Discover the Jewish Autonomous Oblast

With the forests of Bastak Nature Reserve, seasonal wildlife viewing and museums in Birobidzhan, the Jewish Autonomous Oblast offers a range of ways to plan your trip. The nature is especially vivid along the ecological trails, where the Amur tiger’s habitat takes centre stage alongside the diversity of a protected area. Culture enthusiasts will find two museums with different focuses in Birobidzhan.

Nature in Bastak Nature Reserve

Bastak State Nature Reserve comprises two separate areas. The Central Cluster covers 91,771 hectares and lies north of Birobidzhan; the 36,284-hectare Zabelovsky Cluster is southeast of the settlement of Smidovich. These distinct areas provide a concrete framework for exploring nature, without limiting outings to a single viewpoint.

The two-kilometre ecological Tiger Trail runs through Amur tiger habitat. It introduces visitors to cedar-deciduous mixed forests and oak forests, which are typical tiger habitats, and explains the first successful release into the wild of the rehabilitated tigress Zolushka. The trail takes two and a half hours. Visits are possible year-round, except during periods of particularly high forest fire risk.

Another ecological educational trail is 1.5 kilometres long and runs along the left bank of the Bastak River. During the warm season, it is open to visitors as an excursion route; the walk takes about two hours. This provides two different timeframes to help plan an outing in the reserve: two and a half hours on the Tiger Trail and around two hours on the educational trail.

The season also shapes what you can observe. In the lotus lakes of the Zabelovsky Cluster, Komarov’s lotus blooms in July. Large concentrations of migratory birds can be observed there in spring and autumn. Lakes are designated natural monuments in the oblast; their characteristic flora includes Komarov’s lotus, the four-angled water lily, the lesser pond lily and the water chestnut. These lakes are considered destinations for educational and ecotourism.

Museums and regional excursions

In Birobidzhan, the Jewish Autonomous Oblast Regional Museum focuses on documents about repression against Jewish culture, the authorities’ campaign against cosmopolitanism and the present-day emigration of Jews to Israel. If you would like to visit this museum, it is best to confirm visiting arrangements in advance. The Jewish Autonomous Oblast Museum of Modern Art has a different history: it opened in April 1989 as a branch of the Far Eastern Art Museum in Khabarovsk and has been an independent organisation since 1996.

A regional river route starts in Birobidzhan and travels by inflatable boat via the village of Dvurechye to the settlement of Birakan. It then continues along the Bidzhan River to the settlement of Teplye Klyuchi, where visitors are offered a tour of a fish-breeding facility. The sequence of river sections, settlements and a sightseeing destination differs considerably from an outing focused on trails and nature observation in Bastak.

Your planned activities can therefore be a useful starting point when choosing a holiday rental: for example, the museums in Birobidzhan, the nature trails and seasonal wildlife viewing in Bastak, or the stages of the river route. Tailor your search to the focus of your trip, and check the specific visiting arrangements wherever they matter to your plans.

Discover more subregions

For orientation within the oblast: Birobidzhan and Leninsky District.

Discover more destinations: Saratov Oblast, Vladimir Oblast, Lipetsk Oblast, Perm Krai, Mari El Republic, Kurgan Oblast.

To the higher-level travel overview: Russia.