hotel in Karelia, did not fall below 20 thousand rubles. per night, and the cost of a cottage with three bedrooms approached 100 thousand rubles - and even for this money, sometimes it was not possible to find rooms. In September, when you can admire the golden autumn (and enjoy the absence of mosquitoes), prices are slightly lower, but the next dates are available for booking.

Winter's Dacha is located on the beautiful Taruniemi peninsula, surrounded by coniferous forests and skerries. In 1909, the surgeon Gustav Winter chose this place to build a country house, and around it he laid out a unique arboretum, many of whose rare plants were sent to the doctor by grateful patients. Now there is a museum in the building of the estate, and a hotel complex has been built for travelers in the neighborhood. You can stay in one of the hotel's 22 rooms, two-story apartments in townhouses (all with kitchens and separate barbecue areas) or six-bed cottages with fireplaces and saunas.

The local restaurant is popular not only among the guests of Winter's Dacha. The menu is dominated by dishes of modern Karelian cuisine, in the list of hits: “Lohikeitto” fish soup with red caviar, barley with elk, various types of Ladoga and Onega fish and Cloudberry Cloud dessert. Panoramic windows offer a view of the pine trees and the lake, and guests of the restaurant have their own pier. Tables, especially in season, should be booked in advance, especially if you do not live in the hotel itself.

The list of entertainment at Winter's Dacha is not limited to food, a bathhouse (although the bathhouse complex is impressive here), hiking, cycling and a catamaran. On the territory there is a rope park "Tarulinna" with three tracks: from the simplest, educational to the more serious with zip-lines and a 50-meter zip line.

An alternative to Winter's Dacha is the Lace complex, which can be reached from Sortavala by boat in about seven minutes (the road winds through skerries and takes longer). Two-level apartments in townhouses (from 13 thousand rubles) are designed for a maximum of three, guest houses with two and three bedrooms (from 26 thousand to 40 thousand rubles) - for families and companies of up to seven people. Both the apartments and the cottages have fully equipped kitchens – although there is no particular need to prepare your own meals. The hotel's restaurant, as expected, relies on local products and Karelian dishes (such as salted and smoked Karelian trout, fried vendace or smoked borscht), although pizza and several types of steaks can be found on the menu.

Halfway to "Ruskeala" is "Point on the map. Sortavala. Three two-story buildings stand on the shore of a rather compact, but no less picturesque Piyuralampi lake. Double rooms (there are simply no others here) can accommodate up to three people. The rooms themselves are quite small, but they are equipped with everything you need, including a coffee machine, the interiors are designed in a modern minimalist style, prices in September start from 7800 rubles. per night. Two eco-trails start from the hotel building: the first one goes along the lake, the second one goes to the hotel cafe-bistro. So you should be prepared for the fact that every breakfast, lunch or dinner will precede and complete the 15-minute promenade. There are no menus and waiters in the cafe, the format of work is a self-service buffet. Also on the territory there are separate sauna houses (with a steam room, a relaxation room and a terrace with garden furniture) and barbecue gazebos, which can be rented for an additional fee. Next door to the hotel is the Terra Nordica activity centre, which specializes in quad biking and snowmobiling in winter.

By the way, for those who want to go to Karelia not for a long, but for a regular weekend, Russian Railways has come up with a special tour called "Karelian Saga" (from 17,700 rubles): departure on Fridays at 16:50 from Moscow (still the same Petrozavodsk train), in the morning of the next day - an hour and a half walk along Sortavala, after arriving at the mountain park "Ruskeala" - an excursion along the famous marble canyon (Isaac's Cathedral, the Mariinsky and Marble Palaces are decorated with this marble), in the evening - a trip back to Moscow.

Ekaterina Borisova, Anastasia Spengler



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