Nizhneudinsk is a Russian town, the administrative center of the Nizhneudinsk District of the Irkutsk Region.

It is located at the bottom of spurs of the East Sayan, on the banks of River Uda (the basin of Yenisei), 506 km to the northwest of Irkutsk.

Nizhneudinsk has a railway station and a highway junction.

The town with the area of 68 sq km has the population of 35 500 people (as of 2013).

In the Nizhneudinsk District, at the 209 km distance from Nizhneudinsk there is a unique tourist attraction: the land of Tofalaria - the area inhabited by the Tofalars, the smallest nationality of Russia. Tofalariya is connected with Nizhneudinsk airline.

History of Nizhneudinsk

It was founded as the Pokrovsky Gorodok (township) a stockade town was arranged there in 1649 and rebuilt in 1664. The last fortification was constructed in the 1720s.

From 1783 it was the district town Nizhneudinsk of the Irkutsk Province and in 1822 it became the district town of the Irkutsk Province.

The name opposes it to the town of Verkhneudinsk (nowadays Ulan-Ude), founded in the same 1783 at the mouth of the Uda River (the right inflow of Selenga). The definitions “nizhne” (i.e. lower) and “verkhne” (i.e. upper) in these names reflect the towns’ position on the waterway Angara - Baikal - Selenga.

For a long time Nizhneudinsk was the district centre for exchange and trade of gold and livestock products. Food, clothes, hunting supplies were exported.

In 1856 the district town Nizhneudinsk of the Irkutsk Province had 2 churches, 434 houses, and 9 shops.

Architecture and Sights

St. Nicholas Church.

18 km away from Nizhneudinsk, down River Uda there is the Ukovsky waterfall 20 m high.

75 km up the Uda River, to the south of Nizhneudinsk, at the height of about 460 m over the river level there are Nizhneudinsk Caves.