Guzeripl

Guzeripl was founded in 1924 as a ranger station of the Caucasus Reserve; it received settlement status in 1936. For many years it was a lumberjacks' settlement: felled timber was floated down the Belaya as far as Kamennomostsky, and in the pre-war years the logging was done by prisoners of two camps — by the Zholobnaya river and at the Zaklyuchenka glade, where repressed Don Cossacks were held. When the war began the camps closed, and the Suvorovsky station of the reserve took over the glade. Tourism here is older than many alpine resorts: from 1940 the 'Guzeripl' camp operated, and in 1949 the famous All-Union tourist Route Number Thirty, 'Across the Western Caucasus', passed through the settlement — from the Partizanskaya and Yavorovaya glades across the Guzeripl and Armian passes to the Fisht shelter and on to Babuk-Aul. From 1991 to 2009 the whitewater competition 'Interralli Belaya' started from the settlement. Today Guzeripl is a base for reserve tourism: on the right bank of the Belaya stands the reserve's ranger station with its forestry office and rangers, and the settlement itself is lined with guest houses. From the mouth of the Zholobnaya an asphalted road built in the 2000s runs towards Lago-Naki, ending in a dead end at the Yavorovaya glade, from which a foot trail leads to the Fisht shelter. A dolmen stands on the edge of the settlement.