Ay-Petri Mountain Ay-Petri Plateau: winter sports and mountain tourism. What will the ai-petri plateau look like after reconstruction (photo)

You can appreciate the beauty of the Ai-Petri plateau only once you get there. Rarely is nature so close to man. Feeling like one with the environment, hardly anyone will not set a firm goal to come back here again.

In addition to all its other advantages, the Ai-Petri plateau boasts relative accessibility to the tourist. First, in numerous settlements the western part of the yayla can be reached both by personal and public transport, and from there already start your hiking routessecondly, the plateau reveals its wealth to the tourist through passes of varying degrees of difficulty, some of which are relatively easy to cross, and some will make you sweat.

How to climb the Ai-Petri plateau

As for the first way to see the beauty of the Ai-Petri plateau, the easiest one is to arrive at the cable car station on Ai-Petri from Yalta by minibus or by private taxi. In less than an hour, you will already breathe in the incomparable aromas of yayla. In addition, paths and roads run in all directions from the station. In the same way, you can leave the Ai-Petri plateau. Actually, the cable car itself from Miskhor will take you here.

You can use the Baydarsky Pass, having arrived from the direction of Sevastopol or Foros. The fact is that the Baydarskiye Vorota pass is a natural border between Ai-Petrinskaya and Baydarskaya yayla.


Baydarskie gates - road route to the Ai-Petri plateau

There is an opportunity to get to the very heart of the Ai-Petri plateau by arriving at Rodnikovskoye by a regular bus, which should be taken on the Yalta-Sevastopol highway in the area of \u200b\u200bthe turn to Tylovoe.

If you see the goal of tourism in overcoming the hardships of the path exclusively with your own feet, then at your service there are popular and popular passes. You can get to the same cable car station along the Koreiz trail, which, as the name implies, comes out of Koreiz.

The ascent will allow you to be drawn into the rhythm of the hike and enjoy the beautiful pine forest through which the trail runs.

However, one of the most famous passes not only on the Ai-Petri plateau, but also on all the Crimean mountains is the Shaitan-Merdven pass. It owes its wide popularity to its rich history, since even the ancient Roman legionaries chose it to cross the Crimean mountains, the road from Chersonesus to the Kharax fortress (today's Gaspra) ran through it.

Since then, the trade routes went through the Devil's Staircase, this is how the name of the pass can be translated from the Crimean Tatar one. After the earthquake of 1927, it changed significantly, but so far it will not be difficult to overcome it even for an unprepared tourist.

Tourist sites and routes of Ai-Petrinskaya yayla:

Borders of the Ai-Petri plateau

How can you determine the boundaries of the Ai-Petri plateau? This is quite easy to do. The southern border took the form of a mountain peak.

It is more difficult to define the northern limit of the plateau, but slightly expanding the boundaries allowed by the definition of the term "yayla" itself, we can assume that it will become a strip along the mountains with a depth of one kilometer - two on the section Baydarskiy pass - Mount Balchik-Kaya and then an ever expanding area up to five kilometers in the Besh-Tekne - Bedene-Kyr region, where Ai-Petrinskaya yayla merges with Yalta.

Geological features of the Ai-Petri plateau

By the way, understanding that there is a yayla will help us to clarify the boundaries of the Ai-Petri plateau more thoroughly. Yayla is waterless. Limestones, forming numerous karst formations, allow water to pass inside, preventing it from flowing over the surface in the form of rivers. Therefore, the available moisture is barely enough to maintain local vegetation. Yaila was used as a pasture, so this treatment of the landscape gave it features of lifelessness, where only copses and lonely trees adorn the rocky soil covered with grass. The entire Ai-Petrinskaya yayla is strewn with large and small stones, so even on the paths you need not to yawn and look at your feet.

After cattle grazing on the Crimean yailas was banned by the seventies, soil erosion slowed down, and the forest was slowly advancing into open spaces. In other words, yayla is a waterless and treeless area.

The ridge of the Ai-Petrinsky mountains is a visual cuesta, that is, the alternation of gentle and steep slopes. The steep ones face the sea and are subject to constant erosion, they represent the rise of rock, which often crumbles, causing a landslide. The gentle ones end in small beams, behind which a smaller ridge grows again. If you move along the Ai-Petri plateau from the south to the north in areas, for example, the Spirady or Kupol mountains, you will get the impression of sailing along the waves, where ascents alternate with descents. Not that feeling, however, when driving along the mountain line, when it is not at all difficult to find a flat road.

Upper Jurassic limestones form the basis of the Ai-Petri plateau, which affects the nature of the yayla to this day. Walking its routes, pay attention to the shape of the stones protruding from the ground. They are often rounded at the edges and have oval holes. Limestones have become the cause of total karst formation, when for many centuries the water literally ate its way into the depth of the rock, depriving the soil of life-giving moisture. Therefore, the interest of scientists in the Besh-Tekne basin, which is located not far from the At-Bash mountain, is understandable.

Here springs gush and small lakes are filled. The reason is the presence of clay lining the bottom of the basin and retaining water. It is no wonder that it is to this oasis that two paths go through the passes - Jewish and Eski-Bogaz. But it is worth a little distance to the north, as you find yourself in the kingdom of karst formations, which is almost completely devoid of water lingering on the surface.

Peaks of the Ai-Petri plateau

As befits any yayla, Ai-Petrinskaya does not have pronounced peaks. The most accurate definition that asks for language is a plateau. Therefore, looking at the map, one should not imagine that Mount Kilse-Burun is a pointed peak. A small elevation above the surrounding plane will be its top.

By the way, Kilse-Burun, as well as those located to the west of Mshatka-Kai and the Foros edge, are chosen by climbers. But even a hiker, the views from their peaks will bring a lot of impressions. If you move from west to east along the mountain peak, the named mountains are the first in a series of the most popular peaks on the Ai-Petri plateau among fans of mountain Crimea.

The highest of them is Kilse-Burun, which has a height of 712 meters. From the west, the ascent to it is gentle, but from the eastern part it is quite steep. In all respects, this is a very beautiful place.

The next significant peak will be Merdven-Kaya (688 meters), also easily accessible from the west. And climbers did not leave this mountain with their attention.

The next peak in our movement to the east is Merdven-Kayasy (856 meters). The Shaitan-Merdven pass lies between it and the previous mountain. Merdven-Kayasy is a very beautiful mountain. In honor of the legend of Soviet mountaineering, its flat southern surface is called the rock of Mikhail Khergiani. Several climbing routes run along her open chest. The northern slopes of the mountain are covered with a dense beech forest, and they cannot be called yayla. But going down from this mountain to the east, we again find ourselves on the plateau.


Ai-Petri plateau in the area mountains Merdven-Kayasy

To the east, the road will lead us to Mount Balchik-Kaya (945 meters), on which passive signal reflector structures stand and rust.

The next is Mount Kastropolskaya, 955 meters high, under which the village of Parkovoye is located. This mountain is also held in high esteem by rock climbers. If you look down from its top, you can see a pile of large stones that fell at one time.

Morcheka is one of the most famous peaks of Crimea. For both the climber and the tourist, it is an important attraction. There is a cross on one of the rocks of Morcheki.

From the western edge of the mountain, the Kerezla trail goes down. A grandiose panorama opens from its top to the southeast, where small lakes glisten in the green of the forests among the rocks. And in the region of this mountain and to the east, the scale of rock falls is striking. Between the mountains of Morchek and Spirada, below, closer to the village Opolznevoe, there is a whole scattering of huge boulders and fragments of rocks, which is commonly called the Kuchuk-Koi stone chaos.

Between the same mountains of Morchek and Spirada, but already on the plateau, you can observe a section that is classic for any yayla. A rocky path, a carpet of sparse but intoxicating vegetation.


Trail to Mount Spirada on the Ai-Petri plateau	Ai-Petri plateau in the area Spirada mountains

The Ai-Petri plateau begins to rise slowly. Mount Spirada is already 1028 meters high. The mountain is a domed white peak, clearly visible from the Ponizovka and Katsiveli located below. Such peaks along the Ai-Petrinskaya yayla are found everywhere.

The next notable peak in our movement to the west will be Mount At-Bash (1196 meters). The views from the highest point of this mountain, whose name translates as "Horsehead", make you spend time on a short ascent.

Ai-Petri plateau, At-Bash mountain:

To the north is the previously mentioned Besh-Tekne basin.

Weather on the Ai-Petri plateau

In winter and spring, Ai-Petri can make you feel its bad character. It is rather cold here, the whole area is constantly covered with fogs, strong winds awaken in spring, so even in mid-May you can wrap yourself up from the cold.

Tourists who prefer winter hikes know that fog and rain are more frequent between Ai-Petri and the Dome than in the Morcheki area. And the whole Ai-Petri plateau is the coldest in comparison with the rest of its Crimean brothers. Winter can overtake the traveler in early October. While not a single snowflake will fall on the coast for the whole year and the temperature will always be above zero, frosts and snowdrifts on the Ai-Petri plateau are commonplace.

Winter fogs on the Ai-Petri plateau:

Clouds approaching from the sea to the peak Ai-Petri plateau	View from the Ai-Petri plateau to the village of Pokrovskoe

Given the terrain, you need to be very careful off the beaten track. Ravines and grooves are covered with snow in winter, sharp stones from under the snowdrifts are not visible. But this primarily applies to places far from the visor. In summer, it is not as hot on the yayla as below, but you can hide from the scorching sun only by stopping under a tree, a constantly moving tourist will be constantly exposed to the sun's rays. Summer rains on the plateau are rare.

Hiking trails on the Ai-Petri plateau

Now it's worth talking about the trails of this plateau. The easiest route, which gives the most impressions and photos, is the one that runs along the peak. Moving along the Ai-Petri plateau from the Baydar Gate through the Foros Church, we will ride the eighth tourist route. It is fair to say that it starts from the tourist camp "Laspi", but this is the Baydarskaya Yayla. The eighth route will take us along the edge of the ridge through the previously mentioned mountains Kilse-Burun and Merdven-Kaya.

If a narrow path is not to your liking, a wide road runs just below, which can be overcome by a car. The road will lead you to the Shaitan-Merdven pass, from which a new one begins - through a beech forest to the top of the Merdven-Kayasy.

The road to Mount At-Bash itself has no name, which does not prevent it from enjoying the universal love of tourists. The same can be said about the path leading from At-Bash to Ai-Petri. The peak in these places is an alternation of bulges and depressions, the latter sometimes look like amphitheaters. The depressions, as a rule, are covered with a small thicket, and tenacious bushes, through which a path usually runs, as well as bypassing the thicket.

Another way to get from At-Bash to Ai-Petri is to go deep into the yayla along the Besh-Tekne depression and through the Vorontsovka cordon to the Bedene-Kyr mountain, where the radar station is located (read about this route). Probably, it is this route that gives the greatest understanding of what the Ai-Petri plateau is. Here the yayla is the widest, most waterless and significantly differs from its western part. On both sides of the road there are two natural boundaries - Sary-Kol and Vorontsovsky forest. The Beshan-Kosh tract, which replaces the Besh-Tekne basin, is also very beautiful. This tract is an open plain of amazing beauty with small patches of coniferous thickets, stretching at the foot of the Bedene-Kyr mountain, from which, however, the surrounding views are beautiful in any direction.

From the Vorontsovka cordon on the Ai-Petri plateau, two paths go to the north in the direction of the tourist camps "Bukovaya" and "Danila", which are already outside the limits of this plateau, and from there even further north. More precisely, these popular routes begin from the Yalta-Bakhchisarai highway, but slightly northwest of the Vorontsovka cordon they diverge in different directions.

From Spirady Mountain, the route starts to the north-west to the Skelskaya Cave, popular among tourists. The road runs along the Tarpanbair ridge stretching in the same direction, the peaks of which are the Tarpan-Bair (1094 meters) and Chuvash-Koy (1051 meters) mountains. The further to the northwest, the more clearly the forests begin to prevail, and in front of the Skelskaya cave there is a real juniper grove. On the way, you will meet the Chuvash-Gol spring.

It is also worth mentioning the 45th route, starting from the tourist camp "Besh-Tekne", cutting through the entire Ai-Petri plateau in the north-western direction. The final destination of the route is the Tea House tourist stop outside the yayla. Route 45 has many branches, both to the east to the Vorontsovka cordon and to the southwest to the Spirady mountain.

Two popular tourist routes leave from the Shaitan-Merdven pass - the Kalendskaya and Kapurkay trails, but they leave the yayla almost immediately and go deep into the dark beech forest.

Ai-Petri

What is Ai-Petri? It is difficult to answer this question in one or two sentences, it is even more difficult to describe the many-sided nature of this mountain range, where each tract surprises and delights. Have a chat with climbers and rock climbers, tourists and excursionists, cavers and skiers, foresters and meteorologists, mushroom pickers and wild berry lovers - each will tell about his own story, but even these fragments put together will not give an idea of \u200b\u200bAi-Petri until you visit its summit.

Ai-Petri is the top and mountain range with an area of \u200b\u200bmore than 300 km2, one of the canteen massifs (also called yayls) stretched along South Shore Crimea and constituting the main mountain range. The Ai-Petrinsky massif stretches from east to west for 25 km. The distance between its southern edge and northern foothills is more than 13 km. The conditional eastern border runs along the meridian of Mount Roka, separating the massif from the neighboring Yalta Yaila. In the west, Ai-Petri ends with a deep saddle of the Baydar Gate.

However, most often tourists remember not the massif as a whole, but one of its peaks with a palisade of exotic stone pillars, called battlements. This peak of the massif protruding far to the south is actually Ai-Petri, which gave the name to the entire plateau and became the symbol of the south coast.

The highest point of the entire massif is Mount Roka with an absolute elevation of 1346 meters above sea level, slightly less (1320 meters) is Mount Perepelinaya (Benede-Kyr). Mount Ai-Petri itself is much lower - its height is 1231 meters above sea level.

Throughout its entire length, the mountain range faces south, towards the sea, with formidable rocky walls: sometimes strictly steep, sometimes stepped, but everywhere difficult to access. Rare passes, through which people in ancient times laid trails and carriage roads, and now serve as passages from the South Bank to the plateau.

The northern slopes of the massif are not so steep, they are entirely covered with deciduous forests.

Small tracts of Boyka and Sedam-Kaya are extended to the north. The river Kokkozka separates them. Many other rivers and streams run down from Ai-Petri. From its northern slopes flow tributaries of the Kokkozka: Auzun-Uzen and Sary-Uzen, from the western - rivers: Baga, UrkustaUzundzha, from which the Chernaya river is born - the most abundant in Crimea. In the upper reaches of one of the left unnamed tributaries of the Uzundzhi, there is the Karadag forest tract. The rivers of the southern slope - short and shallow in summer - are stormy and dangerous in floods. Hundreds of springs feed these rivers and among them the largest in Crimea is the Skelsky spring.

In the south of the sea coast, the snow-white houses of the beauty of Yalta rise to the mountains. On a clear day, from the top of the massif, the villages Gaspra, Oreanda, Foros KoreizSimeiz, the Blue Bay, the city of Alupka are clearly visible ... In the west, in the Baydarskaya valley, lie the villages of Orlinoe, Podgornoe Rodnikovoe Rossoshanka Novobrovskoe Peredovoe ... At the foot of the northern slopes, one can look out over the dense forest ... And only in the east, where Ai-Petri borders on another mountain range - Yalta, there are no villages.

The southern cliffs of the Ai-Petrinsky massif and its northern gentle slopes are very picturesque, but there is no more charming panorama of the South Coast, opening from the top. It is difficult to find a Crimean resident who at least once in his life has not seen the sunrise on Ai-Petri. Indeed, for the sake of this one moment, when the fireball of the sun seems to emerge from the dark blue abyss of the sea, it is worth rising to this height.

Mountain Crimea, as we see it now, was formed in a relatively short period of geological time - approximately 1.5 - 2 million years.

More or less reliably known is the geological history of the Mountainous Crimea, including Ai-Petri, starting from the end of the Triassic period (about 200 million years ago). At that time, the territory of the present Crimean peninsula was covered by the waters of the ancient Tethys Ocean, which existed for most of the history of the globe (before the Neogene period). In the latitudinal direction, the ocean stretched across the southern edge of the Eurasian continent, the area of \u200b\u200bmodern mediterranean Sea and the extreme northwest of Africa.

Over the past 200 million years, the land area on which Ai-Petri is located has been repeatedly removed from the sea level, and then it was actively destroyed by exogenous forces, and then again plunged under sea level. The depth of diving was different, depending on it, either silt and sands were deposited at the bottom of the reservoir, which later transformed into clays and sandstones, or calcareous silts, which turned into limestones. Sometimes, with a significant uplift of the nearby land and shallow waters of the basin itself, the land was actively eroded and huge masses of pebbles were carried into the basin. Cemented by marine sediments, they were transformed into conglomerates.

150-160 million years ago, volcanoes were active in the vicinity of Ai-Petri, their remains can be seen near the villages of Melas and Foros.

During numerous uplifts and subsidences of the earth's crust, marine sediments, which were transformed into layers of rocks under the weight of the overlying sediments, repeatedly crumpled, cracked and moved. Naturally, the older the rocks, the more they are dislocated (disturbed). Plastic rocks - clays with interlayers of sandstones - bent into bizarre folds, more durable - limestones, conglomerates - were torn into separate blocks. Some blocks were moved a great distance by the mighty forces of the earth's interior. In Crimea, in particular on Ai-Petri, such movements reach a kilometer in the vertical direction and several kilometers in the horizontal direction.

The most ancient rocks that make up the Ai-Petri can be seen in the valley of the Kokkozka River in the cliffs above the road that leads from Bakhchisarai through Sokolinoye to Yalta. These folds cut by the river valley consist of rhythmically interbedded rocks of the Taurian series - sandstone, siltstones, mudstones, colored in different tones. Above the rocks of the Taurian formation, there are rocks of the Middle Jurassic (since they are younger). These are the same overconsolidated clays, interbedded with sandstones, rocks that resemble a "layered cake", geologists call it flysch. The flysch of the Taurian formation differs little from the flysch of the Middle Jurassic in appearance, however, they are relatively weakly dislocated and curved into more gentle folds.

Rocks of the Taurida Group and Middle Jurassic make up the base of the Ai-Petrinsky massif. Above them are limestones. The line of contact runs at various absolute elevations, but generally does not exceed 500 - 600 meters. Only in one place (in the Besh-Tekne tract) flysch rocks were pushed out by underground forces to an altitude of 1000 - 1100 meters to the surface of the plateau.

In the mountainous Crimea for about one and a half million years and on the surface and deep in the depths of the mountains, active karsting processes are imperceptibly proceeding, leading to the formation of craters, hollows and caves of various sizes and shapes. Three karst regions are distinguished on the Ai-Petrinsky massif: the Western Ai-Petrinsky karst region, located between the Baydarskiye Vorota pass and the Merdven-Kayasy peak; Central, occupying the middle part of the massif between the peaks of Merdven-Kayasy and At-Bash; Eastern, lying between the peaks of At-Bash and Roka. The most intense karst is the Central Ai-Petrinsky District. 218 underground cavities and more than 1330 sinkholes have been found here. In total, Ai-Petri has 302 underground karst cavities (caves, wells, mines), of which 12 are declared natural monuments of local importance: Skelskaya, Kristalnaya Hanging Medovaya Pearl Miskhorskaya Kamenepadnaya SyndyurlyuDruzhba Geophysical Kaskadnaya and Danilcha-koba

If karst prevails on the summit of the plateau, then below, at the foot of the slopes, landslide, rock-avalanche and mudflow processes prevail. Landslides are formed in any mountains, especially where geological conditions favor it. In Crimea, the conditions for the formation of landslides are favorable, therefore, only on the southern slopes of the slopes 452 landslides were recorded, of which 112 are active. At the foot of Ai-Petri, you can see many large and small landslides, nine of them are the main ones: Malassky, Chernobugorsky, Muhalatsky, Kuchuk-Koisky, Kikeneizsky, Dolomian, Alupkinsky, Golden beach, Chukurlarsky.

Along with the loose material, very large limestone blocks, which have broken away from the bulk of the rocks, also slide down the slope. Among the softer rocks surrounding them, they look like picturesque rocks. The rejects include the Mogabi mountains near Yalta, Krestovaya in Alupka, Koshka in Simeiz and many others.

The climate of Ai-Petri is distinguished by sharp contrast. The average annual air temperature on Ai-Petri is + 5.9 ° C. In the mountains, in the same month, the average daily temperature can be very different. On Ai-Petri, in January it is + 11.4оС ... –20.4оС, in February + 11.5оС ... –26.5оС, and in August + 27.1оС ... –2.3оС. The warmest month on the yaylah is July, less often August. The average July temperature is 15.6 ° C, but the maximum is much higher - it reaches 32 ° C. The coldest month is February, with an average temperature of –3.8 ° C.

40% of precipitation on the Ai-Petrinsky plateau falls in the form of rain, 60% - in the form of snow. On average, 1052 mm of precipitation falls on Ai-Petri per year (in Yalta, only 635), and 160 mm in January alone. A stable snow cover lasts from mid-December to March. Due to thaws in the whitish areas of the yayla, the snow melts completely by 50-70% several times during the cold period.

The duration of daylight hours on Ai-Petri is great - 2325 hours.

And the unwanted whims of nature here, although they represent an inconvenience and danger, are still short-term phenomena.

Crossing the Ai-Petri from south to north or in the opposite direction, even a layman notices a certain pattern in the distribution of vegetation: the slopes are covered with forests, meadow-steppe vegetation dominates on the plateau. Yayla strikes with wide open spaces with rare clumps of trees and bushes. Unlike other Crimean yayls, Ai-Petrinskaya has natural forests along the edge of cliffs, in the Central karst plateau and along erosion-karst valleys in the western part, but most of the plateau is covered with meadow-steppe vegetation.

The vegetation in the mountains is truly rich and varied. On the southern slopes there is a beech forest with an admixture of pine. From an altitude of 1000 - 800 meters above sea level, the belt of Crimean pine begins, which grows in the first tier with an oak, and in the second - with a prickly juniper. Below 400 meters begins a belt of shrub communities of junipers, hornbeams, gibberds and many other shrubs with an admixture of oak. Here you can find blunt-leaved pistachio, a strawberry tree with a kind of smooth reddish bark, a thin outer layer of which changes every year, and with evergreen leaves, yellow-flowered jasmine, shrub vysel, bubble wort and much more. There are many fruit trees and bushes in the forests. Almost all common types of mountain ash grow on the slopes of Ai-Petri and on the plateau: ordinary, large-fruited, bank, Greek and others.

So what is Ai-Petri? It is unlikely that you can hear an exhaustive answer to this question ...

CD "Attractions of Crimea" -

You can get to the Upper station of the cable car Miskhor - Ai-Petri, from where the trail to the Ai-Petri teeth begins, from the village of Mishor to the west of Yalta, as well as to minibus, which departs from the Yalta bus station... However, this tour will be incomplete if you do not see the Great Chaos Alupka park, also west of Yalta.

The scheme of the Ai-Petrinskaya Yayla and the Boyko massif, the author is not known to us yet.

Mount Ai-Petri dominates Yalta at an altitude of 1234 meters. Several rounded, columnar cogs give particular beauty to its silhouette. They rise about 70 meters above the cable car station.

Ai-Petri mountain range, tourism center

The main ridge of the Crimean Mountains is divided into yayly - separate massifs with a hilly surface.

Ai-Petrinskaya yayla can be reached by highway from Yalta or from Miskhor by cable car... It was laid in 1987, its length is 3 km, the ascent time is 20 minutes.
The Ai-Petri teeth form four large (12-15 m high) and a number of small steep peaks composed of reef limestones.
The huge bazaar offers all kinds of oriental delicacies. Wonderful conditions for active tourism, horseback riding and camel riding, mountain biking, jeeps, paragliding, shooting war adventures and fantasy.
A protected Beech Grove, the largest on the Main Ridge, grows near the Zubtsov. At the edge of the yayla there is a pine tree called "Airplane", it is about 300 years old.
Tourists usually visit the Ai-Petrinsky meridian - a stone globe with accurate geodetic data, a viewing platform on the Shishko rock, a meteorological station, Bedene-Kyr mountain (several ski lifts work here in winter), Trekhglazka cave, equipped for excursions. On a slope near the highway from Yalta to Ai-Petri, you can see a "drunken" pine grove - a century-old Crimean pine forest, disturbed by a landslide.

Limestone rocks of all three ridges of the Crimean Mountains (as well as many river valleys cutting through them) are literally packed with fossilized remains of marine organisms: snails, bivalve molluscs, worms and corals.
As a rule, limestone rocks differ in layered structure and are even drawn on the diagrams as stacked one-on-one rows of rectangles.
Nothing like the southern cliff of Ai-Petri is shown to us: all this powerful colossus from the base above Alupka and Miskhor to the Zubts is a smooth stone geyser.

Ay-Petri mountain is located near Yalta resort. The highest point of Ay-Petri mountain is about 1234 meters. How you can get to Ay-Petri mountain? Go to the busstation in Yalta town. It will take 30 or 40 minutes to get to Ay Petri mountain from Yalta town by bus or by your own car. Ay-Petri is the name of the mountain peak, as well as it's a plateau. A view from Ay-Petri is spectacular.

The weather on Ay Petri is very cold in winter and very hot in summer. Ay Petri is the biggest area for tourists visiting this mountain every year.
Ay-Petri mountain is one of the biggest plateau of Crimea and every visiting this area has an opportunity to see all power of this mountain. Ay-Petri is very ancient coral reef that rises from the sea bottom many years ago. Ay-Petri's ancient history is a rich one and many archeological groups work here every year.

Ay-Petri is a famous tourist attraction all the year round. It is a place for skiing in winter and hiking in summer.

Crimean photoblogger Sergei Anashkevich aka aquatek-filips tells: “ Better than mountains there can only be mountains. And even though the mountains in Crimea are not high, they are still mountains. Demerdzhi, Karadag, Chatyrdag, Karabi, Babugan, Echkidag and, of course, Ai-Petri. I love going there. Each place is interesting in its own way at different times of the year. Somewhere autumn is incredible, somewhere summer forbs, and somewhere spring awakening.

On Ai-Petri it is almost guaranteed in spring you will encounter frequent fogs. Rather, these are not entirely fogs. These are clouds that creep on the plateau from the side of the sea. And then during the day you can visit under the clouds, above the clouds, inside the clouds or watch the clouds break on the rocky walls of the mountains ... Backpack, water, tea, camera ... The rest is superfluous. To leave more room for emotions. "

(24 photos total)

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1. Earlier April morning at the Ai-Petrinskaya yayla, as the plateau is called correctly. Nice sunny weather. In the distance, one can see the balls of locators on Beden-Kyr.

2. Southern slopes. The Ai-Petrinskaya Yayla itself is a plateau that stretches for more than 20 kilometers from west to east, gradually narrowing to the east.
And in the place where it passes into the Yalta Yayla, the distance between the southern and northern slopes is a little more than a kilometer, which allows observing two completely different landscapes in a short time. On the one hand - the sea, steep rocky walls and coniferous forests, and on the other, which you can quickly go to in 15 minutes - mountain peaks to the horizon, covered with beech forest, lakes, villages and Sevastopol 40 kilometers away on the horizon.

4. There are even birch groves. They were planted by hand in the 60s.

5. The road to the Ai-Petrinskaya yayla.

6. Rocks Taraktash on the southern slope of the plateau. Along them the Taraktash trail winds down, along which you can get from Ai-Petri to the Uchan-Su waterfall and further to Yalta

7. The famous "window" in the form of a cross in the rock

8. One of the countless talus gorges descending towards Yalta.

9. The eastern side of Ai-Petrinskaya yayla stretches, passing into Yalta, then Gurzufskaya and Babugan-yayla.

10. We descend to the northern slopes of the plateau. Hence a completely different view. In the distance - the Boyka massif

11. This is how Sevastopol looks from the Ai-Petri plateau. Due to the distance of 40 km and the haze, I had to apply a rather tough photo processing.
Otherwise, we could only see the dim outlines of the city in the distance.

13. View of the foothills. Below is the Belbek Valley.

14. While we were observing the Kachinskaya Valley, dense clouds began to descend on the plateau. We return to the southern slopes, because it is there that you can fully observe both the movement of clouds above and below your feet, and their formation when air masses break against these steep rocky walls