After the end of the Cold War, the coastal resort towns north of Alicante became popular with Russians, both expatriates and holiday home owners.
But until 2007, many of the Russians in the area did not have a proper place to worship. A Russian businessman decided to change that by financing the construction of the first purpose-built Russian Orthodox church in Spain.
*Photo property of blog de los yuyis
The country had a few other Russian Orthodox churches, but they had all been opened in Reformed buildings. The magnificent structure of architecture in Altea is largely constructed of wood and was designed to be a copy of a 17th century church in Russia. Its materials were imported from the Ural Mountains and assembled by a number of skilled Russian craftsmen.
The interior of the church is adorned with the iconography you would expect to find inside a Russian church. Its exterior features excellent works of art in addition to the golden onion-shaped domes common in Orthodox architecture.
The church is open from Monday to Friday, from 10:00 to 20:00. Saturdays and Sundays from 8:00 to 18:00h. It is located halfway between the towns of Altea and Calpe within a luxury urbanisation called Altea Hills, just off the coast road N332.