An apple orchard grows in Yekaterinburg

An apple orchard hundreds of years old grows in the heart of Yekaterinburg with a kind resemblance to Monet's garden/Photo by Patricia Leslie

In the heart of Yekaterinburg, Russia's fourth largest city, grows an apple orchard hundreds of years old.

This unique place (unknown in any large American city) has different names: "Museum of the Middle Urals Fruit Gardening,"   "Fruit Gardens Museum of Central Ural Mountains," or what the label on the side of the house in the orchard, says:  "The Museum of the History of Fruit Horticulture in the Middle Urals."

You get the picture: It's got fruit...and beauty, besides!

An apple orchard in the heart of Yekaterinburg. My guide and the curator/Photo by Patricia Leslie

This is the identification on the outside of the Kazantsev Manor house which I believe says the owner, Mr. Kazantsev (1875-1942) lived here from 1913-1942/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Whatever the name, it's an oasis in the middle of a bustling, industrial city (not far from the new Boris Yeltsin Center), and there are plans to uproot the very old trees, plants and farmhouse.

It seems that the owner, the government, plans to sell the property for more lucrative use (shades of the western world!).  It's a controversial topic which the curator (pictured) has been fighting probably the whole nine years he's been curator. He was a energetic fellow who talked non-stop to my guide (and I may have been lucky that I do not understand Russian).

Inside the Kazantsev Manor house/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Inside the Kazantsev Manor house/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Inside the Kazantsev Manor house. Note the record player!  I bought a marvelous CD here which I'll photograph the cover and upload.  True Russian music!/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Some of the delicacies offered tourists at the History of Fruit Horticulture, Yekaterinburg/Photo by Patricia Leslie

Being a preservationist, I do hope the government leaves the property alone for entering the grounds takes you on a trip to another world, an earlier century where the greens and soothing environment can calm down almost anyone.  It reminded me of Monet's garden which I've never visited, but I've seen his work, and perhaps Monet came to Yekaterinburg to paint.  

I had wondered (and so did my guide) why my tour company would take me to an apple orchard, but when my expectations are low, I have learned, they are always exceeded, and they were!  

This is another world not to miss in modern-day Russia.

 patricialesli@gmail.com