Petrovshchina offers two levels of historical and landscape discoveries: the surrounding area and the broader destination of Novgorod Oblast. Soltsy provides specific architectural and church highlights; Valday and Valdai National Park broaden the view to the region. If you are looking for a holiday apartment, you can first decide whether historical architecture, bell culture or nature will be your main focus.
Soltsy and Historic Places in the Surrounding Area
Soltsy lies near Petrovshchina. Historic merchants’ buildings have been preserved there, including merchants’ mansions and shops. There is also an Old Believer prayer house and the wooden Church of the Intercession, dating from the 18th century. The active Ilinsky Cathedral provides a later architectural point of reference: it was built in 1824–1825 in the neoclassical style. Thus, merchants’ architecture and religious buildings stand side by side in Soltsy. They also differ in age: the Church of the Intercession dates from the 18th century, while the cathedral was built in the 19th century.
In the village of Gorki, near Soltsy, stands the former 19th-century estate of the Vanyukov merchant family. It offers a different historical point of reference from the merchants’ mansions and shops in Soltsy: in Gorki, the focus is on a single former estate. Molochkovo has a 19th-century Church of the Assumption; Velebitsy has a Church of St. John the Theologian, dating from the second half of the 19th century. Both village churches therefore date from the 19th century, with the date for Velebitsy specified more precisely.
Nature in the Broader Destination of Novgorod Oblast
Valdai National Park covers 159,100 hectares and extends across the Valdaysky, Demyansky and Okulovsky districts of Novgorod Oblast. Its size and the three districts named here reflect the natural landscape on a regional scale. This is a different scale from that of the individual historic buildings and village churches near Soltsy: here, the focus is on specific buildings in individual places, while there, it is on a large national park within Novgorod Oblast.
Valday in Novgorod Oblast: Bells and Town History
In Valday, staff at the Bell Museum demonstrate bell-ringing techniques that visitors can try for themselves. The museum’s Bell Centre displays bells from around the world, along with bell types ranging from the 3rd century BC to the Middle Ages, as well as modern souvenir bells. The collection thus reveals a broad span of time; the demonstration at the Bell Museum focuses on the technique of ringing bells.
An exhibition at the Museum of the County Town, opened in 1998, explores the daily lives of townspeople, the development of local trades, and the lives of individual Valday families and well-known summer visitors to Valday. The museum also preserves the memory of local craftspeople: stonemasons, carpenters, blacksmiths, women who baked bubliki, soap makers and bell founders. In addition to bells as objects, the museum also explores trades and town life.
In 2017, the monument “To the Blacksmiths and Bell Masters of Valday” was erected in Valday. From Valday’s waterfront promenade, visitors can enjoy a view of Iversky Monastery. Together with the museum’s exhibits, these sights show how varied the cultural points of interest are across Novgorod Oblast: from crafts and everyday town life to a named viewpoint by the water.
Discover more destinations: Selishche, Polnovo, Berezovik, Ondvor, Grigorovo, Staraya Russa, Borovichi, Simanikha.
Back to the broader travel overview: Novgorod Oblast.
