Beautiful Sunday. The apple orchard and the station village

Greetings, friends! This time I've chosen an apple orchard for my Sunday walk, located in one of the newer neighbourhoods of the city. The neighbourhood is mostly built up with panel buildings and the apple orchard is the main attraction of the neighbourhood. I took the metro to the area, and I took some photos of the station at the very beginning. I think this underground station is very beautiful and could be considered an important neighborhood landmark as well.

I had a new hobby in 2020. In the past, new experiences for me were inextricably linked to travelling long distances. Do you want to go for a walk, get some fresh air and see some beautiful scenery? There are many wonderful places in the city centre and the surrounding suburbs that I have known since childhood. Do you feel like exploring new places you've never seen before? Then get on a train or a plane and off you go, on an adventure! The year 2020 drew a fat line under this way of life - and, more importantly, under this way of thinking.

We find ourselves in a situation where we have to search for new unexplored places and new experiences somewhere close to home. It's a non-trivial task. At first I was at a loss, and longed for distant wanderings. But then I decided to look at the new-build areas.

Probably many cities are built on the same principle as St. Petersburg. There are historic buildings in the central part of the city. This is the most beautiful and pleasant part of the city to walk around. I wouldn't claim to have seen every building, courtyard and alleyway in the centre. But it is the most visited part of the city and unfamiliar areas may come across only in small fragments during a walk.

The following area surrounds the central historic part of the city. This area is sometimes referred to as the grey belt. Factories and plants were located here in the 18th - 20th centuries. Some of these factories are still in operation today. Others have moved to modern buildings outside the new city limits, where there is more space and land rents are significantly cheaper. Some factories have closed down and are no longer in operation. Some of the buildings in this part of the city are very interesting and are monuments of industrial architecture. It is impossible for the average person to see all the sights in this part of the city - those enterprises, which are still in operation, are inaccessible for tourists.

Farther afield are neighbourhoods that are often referred to by the collective name of 'new buildings'. These districts were built with multi-storey apartment buildings in the second half of XX and the beginning of XXI centuries. These houses were built according to standard designs, and you can see similar buildings anywhere, in any city. At first glance, there doesn't seem to be much point in walking around these neighbourhoods. Even if you've never been to these places, you've probably walked down dozens of similar streets.

But all these new buildings didn't spring up from nothing! Before they were redevelopment areas, they had a history, each one different. I started looking for information about the history of these districts, which I used to think were faceless, and I found a lot of interesting things. I read books on the history of the city, studied specialist websites, and looked at geographical maps.

I found the apple orchard on a map. The name of the orchard seemed very romantic and I decided to come here one day. The best time to visit the apple orchard is undoubtedly spring, the time when the apple trees are in bloom. I think the timing was perfect - not only were the apples in bloom, but also cherries, bird cherries, lilacs and chestnuts. This small orchard surrounded by typical high-rise buildings was fantastically beautiful.

I didn't want to go home right away after my walk through the garden, so I decided to drive to the nearby railway station. The railway was built in the nineteenth century, and there were traditionally service buildings near the stations. I was going to look at the houses of the old station village. I was particularly interested in the old wooden house, about which there was very little information. Judging by the photos online, it was a simple two-storey house, with no architectural decorations and in a poor state of repair. Unfortunately, I never got to see the house, it had been dismantled earlier. I only saw the fence that surrounded the place where this house stood.

I walked down the short street of the station village and soon saw apple trees in bloom. The place was not marked on the map or mentioned in the guidebooks, but the flowering trees were every bit as beautiful as in the other orchards.

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Smartphone	Google Pixel 3a
Location	Saint Petersburg, Russia

This is my entry for the #BeautifulSunday challenge by @ace108 and the #SublimeSunday challenge by @c0ff33a.