In the Perm Territory, not far from the city of Kungura, in the village of Filippovka, there is the Kungurskaya Cave, which is already quite famous among tourists. They not only take everyone here on excursions, but even offer to buy for Epiphany, organize a wedding or a romantic date with a saxophonist. But is it appropriate to spend all this in a cave that is more than ten thousand years old?
The Kungur cave was discovered at the beginning of the 18th century. It is a karst formation with gypsum inclusions. The total length of the cave is 5700 meters, depth - 27 meters, volume - just over 200 cubic meters. Only one and a half kilometers of the cave are accessible to tourists. It is one of the largest karst caves in the European part of Russia and the seventh longest gypsum cave in the world. There are 57 grottoes, 70 lakes and 146 so-called organ pipes in the cave, thanks to which the cave "breathes". Scientists have calculated that one of these pipes is already about 10 - 12 thousand years old.
At the beginning of the 18th century, scientists who were the first to explore the cave drew up a detailed plan, now lost. The first tourists were taken through the cave by local residents - then it was still in that original form, in which it stood for more than ten thousand years.
But in 1914, Khlebnikov, a native of these places, began to develop tourism here, who managed to travel around Japan and America. He was impressed by the Mammoth Cave in North America, and decided to advertise the Russian cave on the same scale. To do this, he rented a site with a cave, developed excursions, printed advertising brochures and began to actively invite travelers. For their convenience, a cafe and a souvenir shop were opened near the cave.
Through the efforts of Khlebnikov, the Kungur cave was quickly learned in different parts of Russia and even outside the country. Crowds of tourists rushed here: in 1980, a little more than two hundred thousand people visited the attraction. Now there is a hotel near the cave, souvenir stalls with handicrafts made from decorative minerals, the cave is open from 09:00 to 16:00 daily, excursions are held according to the established schedule. Inside the part of the cave accessible to tourists is actively illuminated by bright lanterns, which completely distort its natural interior appearance.
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Despite the fact that the cave is often called the Ice cave, the ice in it has already noticeably decreased. Due to the fact that, in a fit of giving it a tourist attraction, doors were installed at the entrance to the cave, and the entrance was artificially punched and concreted, the temperature inside the cave system increased slightly. As a result, the ice melted, so now I advise tourists to come here exclusively in March - it is during this period that there are more snow build-ups in the cave than ever before. There are, however, a few more grottoes in which the temperature remains below zero even in the warm season.
The depth of the cave lakes in some places reaches 3 - 5 meters. However, due to the transparency and purity of the water, it is difficult to imagine what is so deep there. The largest is the Big Underground Lake. The waters of the lakes are inhabited by krangonix crustaceans, amphipods and small frogs. In addition, springtails, limoniid mosquitoes, nematode worms and other invertebrates were seen here. Fish, bats and rodents also live here. And for some time now, basidiomycetes began to grow in the cave along the concrete path - their spores were brought here along with the construction sand during the construction of the cave.