Большая Азишская пещера

Bol'shaya Azishskaya Cave - Big Azish Cave

Useful Information

Location:	On the road Krasnoyarsk-CAT Lago-Naki, 28 km from the village of Dakhovskaya.
Open:	Winter daily 9-18, last tour 17:30. Summer daily 8:30-19, last tour 18:30. [2020]
Fee:	Adults RUB 500, Children (7-14) RUB 250, Children (0-6) free. [2020]
Classification:	Karst cave
Light:	LED Lighting Coloured Light
Dimension:	L=690 m, T=6 °C.
Guided tours:	L=220 m, D=1 h. V=200,000/a [2000]
Photography:	allowed
Accessibility:	no
Bibliography:
Address:	Bol'shaya Azishskaya Peshchera, 5-й пер., 7, п, Каменномостский, Adygea Republic, 352666, Tel: +7-918-088-34-98.
As far as we know this information was accurate when it was published (see years in brackets), but may have changed since then. Please check rates and details directly with the companies in question if you need more recent info.

History

1910	first explored by the locals.
1973	declared a natural monument.
MAY-1978	counting of the stalagmites.
1987	opened as a show cave.

Description

Большая Азишская пещера (Bol'shaya Azishskaya Cave) is a show cave in the Republic of Adygea in southern Russia. It was lately refurbished with comfortable trails and LED lights, unfortunately also with coloured lights. So the cave visit is quite pleasant and safe. Before the recent development the trails were quite rough and mostly just clay and flowstone, there were no concrete trails, which required some surefootedness and good shoes. The cave was not well lighted, and visitors were equipped with a helmet. Nevertheless the tours were not cave trekking tours, no special caving knowledge or physical fitness required. And they were very popular, we read that it was visited by 200,000/a, which is quite impressive.

The first exploration of the cave in 1910 is well documented. One of the participants, Kosma Kasyanovich Shevyrev, gave a detailed description of the cave which was published in the newspaper «Кубанские областные ведомости» (Kuban Regional Gazette).

The cave was declared a natural monument in 1973 but there was no door. So people went in to see the cave, took some speleothems home as souvenirs or simply thrashed some of them for fun. When the destroyed stalactites were counted in 1978 a total of 4,000 had been destroyed. In this year the cave was explored by speleologists for the first time. The destruction continued until the cave was finally developed as a show cave and is now only open on guided tours.