Rostov the Great: Around the Town Center

7 points6 km6 hours

Rostov the Great is more than a thousand years old. Today it's a small town, but it was once a spiritual center of the country and a major trading post. Visit the local kremlin, which was never a fortress, and stroll down an old street lined with merchant buildings. Make the rounds of the local museums and find out how two famous heroes of Russian epic tales are connected with this place.

Route author

Susanin Team

Things to do

📜 Learn the city's history
🌆🌿 Soak up the atmosphere

Route points (7)

Lake Nero Embankment in Rostov Veliky

Point on route “Rostov the Great: Around the Town Center”

Point 6

Lake Nero Embankment

🚶‍♂️ Waterfront • 🔭 Viewpoint

An Ancient Lake

Lake Nero, which Rostov hugs in an almost perfect semicircle, is the largest and one of the oldest lakes in the Yaroslavl region. It isn't deep: 4 meters (13 feet) at most and 1.5 meters (5 feet) on average. It was named by the Merya, an ancient Finno-Ugric tribe who once lived here and were allies of the Slavs. In their language the root ner- means “fresh water.” Short and to the point, and certainly better than the name Peter I gave it in his day, when he wanted to build his first “toy” fleet here: “a dirty puddle.”

Rostov Market Gardening

The whole lake bottom is covered with a thick layer of silt. It goes down an average of 5 meters (16 feet), and in places the deposits are as much as 20 meters (65 feet) deep. Rich in minerals and complex organic matter, it has been used in farming since ancient times. That is why market gardening flourished in the town. Almost every resident had a vegetable plot, growing vegetables, hops, and later medicinal herbs.

Nativity Island

The small patch of land opposite the Kremlin is called Nativity Island. Overgrown with small trees and bushes, it is a single solid piece of rock, a so-called remnant monolith. It was a sacred place for the Merya who lived in these lands, and under the Slavs it was a place of worship of the god Veles, with a stone idol set up there. The island remained sacred to pagans until the 12th century, when paganism was stamped out. Later, in the 1680s, it was donated to the Nativity Convent and got its present name. In the years before the revolution the island was a secret meeting place for members of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party. If you'd like to visit and enjoy the birdsong, go ahead and rent a boat at one of the piers. Be sure to ask the locals where you can find a shore suitable for landing. Just judge your strength wisely: in windy weather it can be exhausting!