Travel Palace. Museum and Cultural Centre

The Museum and Cultural Centre is a branch of the State Museum of Artistic Culture of the Novgorod Land. It lies between Russia’s two capitals: Moscow is 600 km away by road, about 9 hours 20 minutes, and St. Petersburg 260 km away, about 4 hours 33 minutes. Veliky Novgorod is 64 km to the northeast, about 1 hour 26 minutes away, and Staraya Russa 32 km away, about 43 minutes. The district centre, Shimsk, is 18 km away. The museum stands on the southwestern shore of Lake Ilmen. Its main attraction is the 19th-century Travel Palace, built for members of the imperial family and beautifully integrated into the local landscape, with panoramic views from the museum balcony. Permanent exhibitions cover local history, the peace treaty between Veliky Novgorod and Moscow, and traditional clay toys of the Novgorod Region. The galleries also display works by Russian artists and photographers, as well as an exclusive model of the Ilmen Glint geological monument. The model shows Lake Ilmen and, through replicas of fossil impressions, illustrates what the area looked like more than 400 million years ago. Visitors can explore independently or book guided tours, including a general museum tour and the walking tour of Korostyn village, “Into the Depths of the Centuries.”