Attractions of Bakhchysarai district

Mangup-Kale is a fortress city (VI-XV centuries) next to the village of Khodzha Sala between the villages of Krasniy Mak and Ternivka.

It is located on the top of the mountain, which rises 250-300 meters above the level of the surrounding valleys. Since the 6th century it has been known as Doros, the capital of Crimean Gothia. The construction of a 25-meter-deep mine-well on the top of the mountain, which reached the aquifer, made Mangup an impregnable fortress capable of withstanding a long siege. From the 11th century - the capital of the Feodoro principality, then a Turkish fortress.

In 1790, the last inhabitants left the Mangup settlement - the Karaite community. The best-preserved three-story palace-citadel.

Access is free. Transfer by car and excursions are organized from the village of Khodzha Sala.

The complex of medieval Aziz (religious buildings, symbolic tombs, mausoleums) is located in Bakhchysarai in the area of ​​the old Tatar market.

Previously, a large cemetery of the city of Eski-Yurt was located here. The cubic tomb of durbe Ahmed-bey (1577), the mausoleum of durbe Muhammad-bey in the form of an octagonal yurt (16th century), the elegant Aziz of Khan Muhammad-Girey (17th century), the remains of a prayer hall (tekke) of wandering Muslim monks (dervishes) in the form of an octagonal tower, to which 12 steps lead (16th-17th centuries) have survived to this day.

The Tatar name Shaytan-Koba ("Devil's cave") is given to the grotto, in which the site of an ancient man of the Paleolithic era (100-40 thousand years BC) was discovered.

It is located at the foot of a cliff on the Bodrak River, on the south-eastern edge of the village of Skalyste.

Flint products, animal bones were found.

The Skelska stalactite cave in Crimea is located in the tract "Karadah forest" at the foot of Mount Kara-Dah on the slope of Baydary Valley near the village of Rodnykivske.

It was opened and first examined in 1904 by a local teacher, Fedir Kyrylov. The total length of the investigated part is 670 meters.

Skelska Cave was formed in Upper Jurassic marbled limestones by tectonic faulting - as a result of underground water processes in cracked limestone rocks.

The cave has several halls connected by passages. The height of the vault of the largest and most beautiful hall reaches 25 meters. The walls are decorated with numerous hanging curtains and ribs, original niches-baths.

The main attraction of the Skelska cave is a seven-meter stalagmite.

Underground rivers and lakes with a depth of up to 70 meters have formed in the lower narrow galleries, which feed the Baydary Reservoir.

The cave is listed in the Crimean Book of Records as the most inhabited by speleofauna: spiders, crustaceans, arthropods, grasshoppers, millipedes, bats, etc. Basically, these are endemics - creatures that live only in this area. The temperature in the upper halls is +12 degrees, and in the lower one, where the labyrinths of water wells pass, +9 degrees.

The Skelska cave is open for visitors.

Skelsky Menhirs of the Baydary Valley are ancient (III-II millennium BC) megalithic structures of cult (astronomical) purpose.

They are stone blocks of marble limestone placed vertically in the form of obelisks. The height of the largest of them is 2.8 meters, the other is 1.2 meters. The third was excavated in the 1950s during the construction of an aqueduct. In 1989, another fallen menhir with a height of about 2.4 meters was discovered.

The Tatars called this place Tekli-Tash ("placed stone"). The mass of Menhir reaches 6 tons. It is interesting that there are no quarries nearby, and the nearest rocks are located several kilometers from here.

Menhirs are attributed magical healing properties, calling them "the place of Power".

The natural sphinxes of the Karalez Valley are unusual stone figures, the result of weathering of limestone on the ridge of the wooded Uzun-Tarla hill.

Some of the stone figures rise above the ridge by 8-15 meters and bear their own names: the southernmost figure of Yukle-Kai (Pregnant), further Suyuryu-Kaya (Pointed), Chuyun-Kaya, two similar flat-topped Sandik-Kaya (Chest ) and Shapka-Kaya (Hat).

The Syuren Caves-Grottoes are located near the road near the village of Tankove.

A Late Paleolithic settlement was found in one of them, and a Mesolithic site in the other.

Grottoes are classic forms of weathering and water erosion of the steep limestone slopes of the transverse Cuesta Valley.

The Syuren tower is part of the medieval fortification of Syuren in the southeastern part of the Kule-Burun mountain on the left bank of the Belbek river near the village of Male Sadove.

From the 8th century there was a Byzantine fortress here, which from the 13th century began to take on the features of a small town. The Syuren fortress was one of the outposts of the ancient principality of Feodoro with its capital in Mangup.

The Syuren Tower has preserved its domed ceiling with traces of fresco painting.

From the top of the plateau there are breathtaking views of the surrounding area.

The fortified cave settlement of Tepe-Kermen ("mountain fortress") is located on a mountain plateau above the Kacha River near the Kiz-Kermen plateau near the village of Mashyne.

Probably founded in the early Middle Ages. In the 8th-14th centuries, icon worshipers expelled from Byzantium during the era of iconoclasm lived here. The cave church with columns is located in the northeastern part of the plateau. 250 caves were explored: temples, casemates, granaries, cattle sheds, etc.

The late antique Ust-Alma Necropolis is located one kilometer from the village of Pishchane, in the lower reaches of the Alma River (a special self-colored pebble is found in the sediments of the mouth).

Here passed the sea route from Chersonesos (Sevastopol) to Kerkinitida (Yevpatoriia) and further - to Olbia (Dnipro-Buh estuary).

The remains of an earthen rampart and a ditch on the high seashore have been preserved, several residential buildings and a burial ground have been investigated.

Visiting is free.