Discover Ukraine: Kachanivka - Trostyanets
In connection with the already tired of the pandemic, the views of tourists from all countries turned to local tours in their country. Ukraine is no exception. Almost all tour operators record an increase in tourists' interest in their attractions.
And Ukrainian tour operators have something to offer. The choice of one- and two-day tours is very large.
And most interestingly, you still have time to "jump" into the group, because often there are no seats. It is clear: the minimum number of days on the road and the minimum number of contacts with people.
"Park trails of Chernihiv region" - this is the name of the tour from the company " EthnoWorld ", which includes a tour of two beautiful parks in one day: National Historical and Cultural Reserve" Kachanivka "and State Day.
Departure from Kyiv at 8.
00, the crossing is long, 200 km, but we were very lucky with the bus, and we almost did not notice this distance.
Kachanivka Palace
Kachanivka is the former estate of the Tarnowskis, in any case, he became famous for them. However, the first mention of Kachanivka dates back to 1771, when on behalf of Empress Catherine II, the hamlets of Parafiyivka and Kachanivka were bought into the treasury and given to the Russian general Count Peter Alexandrovich Rumyantsev-Zadounaisky, who created in his new estate. Governor of Little Russia.
After the estate passed to her son, he sold it.
A childless couple named Nyrtsi (Hryhoriy Yakovych and Paraska Andriivna), who bought the estate due to the absence of their heirs, bequeathed it to her son Paraska Andriivna from her first marriage - cadet cadet Hryhoriy Oleksandrovych Tarnovsky. He rebuilt the palace in the style of classicism.
The glory of the cultural and artistic center Kachanivtsi brought 1824. It was the patron Vasyl Tarnovsky who turned this picturesque corner into a real pearl of palace and park art.
View from the terrace of the palace to the pond
The estate was inherited through the paternal line.
Its next owner, Hryhoriy Tarnovsky, considering himself a patron of the arts, turned Kachanivka into a place of local cultural life. Many famous writers, poets, composers and artists visited Kachanivka.
In 1835-36, Nikolai Gogol visited the Tarnowskis for the first time.
In 1838, Mikhail Glinka lived in Kachanivka all summer, where he wrote "The Ballad of Finn" and "March of the Black Sea" from the opera "Ruslan and Lyudmila". All famous guests of Kachanivka had their favorite places.
Glinka Gazebo
In particular, Glinka worked in the grotto under the belvedere, located on a hill above the pond. Since then it has been called Glinka's Arbor.
Glinka's gazebo inside
Famous artist Vasyl Sternberg loved to spend all summer months in Kachanivka.
Room-flashlight inside
Copy of Sternberg's painting
He painted his paintings in a flashlight room.
Room-lantern outside
His most famous work is "GS Tarnovsky's Estate in Kachanivka" (1837):
Taras Shevchenko was also a guest in Kachanivka, who either sold or presented Tarnowski with his famous painting "Katerina".
Shevchenko's Room
The last time Taras Shevchenko was in Kachanivka was after his return from exile and the death of Hryhoriy Tarnovsky, in August 1859. When deciding where to rebury Shevchenko's body in Ukraine, Vasyl Tarnovsky Jr. suggested doing so in Kachanivka.
Hryhoriy Tarnovsky himself died one day with his wife Anna Dmytrivna in 1853. They were buried in the crypt under St. George's Church on the territory of the estate.
St. George's Church
Since they had no children, the estate was inherited by their nephew Vasyl Tarnovsky Sr. And in 1866, after his death, to Vasily Tarnovsky Jr.
Alleys in Kachanivka Park
Art. V. Tarnovsky Jr. collected a rare collection on the Kachanivka estate, the basis of which were Cossack relics. Among the rarities of the collection were the sword of Bohdan Khmelnytsky, personal belongings of Ivan Mazepa, Pavel Polubotko, Kirill Razumovsky, Cossack swords, hetman's universals, as well as portraits of many figures of the Cossack movement. It was a real museum of Ukrainian studies.
Under Vasyl Tarnovsky Jr. , Kachanivka once again became one of the centers of cultural life visited by famous artists of that time.
Interest in his collection led to Kachanivka Ilya Repin, who at that time was working on the painting "Cossacks write a letter to the Turkish sultan. " He portrayed the owner of the estate in the image of a gloomy Cossack on "Zaporozhye".
After the revolution of 1917 the estate suffered a sad fate. It was nationalized and began to crumble. In an unguarded palace, peasants stole furniture and paintings. And in the park, Glinka's gazebo and "romantic ruins" began to be dismantled into bricks. Then a children's commune was arranged in the estate.
During the Great Patriotic War it housed an evacuation hospital, and since 1970 an anti-tuberculosis sanatorium. However, few people can be surprised by these facts, because almost all "bourgeois" buildings had a similar fate.
However, in 1973 the staff of the anti-tuberculosis sanatorium asked the Ukrproektrestavratsiya Institute to conduct a survey of the palace and park complex and to carry out restoration work to preserve the historical and cultural monument.
In 1981, Kachanivka was declared a State Historical and Cultural Reserve, and in 2001 it was granted the status of a National Reserve.
What can you see in Kachanivka now?
First of all, of course, the palace. It is almost completely restored.
Вестибюль
Original front stairs
His ceremonial halls ...
One of the halls of the palace
...living and guest rooms have always been full of the spirit of art.
In the palace, due to the enormous efforts of the reserve staff, the furnishings were partially returned.
Original marble fireplace
Some of them were bought at auctions ...
Interior items
...and some were returned by the descendants of peasants who stretched objects.
Interior items
There are many paintings in the halls, but no originals, only copies.
Portraits of the owners of the estate
Some of the original paintings that were here are in various museums in Ukraine. The palace has rooms of Shevchenko, Sternberg and Repin.
Today the area of the manor park is almost 600 hectares, 125 of which are covered by ponds.
Picturesque pond in Kachanivka
Swans swim in the ponds.
This was the case with the first Tarnowski, when Majorski became enlarged, and in order to prevent geese and ducks from peasant farms from swimming in the pond, Tarnowski evicted peasants from the opposite bank of the pond, giving them plots in the village. Instead of a peasant bird, swans were launched into the pond.
For such a huge area, the reserve offers three types of excursions: 2 hours, 3 hours and 6 hours. In non-quarantine times, the estate can be ridden on a horse-drawn carriage.
If you want to cover a 6-hour tour, you can stay in a hotel located in the 2 wings of the palace.
Palace wing
Conditions there, however, as in a hostel, but the place, however, will have to book in advance, because there are many willing.
And we go with a guide on a 2-hour walking tour of the territory.
The guide is amazingly interesting about all the owners of the estate, about their family and love relationships. In the story of this, of course, can not be conveyed. You need to listen in person.
The first object near the palace is a mound. The story of his appearance is very sad. There used to be a hand-raised bear in the palace. He was manual, not aggressive and loved to play with children. But one day the bear grew up and crushed two children to death in the game.
The bear had to be shot, and was buried near the palace, filling the hill as a memory.
Somewhere buried a bear
In the lower part of the park, our attention is drawn to the "Romantic Ruins", which belong to the buildings of the Rumyantsev period of possession of Kachanivka. They were a mock fortress, built as a tribute to contemporary fashion.
Romantic ruins
Over time, the origin of the ruins was forgotten, and Vasyl Tarnovsky Jr. in 1859 even started archeological excavations in their place, which was witnessed by Taras Shevchenko, who visited the estate.
We also have the opportunity to see the stone arch bridge.
Stone arch bridge
There were at least two of them on the estate, but one has survived to this day.
And in the estate, at the end of the central alley, we can see St. George's Church built in 1816. Unfortunately, the church was closed during our quarantine visit. It is open only to church services.
Exit to the terrace on the 2nd floor of the palace
How does the reserve survive today? Entrance costs 50 hryvnias. There is no direct road or public transport to Kachanivka.
The nearest settlement Parafiivka is not close at all.
You can get there by car or on the road, as well as in the tour group (as in our case).
Cedar, which is 250 years old
No government funding. All necessary restoration and maintenance work is financed in part from the local budget, which is meager, unfortunately. Patrons and ordinary citizens help.
Also, the reserve earns money by arranging on its territory recreation areas equipped with barbecues. For the arrival of one car they charge about 400 hryvnias and there are enough people willing.
At the entrance to the reserve there is a cafe with amenities and hot water, as well as a souvenir shop. Therefore, tourists who come to Kachanivka for a few days will have a place to eat.
And our journey continues.
And our next stop will be Dendrological Park "Trostyanets". The move takes only half an hour. And here we are.
Cypress alley in Trostyanets Park
Trostyanets State Dendrological Park is based on the lands of the former Skoropadsky family estate. Unfortunately, the wooden house has not survived to this day.
Be sure to go to this park with a guide. You will not see anything there, except for lush greenery.
The park has great guides, just fans of their craft. We were led by Zoya Heraldivna, a woman in her old age, but the whole group was charged by her energy.
This is a man-encyclopedia! How many interesting things she told us! She showed the fruits of the false coffee tree, drew our attention to the amazing shape of the cones ...
...brought inside the giant thuja "Monomakh's Hat" ...
Thuja" Monomakh's Hat "
...and explained the difference between spruce and fir. But most of all we were interested to learn about the former owners of the estate, about their fates.
The park was created thanks to the efforts and funds of the famous in the Russian Empire Ivan Mikhailovich Skoropadsky. The arboretum is located in the south-eastern part of Chernihiv region on the area of .204.
7 hectares in favorable climatic conditions for the development of woody vegetation.
The site chosen for the arboretum in the early 19th century was typical of the Left Bank Forest-Steppe: the open plain was intersected by numerous deep swampy beams. In 1858 the transformation of the plains into a relief landscape began. The uniqueness of the arboretum is that its hills are loose. " So what?
- you will say, - in Europe there are a lot of bulk parks ». Yes, but in Europe parks were filled with stones, and here what Ukraine is rich in - chernozems! And filled the hills 30 meters high! They started with 5 hectares, and later expanded the area to 30 hectares. As a result of work that took about 30 years, a mountainous terrain was created, reminiscent of the Alps, where the height of individual slides reached 35 m. The slides were lined with trees, mainly pines.
And the owner wanted to see his offspring not in "adolescence", but already formed. And so he brought seedlings of trees 20-30 years old. The technology of transportation in those days was as follows: the seedling was dug up, placed on a cart drawn by nine pairs of oxen, vertically, and thus transported. And already in the park they dug a big and deep hole to put the whole root system there. And it worked!
In 1886
the first inventory of park plantings was carried out. According to its results, the area of the park was 170 hectares. In the park grew 50 species and forms of oak, maple - 60, spruce and fir - 51 species! To obtain such a wide collection, IM Skoropadsky wrote seedlings from St. Petersburg, Riga, Paris, Kiev, Nikita Botanical Garden in the Crimea. Along with the development of park landscapes, there was a real need to create protective plantings.
Plantings were placed in strips or compact lawns, the park was planted in a cascade method, creating a protective zone, expanded by the prevailing wind direction.
Roe deer, foxes, badgers, muskrats are found here.
Admiring the beautiful landscape of the arboretum, it is hard to believe that it was a forestless plain, crossed by shallow beams and swampy lowlands along the stream Trostyanets.
Now you can see the profile of the Alps, and the Swiss gorges, and sunny meadows, and centuries-old giant trees ...
Sawn pine, which was 200 years old
...who look into the depths of the ponds. Thanks to the successful combination of water, greenery, architectural forms, the mountainous terrain created, the park becomes harmonious, integral and extremely attractive at any time of the year.
The calm surface of the ponds calms, reconciles, inspires.
Light wooden bridges spanning ponds still allow you to admire the unique coastal landscape. Weeping willows, blond birches, dark green trees are reflected in the water, stopping the relentless passage of time.
And only wild swans, stirring the waves, return to our days.
Once in the park, we first find ourselves on the Lobby Lawn ...
Vestibule Glade in Trostyanets Park
...then Berezov's turn opens ...
...Yew, Cedar meadows. On some of them there are Scythian stone women, brought by Skoropadsky from the steppes of the Black Sea coast.
Photos from the Internet
Crossing the central bridge, we get to "Switzerland".
Bridge over the pond in Trostyanets
There is a "Broken Hope" in the Trostyanets Arboretum and the Column of Sorrow. Similar columns were erected in many parks. No information has been found on when or why she appeared in Trostyanets, but it can be assumed that Ivan Skoropadsky perpetuated his grief for his sisters and brother, who all died at the age of 16-27.
Or, perhaps, it is his immortalized heartfelt sorrow for the young person, whose affection he reached in adulthood, and secretly warmed the hope that she would agree to live with him in Trostyanets. However, the person came to the estate, but did not want to live there and the relationship broke down. Ivan Skoropadsky's official marriage was also disrupted before that. He was fascinated by the creation of a park that his wife preferred to live in Switzerland.
In the hilly part of the park and buried its founder - IM Skoropadsky.
While still alive, he ordered a marble stele with wonderful words, as if addressed to us, the descendants, through the ages: "Dear passerby! The garden in which you walk is planted by me; he served as a reassurance to me in my life. He who leads to its destruction, tell the master of the garden about it: you will do a good deed. "
What can I add next? Currently, the village of Trostyanets has only 700 inhabitants.
Tourist infrastructure is not developed. There is no place to stop. There is no hotel or hostel. There are no cafes or shops in or near the park. If you are lucky, the locals will bring delicious homemade cakes to the entrance to the park, and if not, it is better to stock up on provisions from home. Entrance to the park costs only 30 hryvnias. There are long tables (40 people) on the territory, where you can celebrate any event.
If you want to celebrate an event in this beautiful place, please leave it in the same original form as it was before your arrival. To do this, green wooden boxes are installed on the territory.
What I would like to say in conclusion: travel is never boring! And even in the immediate vicinity of Kiev there is something to see.
