The Kama River
THE KAMA (Russian: река́ Ка́ма) is a major river in Russia, the largest in Western Ural, and the longest left tributary of the Volga.
The overall length is 1 805 km (1125 miles). The Kama river basin includes 73 718 rivers (93% of them are 10 km and shorter). The largest tributaries to the Kama are Kosa, Vishera, Sylva, Chusovaya, Belaya, Ik, Izh, Zay, Vyatka and Myosha Rivers. The cities situated on the banks of the Kama are Solikamsk, Berezniki, Perm, Sarapul, and Naberezhnye Chelny. It is fairly well used trade route. Passenger routes connect Perm and Moscow, Nizhniy Novgorod, Ufa, and Astrakhan. Picturesque scenery and beautiful banks of the river attract numerous tourists.
There are 3 bridges over the Kama river in Perm: the main city communal bridge, the railroad bridge, and the Krasavinsk transport bridge.
Rising in the Upper Kama Upland of Udmurtia, the Kama flows north, then east, south, and southwest for 1,122 miles (1,805 km) until it enters the Volga River below Kazan, in the Samara Reservoir. It drains a basin of 202,000 square miles (522,000 square km). The spring maximum flow following the snowmelt accounts for nearly 60 percent of the annual flow; freeze-up lasts from mid-November or early December until April. The Kama is one of the most important rivers of Russia - historically as the routeway to the Urals and Siberia and economically as part of the vast Volga system of waterways.
There are large barrages and hydroelectric stations at Perm, at Chaykovsky near Votkinsk, and at Nizhnekamsk, downstream.
Fish: sterlet, sturgeon, bream, carp, crucian carp, white bream, ide, bleak, pike-perch, perch, ruff, chub, pike, eelpout, catfish.
The Kama is known as the symbol of Perm Krai, the blue road of Prikamie, the waterway of Perm. The origin of the name "Kama" is still indefinite. 
One of the versions refers to the legend about the powerful Kama who in different situations appears as a heroic defender, kind deity, or evil magician. According to the scientific explanation, the word "Kama" (from Udmurt "Kema") means "long", "prolonged". Indeed, the length of the river is over 1800 km (1125 miles).
Many poets, writers, and artists have admired the beauty of the Kama. Poets Vasiliy Kamenskiy and Vladimir Radkevitch call it lovingly Kama-Kamushka, the Kama-Mother, the Blue-eyed Mother-Kama. The people who live along the River, call it the Kama-Worker, the Kama-Beauty.
