Levitan Mountain is one of the two hills in the town of Plyos, offering pastoral views of the blue waters of the Volga and the emerald hills along its banks. These panoramas inspired many talented Russian artists, but Isaac Ilyich Levitan was the most impressed by the views. One of his most famous paintings, "Above Eternal Peace," immortalized the beauty of the surrounding nature and the panorama that opened up from the hill.
Previously, the mountain was called Petropavlovskaya, after the Church of Peter and Paul, which stood here from 1561 to 1903 and was destroyed by fire. It was this church that Levitan painted in his famous picture, surrounded by storm clouds drifting from beyond the river. The mountain was renamed in 1972, after the opening of the artist's house-museum at its foot.
Along the slopes of the birch-covered hill, a wooden stairway path leads to the summit, retracing Levitan's route to the top of the mountain with his sketchbox and brushes. At the top stands Isaac Ilyich himself before an easel, painting heavy clouds above a small wooden church on a small canvas.
The monument to the artist appeared quite recently, only in 2012. Much earlier, in 1982, a twin of the burned-down Petropavlovskaya Church appeared here - an ancient wooden church built in 1699, which was brought here from the village of Bilyukovo to recreate the legendary panorama.
