Ugra National Park

Ugra National Park was founded on February 10, 1997. It stretches for 200 kilometers through the entire Kaluga region, its territories are captured by 6 districts - Yukhnovsky, Dzerzhinsky, Kozelsky, Peremyshlsky, Iznoskovsky and Babyninsky. The area of the park and protected areas around it - North, South and Vorotynsky with the "Lake Ticha" - more than 150 thousand hectares.

In the park "Ugra" protected not only the landscape, but also historical settlements, and historical and cultural objects. There are about 300 of them in the national park: archaeological monuments and monasteries, ancient roads and places of famous military battles, noble estates and temples.

It is here, as scientists believe, the Great Stand took place on the Ugra in 1480 between the Khan of the Great Horde Akhmat and the Grand Duke of Moscow Ivan III. It put an end to the Mongol-Tatar yoke and marked the beginning of a new era in the history of the Moscow state.

During the Great Patriotic War there were fierce battles. Today in the national park there are 34 burials of Soviet soldiers, 17 memorial signs and graves of local residents who died during the German occupation of 1941-1942.

On the territory of the park and near it are the remains of six monasteries and more than two dozen temples. All-Russian shrines are considered stavropegial monasteries Vvedenskaya Optina deserts and Holy Ambrose desert in Shamordino. The inhabitant of the Shamordinsky Monastery was the favorite sister of the writer Leo Tolstoy - Maria Tolstoy.