Gold tour around the Southern and Middle Ural

Duration -  7 days

1 day
Arrival in Ekaterinburg, accommodation in hotel.
Free time.
Spend the night in hotel.

2 day
Breakfast in hotel.
Transfer to the settlement Svetlyi (area of the town Plast, Cheliyabinsk region).
Lunch.
You can see world famous gold placers along the river Sanarka, where  pink topazes and euclases were mined. Here it will be possible to take part in panning out gold. Besides it is possible to find here samples of kyanite, quartz with original flattened shape, pink topazes.
Also we’ll visit:
   -  Borisovskie Hills, where the kyanite mines are situated. You can find attractive samples of kyanite in paragonite schists.
   -  Pegmatite quarry Svetlyi, where good samples of beryl, topazes, polychrome tourmaline (blue-green), morion, albite, tantalite etc. were mined.
Dinner.
Spend the night in tents.

3 day
Breakfast.
Transfer to the town Miass.
Miass is known as the town in the Golden Valley. For half of the century Miass valley was the main store of gold in Russia. The old center of the town has many monuments of history, culture and architecture of every 19-20^th centuries styles.
Visit the museum of Ilmenskij reserve, where you can see several expositions:
Minerals of Ilmen Mountains
   -  Mineralogical systematization
   -  Minerals of Russia
   -  Technogenic mineralogy etc.
Besides, there are zoological, botanical and archeological expositions.
We can visit a few old mines near the base of Reserve.
Lunch.
You can see world famous gold placers along the river Miass and the place of find of the largest Russian nugget of gold – “Big Triangle”.
Spend the night in hotel.
It will be possible to take part in panning out gold.

4 day
Breakfast in hotel.
Transfer to the Ekaterinburg
On the way:
The town Karabash.
Visit the Gold Mountain – place of the first find of auricuprite. Here it is possible to find out samples of native copper.
Lunch near Sugomakskaya cave (area of the town Kyshtym). Visit the cave.
The town Kasli.
The gifted craftsmen have made their town world-famous. In the early 19^th century the small Ural town had already turned into one of the world centres of iron art casting. Art castings produced in Kasli were awarded the gold medals at exhibitions in Paris, Vienna and Philadelphia. Kasli art castings used in the decoration of streets and squares give the town its unique look. While visiting the only museum of art castings in Russia, you will see the outstanding works of Kasli craftsmen.
Accommodation in hotel.
Spend the night in hotel.

5 day
Breakfast in hotel.
Visit gold deposit of Berezovsk town, which is the native land of golden industry Russia.
Visiting of the place of find of first gold in Russia and the monument to discoverer of gold - Erofei Markov.
   -  Visiting the museum “Gold and platinum in the Urals” in the settlement Berezovsky.
   -  Visiting the quartz vein "puff vein" where you can pick up samples of rock crystals, including of dark green tourmaline.
Visiting the mountain “Gold hill”. Tourists can descend into the mine (depth up to 8 m). From the tailings it is possible to pick up samples of rock crystals of various morphology, including carbonates, fuchsite, green tourmaline, manganite, pyrolusite, goethite.
Lunch.
Visiting the “Galena vein”, where you can look at interesting paragenesis with azurite and malachite. Here it is possible to collect samples of minerals (dolomite, magnetite, goethite).
Spend the night in the hotel.

6 day
Breakfast in hotel
Visit of Nizhnij Tagil. (150 km from Ekaterinburg) – ancestral land of the Demidov’s - founders of the mining and metallurgical industries  in the Urals.
In time of excursion we’ll visit:
   -  The famous deposit “Mednorudyanskoe”. This deposit was discovered in 1813. The major amount of uralian malachite of the 19^th century was extracted from here. Right here was discovered a gigantic nest of malachite - which gave 480 ton of ornamental malachite, including a monolith of about 40 ton. Mednorudyanskoye deposit is where new minerals such as brochantite and delafossite are found. You can found out on the quarry’s dump specimens of malachite, chrysocolla, brochantite, martite, cuprite, pseudo-malachite, pyrolusite and quartz with hematite.
   -  Visit the local lore museum of Nizhni Tagil (where was invented the first locomotive). The museum presents wonderful specimens of local stones, rocks and stone crafts.
Lunch.
Visit of the town Neviyansk - one of the oldest plants of the Urals. Neviyanskij Plant was built on the edict of Peter the Great in 1710.
We’ll visit famous inclined Neviyansk tower (like the Leaning Tower of Piza) belonging to the mining and metallurgical works of the Demidov’s.
Spend the night in the hotel.

7 day
Breakfast in hotel.
Visit the Ural Geological Museum.
The Ural Geology Museum was founded in 1937 as an exhibition of mineral treasures of the Urals organized for the 17th session of the International Geological Congress. In 1938 it was transferred to the Ural Geological Institute.
Nowadays the museum is the state “treasure-house” of the Urals and the cultural centre carrying out large tutorial, scientific and educational work. Its main aim is accumulation, investigation, systematization of rocks and minerals of the Ural region and their preservation for the next generations. In the museum are more than 40 thousand exhibits (rocks, minerals, crystals, fossils and others), reflecting the mineral riches and geology of the Urals.
It is housed in a four-story building not far from the city centre.
The exposition of the museum is subdivided conveniently into 4 main departments:
   ·  Crystallography and Mineralogy
   ·  Minerals
   ·  General and Historical Geology
   ·  Petrography and Lithology

Overview of the excursion in the historical centre of Ekaterinburg.

Visit the Museum of the History of Jeweler and Lapidary Arts.
It was founded in 1992 as a branch of study at the local lore museum of Sverdlovsk district.
It is located in one of the historical-architectural monuments of Ekaterinburg from the 19^th century – a former factory drugstore.
The collections contained in the museum are based upon: handicrafts from the Ekaterinburg lapidary factory, modern jewelers and masters of lapidary and people’s private handicrafts from the Ural region.
The exposition is subdivided into several halls, among them: the hall of the Ekaterinburg lapidary factory, the malachite hall, the hall of the Uralian jasper, the hall of Russian jewelry from the end of the 18^th to the beginning of the 20^th century, the hall of the history of gold and platinum industry, and also exhibitions of sacred monuments and modern jewelry from the Urals.
Lunch.
Free time.
Spend the night in the hotel.

8 day
Breakfast in hotel
Transfer to the airport.