Cities of the Kola Peninsula: Kandalaksha

The gateway to the White Sea and Tersky Coast

Kandalaksha is situated in the South of Kola Peninsula. All of the villages and settlements on the White Sea coast like Kandalaksha, Umba, Varzuga and Kovda were founded by the Russian settlers from the Novgorod Republic.

Kandalaksha is the oldest town of Kola Peninsula and has 25 thousand inhabitants. The first record in chronicles about Kandalaksha dates from 1526. For a long time, the Kandalaksha Monastery (built in 1532) along the Solovetsky Monastery was the main landowner of Kola Peninsula.
The history of Kandalaksha keeps a lot of remarkable facts, including facts about frequent military skirmishes of local residents with Sveya "Evil people". It was the centre of administrative authority of the Kola Peninsula till 1582 and then the management has passed to Voevoda (the governor) of Kola.
In the beginning of XX century Kandalaksha played a great role in the development of our region, when it became one of the main centres of construction of the Murmansk railway. The construction began in the spring of 1915 and the railway was commissioned on the 15th of November 1916. This event amazed the World; to lay a railway of more then one thousand kilometres in length in the middle of forests and bogs for only 17 month is an unprecedented case in the history of the World. Today Kandalaksha is a large industrial centre. The major enterprises of the town are the Kandalaksha Aluminum Plant and Locomotive Depot.

The town of Kandalaksha is stretched on the coast of the White Sea - the cradle of Russian navigation. The seaways to Arkhangelsk, Kem, Keret and Solovetsky Islands were coming to an end here in the times when the sea crafts were the basic means of transportation. And on the contrary, for those who were coming from the West or from the North, the seaway began here. Today, the seaport connects Kandalaksha to the entire World and Kandalaksha bay is one of the major points of interest not only for the town but also for the Kola Peninsula. The White sea - clean, expanse, rich of fish, with hundreds of islands -  and the forests are real treasures of this beautiful part of Kola Peninsula. Every year the White Sea becomes more and more popular for divers and for tourists who like to canoe, kayak or to sail with catamarans.

The administration of the Kandalaksha Forest Reservation, which includes all small islands of the White Sea and the Aina Islands in the Barents Sea, is situated in Kandalaksha.

We invite you to come over for excursions on our beautiful Kola Peninsula. We organize bus tours and an interesting bicycle tour where we visit old Kandalaksha and many other points of interest. For lovers of ancient mysteries the boat excursion to the ancient labyrinth 'Babylon' is undoubtedly the best place. You will have a beautiful view on Kandalaksha bay with the great number of islands. One can often see seals and white whales (beluga's) in the White  Sea.