The main place of active recreation of citizens are urban and suburban park and forest park zones. It is here with minimal financial and time costs they can spend the weekend, in the fresh air to get rid of physical and spiritual fatigue accumulated during the working week.
Among park health-improving zones a special place is occupied by dendroparks — territories designed for public recreation. There are more than a dozen of them in Ukraine and they are located in different climatic zones of the country. Among these parks are the oldest and well-known not only in Ukraine are the park «Sofiyivka», located in the northern part of the city of Uman Cherkassy region, Alexandria Park in the city of Bila Tserkva, Kiev region, park «Trostyanets» in the village of Trostyanets, Chernigov region, Krasnokutsky Park in Kharkiv region and others. All these areas have all the necessary conditions for healthy active recreation — beautiful landscapes of landscape architecture, and intoxicating silence, broken only by birdsong, and rich collections of ornamental vegetation, many interesting monuments of history and culture of the native land.
«Sofiyivka» is one of the best parks in the world, in which according to the Russian traveler IM Dolgorukov «nature and art, combining all their forces, created a beautiful picture». Each composition or small architecture of the park is an illustration of Homer’s poems «Illiad» and «Odyssey». «Sofiyivka» is a monument of landscape type of the world garden and park art.
Park «Alexandria» is named after Countess Alexandra Engelhardt (married Branitskaya), the niece of Prince Grigory Potemkin. Architectural structures, unique landscape compositions, lawns, meadows, ponds and the Ros River create a wonderful park ensemble, which is one of the best in Europe. Its collection fund includes over 2500 species and varieties of plants, many of which are more than 200 years old. The Alexandria Park is very popular among participants of weekend tours.
Many park, interesting natural and historical areas attract Kiev residents on vacation. These include: Hydropark with its water-entertainment complexes, beaches, attractions, water stations; Central Botanical Garden, which has 170 hectares of beautiful natural landscape; vast «Goloseevsky Park named after Rylsky», which is part of a natural forest; unique with its rich vegetation monument of garden and park art Syretsky Dendropark.
The natural world of Ukraine is rich, diverse and picturesque. Almost all cities of the country have preserved corners of wildlife, where tired of the hard work rhythm residents can spend Sunday rest, really relax, get a charge of vigor and healthy emotions for the next working week.