Text: Ekaterina Krutova

Conveniently located between Moscow and St. Petersburg, the region attracts residents of both capitals who can enjoy a fabulous weekend getaway there.

But Tver and other towns in the region can also offer you longer staysin theircozy hotels and historic manors, with plenty of restaurants around. You won’t be bored!

Tver in full view

Not everyone will risk going up several hundred meters into the winter air, but those brave enough are sure to have a truly outstanding experience. Tver is in full view from here, spread out before your eyes.

Tver’s festive trident

It gets dark early in winter, and at five o’clock the city is all in lights.Along with city residents, you can admire the old town’s illumination on Sovetskaya, Volnyi Novgorod and Novotorzhskaya Streets.These are the streets that radiate out in three rays from Sovetskaya Square, forming the famous “festive trident”–the basis of Tver’s city planning. St. Petersburg has something similar, but you won’t find anything like it anywhere else in Russia. The construction of Tver began,toordinary plans, during the earliest days of the reign of Catherine the Great, but a terrible fire of May 12, 1763 destroyed 852 houses. The Empress was informed of the tragedy, and the restoration of the city became an affair of state importance. The so-called “unified facade” is characteristic for the Northern capital, when buildings are constructed next to each other, without gaps between them. It is Tver’s signature architecture.

Preobrazhensky Church

Make sure to visit the village of Krasnoye in the Staritsky Region. This is one of the rarest Gothic Revival structures of the 18th century, and is built of brick using white Staritsky stone. Two centuries ago, the richest landowners of Staritsky were the Poltoratskys.The founder of the dynasty Mark Poltoratsky was Catherine the Great’s favourite singer, and she bestowed landin Tver Province upon him.Mark Poltoratsky’s wife, Agathocles, ran the house.She gave her husband a gift by building an exact copy of a church erected in St. Petersburg in 1770 at the place where, as legend has it, Catherine learned about the victory of the Russian Fleet at the Battle of Chesma.The cathedral’s amazing acoustics still astonish today.

Grishkino Park 

Get back to enjoying nature in the recreational park in the village of Bolshoye Grishkino, in the Kalininsky district.You can choosefrom skiing runs of various levels of difficulty, skate at an open-air rink, or “fly” from a hill while snow tubing.Learn to ride a snowmobile, then proceedinto the untrodden expanses, either with an instructor or on your own.

Quick as the wind on sled dogs

The magic of nature, as well as friendly Alaskan and Siberian huskies, will turn your vacation into a fairy tale at the Chukavino Sled Dog Centre, one of just a few professional dog-sled racing centers in Russia. It breeds Siberian and Alaskan huskies and Samoyed laikas, with over 40 dogs at the kennel. Chukavino dogs are not only excellent athletes, they are also trusting and friendly, and they love children and are good at posing for pictures.

“Marshmallow wonderland”

After you have enjoyed some wonderful selfies, continue your journey to Likhoslavlsky district, where “Marshmallow wonderland” awaits you in the village of Mikhailova Gora. It’s a famous tasty treat from the area, which the villagers cook using a special recipe, without artificial dyes or preservatives, but with a filling made out of forest berries, nuts, dried fruits and even ginger root. The produce of the small private factory has made it to the Top 100Goods of Russia! There is entertainment on hand for adults and children alike, including Baba Yaga, who happens to be kind and not at all scary in this fairy tale.

For more information, visit “Welcome Tver!” at welcometver.ru

TEXT: EKATERINA LYULCHAK

There are a great number of destinations in Russia suitable for mountaineering beginners to go trekking. For the most part, popular treks run through the “small mountains” – the Khibiny, the Urals, the Sayan, or in Kamchatka – or through the foothills of the “big mountains” – the Caucasus and Altai.

Mounts Narodnaya and Manaraga

These mountains are a good starting point for anyone who has never been mountaineering before. Mount Narodnaya (1895m) is the highest peak in the Urals, located within the Yugid Va National Park, which is on the list of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. It is also the largest national park in Russia. Not far from Narodnaya stands Mount Manaraga (1662m), which is considered to be the most beautiful mountain of the Subarctic Ural Region. The great advantage for beginners is the proximity of these two mountains, making it easy to reach both peaks in a single trek. A standard trek lasts nine days, and covers a 110km walking route.

Trekking in the Urals is not expensive – around $160 per person, which includes transfer in an SUV from Inty Station to the Zhelannaya Camp, from which your trek begins. You’ll be welcomed there by your guide and instructor, with hire equipment already prepared for you – a tent, a sleeping bag, a gas stove, and (to the joy of every traveler) a mobile sauna. Narodnaya is even suitable for older children, as the ascent is rated in the simplest 1A category.

Getting there:
The first point on your journey is Vorkuta (flights from Moscow from $130). From there you can take the train to Inta. The five-hour train trip costs $8.

EXPERT OPINIONS

YULIA NAUMOVA, Assistant Director of SunTrek:
“For us, the highest demand is for uncategorized mountain treks. These are popular with a wide range of tourists, including families with young children and pensioners – everybody who wants to enjoy the beauty of the mountains, but do so in comfort and with no risk. Our most popular routes are in the Elbrus foothills, Dombay, and Arkhyz. We’ve given up on tents and heavy rucksacks. All through the treks, our tourists spend the night in hotels with showers and a proper breakfast, and eat their meals in cafés. They are taken to the start of their trek by car, and collected at that end. A standard trek can last four hours or the whole day, but the pace and intensity of the trekking is always tailored to the travelers’ capabilities. People can take a walk through the hills, take a rest when they want to, and stop for unhurried photography.

Cherskiy Peak

The Khamar-Daban mountain range, which is crowned by Cherskiy Peak (2090m), is one of the most interesting and picturesque regions of all Eastern Siberia. The mountains here are not high, but they are very munificent, with lots of berries, mushrooms, and pine nuts (khamar means “nut” in the Buryat language). It is also the location of the most interesting floatable rivers and warm lakes. The climate here is very humid, and Khamar-Daban is often referred to as the “Siberian tropics”. A walk through the charming forest clears the lungs and calms the nerves, while a climb up Cherskiy Peak offers the reward of fantastic views of Lake Baikal. The ascent of Cherskiy Peak is not considered difficult, and visitors make the climb and back in just a few hours, with a camera, a thermos of tea, and a good mood being the only provisions required. A standard itinerary with three days of trekking and climbing costs $65-80, which includes accommodation at a leisure camp then in tents at a campsite, food, and a guide/instructor. Rafting down the Irkut River of Class 2 or Class 3 difficulty can be added to the itinerary, for those who are interested.

Trekking in the Urals is not expensive – around $160 per person, which includes transfer, a guide and instructor, and equipment hire – tent, sleeping bag, and gas stove, and (to the joy of every traveler) a mobile sauna.

Getting there:
First fly to Irkutsk (direct flights from Moscow are around $370), and then take the train to Slyudyanka ($8-16), which takes around eight hours.

Oshten

Oshten (2804m) is a peak in the Lago-Naki Uplands, part of the foothills of Mount Elbrus. Once upon a time, Oshten was a coral reef in an ancient ocean, which is what gives its cliffs their pinkish tone. Here you can find fossilized ammonites (ancient molluscs), and the imprints of starfish, sea-urchins, and coral in the stones. The simple ascent (category 1A) and the many interesting palaeontological finds on the route to Oshten make it very popular with travellers. The best time for trekking in Lago-Naki and an ascent of Oshten is between May and October. These are the months when the slopes are free of snow, and the routes are accessible for almost anybody. Don’t forget, however, to bring hiking poles with you to help on the steeper ascents and descents. A big advantage of travel in the Elbrus region is the comparatively well-developed infrastructure for tourists. There’s no problem here finding somewhere to spend the night. Three days of trekking with food, lodging at the superior Lago-Naki leisure camp, and ascent of Oshten with an instructor costs $160-200.

Getting there:
You can get to Krasnodar by plane, train or automobile for $50-80, then take a local train to Khadzhokh for a further $3.

Khibiny
The Khibiny Mountains, located within the Arctic Circle on the Kola Peninsula, offer a well-established trekking route that runs through seven simple mountain passes. The Khibiny are not the highest mountains in the world, but they do boast 400m precipices. The highest point in the Khibiny is Mount Yudychvumchorr. Although only 1,200m high, the thin Arctic air on its slopes gives the feel of ascending a much higher mountain. The Khibiny are very beautiful, the mountainsides covered with ice caves, glacial cirques, and more than 30 mountain lakes with exceptionally pure water.

The trekking routes in the Khibiny are normally circular, with tourists making a trek of about 100km to return to their departure point. Throughout the trek, you pitch camp every night with the help of your guide. No special equipment is required beyond the standard set of hiking provisions – sleeping bags, appropriate
clothing, walking boots, and a thermos. Even though there is no actual climbing involved, trekking in the Khibiny is restricted to those older than 14. A week-long trek works out at around $160-190 per person.

Getting there:
The flight from Moscow to Apatity is relatively lowcost – from $80. From Apatity, it’s best to order a taxi, which for only $8 will take you to the required leisure camp.

Avacha Volcano
To ascend not just any peak, but to conquer the summit of a real volcano is a challenge for the particularly adventurous. To view a panorama of massive fire-breathing mountains and to look right inside a crater is possible in Kamchatka. Avacha Volcano (2,741m) is located 30km from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. Climbers are taken to the base of the volcano, where they are put up in guest houses for a night. You can leave most of your belongings there, as no special equipment is required and all you need is a small rucksack with dry food and spare clothes. The route of ascent takes you across lava fields, over the deep crevasse of the Sukhaya River, and up to the crest of the volcano. The ascent takes 6-8 hours, and the return trek is a further 3-4 hours. The distance covered on the ascent is only 8km, but the final stage of the climb, where the incline is 30º, takes some effort. The trekking season runs from the end of July to the beginning of September, and the cost of the tour per person is $120.

Getting there:
A ticket to Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky from Moscow is not cheap – upwards of $400. From there, it’s easiest to order a taxi, which will cost around $8.

If you’re preparing for a serious ascent, you’ll need grapnels, a harness, an icepick, a helmet, three locking carabiners, climbing boots, lined over boots, and a safety lanyard.

EXPERT OPINIONS

VLADIMIR KAVUNENKO, international master mountaineer:
If you’re going to the mountains, you have to understand that a tourist is not the same as a mountaineer. There are many mountains it’s better not to visit for people who just want to relax and enjoy the view. Moreover, the difficulty of the ascent is not always dependent on the height. For example, my favourite mountain Ushba (4,700m) in the Central Caucasus is lower than Elbrus, but far harder to climb. Its double summit is known throughout the mountaineering world. There’s even a club of “Ushba lovers” in England – the mountaineering elite. However, for beginners even Elbrus is dangerous. The weather changes there very quickly, and sometimes the wind twists so hard it’s impossible to move. That’s why those who love the mountains are brave, but also cautious. I’d recommend beginners start slowly, and definitely get some proper instruction and training.

Belukha
The Altai beauty Belukha (4,509m) is one of Russia’s highest mountains. Legend has it that this is the site of the hub of the universe and the gateway to the mystical Shambala. The route of ascent on Belukha can be divided into two parts – the trekking stage and the technical stage. The trekking stage, which is suitable even for children, starts in the village of Tyungur, follows a forest path up the mountain slope, and ends when you emerge at the pretty Akkemskoye Lake, where the group makes a base camp. Here at the base of Belukha, there are various leisure camps with different levels of comfort, and for $13-16 per night you can rent a room in a guest house, for example at the Vysotnik leisure camp.

Once at camp, the experienced and properly trained climbers – the only ones who can continue the ascent – start to get acclimatized with trips out onto the ice to practice with ice-climbing gear. From here on, the ascent is classified in the very challenging 3A category. The climb goes up snow-covered cliffs, and in place you’ll encounter the odd glacier. You’ll need to take with you a proper climbing rucksack with grapnels, an ice pick, and sleeping bag. After a ten-hour climb to the summit of Belukha, the mountaineers return to base. The full trek with final ascent takes around ten days and costs $800.

Getting there:
The starting point for the trip is Gorno-Altaysk (flights from Moscow start at $320). Cheap buses run from there to Tyungur – the village at the foot of Belukha.

Elbrus
The magnificent two-headed Elbrus (5,642m) is the crowning achievement for amateur mountaineers in Russia. Before beginning their ascent on the highest peak in the country, visitors get acclimatized in the Adyl-Su ravine, where they make short climbs in the foothills of Elbrus, during which they visit the observatory at the summit of Terscop Peak and the Devichi Kosy (“Maiden’s Tresses”) waterfall. Then they spend two or three days with instructors making preparatory climbs to heights of 4,000–5,000m, sleeping in tents or leisure camps. On the seventh day, they make the ascent on the western peak of Elbrus.

The ascent and return to camp take up to 14 hours. The classic southern route is classed as of medium difficulty (2A), while other routes are all classed as difficult (3A), so tourists need to be in good shape and properly equipped. If you’re not confident in your abilities, however, you can opt for a more comfortable ascent with the help of winches and snowcats. Ten days on Elbrus with accommodation, meals, and guide services included cost around $480.

Getting there:
The nearest airports to Elbrus are in Nalchik and Mineralnye Vody (flights from Moscow from $80). For there to the village of Terskol, where trekking routes begin, there are scheduled buses or you can take a taxi.

What’s most impressive about Ergaki is its landscapes – the expressive, inimitable lines of the mountain tops, with their ridges, separate peaks, and rocky outcrops. Add to that the real taiga, with cedars, firs, and spruces, and a plethora of mountain lakes with exceptionally clean water.

In summertime, the area is filled with tourists, and at times it can be difficult to find a spot for your tent. This applies in particular to the areas within a day’s walk of the leisure camps that line the highway. It’s thanks to the highway, in fact, that Ergaki has been able to become a relatively accessible site. It was built not so long ago, and with it came a great influx of visitors. In one day it’s quite possible to reach Svetloye, Karovoye or Raduzhnoye Lakes, to climb to the Hanging Stone, and to get back to your comfortable camp by the highway.

The most beautiful places, however, are not so easy to reach. To get to them, you need to go through some quite challenging passes, some of which require mountaineering equipment. There are less challenging passes, but even these require a certain amount of fitness, stamina, and courage. Plus, you’ll need to carry a tent, sleeping bag, food, and other essentials with you. On the other hand, on the other side of those passes is the real Ergaki. That’s where you find the Lake of Artists, the Lake of Mountain Spirits, the famous Parabola, a double granite peak with a very distinctive shape, and much more. But even in these hard-to-reach areas, in summertime you’ll find the parking lots crowded with tents. Go further still, and there are some places far from the beaten track where it really is possible not to see another human being in a day’s walk.

These hard-to-access areas have become popular thanks to professional photographers, huge numbers of whom have visited here in the last two decades. However, this newfound popularity has a darker side – the anthropogenic impact on the environment has reached critical levels. Th ere are even some confl icts with the animal kingdom. For example, dangerous encounters with bears have been known to occur. Bears are, aft er all, the masters of the Taiga. Th ere are several signs dotted around with instructions for how to behave in the park, including what to do should you run into a bear.

Of course, for real adventure-seekers, that type of risk is unlikely to be much of a deterrent. And just think how many other extraordinary places there are in Russia that nobody yet knows about, but that in time will become as popular as Ergaki.

Getting THERE

How to get there
From Krasnoyarsk or Abakan, it’s easiest to reach the park with your own car, but there are also daily scheduled buses that pass through the park on the Krasnoyarsk-Kyzyl and Abakan-Kyzyl routes, tickets for which can be bought at the bus stations in either city. The territory of the park is split from north to south by the M54 Yenisey Federal Highway. All the leisure camps are located along the highway between the 605km and 640km markers. Most of the tourist walking routes start from the highway, too.

Where to stay
There are several holiday camps within the park, offering tourists accommodation, food, guided tours, and equipment hire. In the summer period there are also commercial campsites at Uyutnoye and  vetloye Lakes.

Visitor Center
The park’s Visitor Center is open year-round, and you are encouraged to drop in to register your visit and receive a short introductory drill. You can also order guided environmental tours, and buy  souvenirs,  guidebooks, and walking maps.

TEXT: MAXIM KOVALYOV,
IRINA MARKELENKOVA

Today Kamchatka is open to travellers, the number of whom grows each year. They all recognize the land’s extraordinary spirit and the warm hospitality of local residents.

The Kamchatka Peninsula is the largest in Eurasia, with a sea coast, lakes and rivers, forests and, of course, volcanoes. Mountains occupy three quarters of the peninsula, with as many as 36 active volcanoes.

Volcanoes are an iconic feature of Kamchatka – no wonder that they are included in the UNESCO World Heritage list. You can see them first even from the plane. The socalled “domestic” volcanoesare lined up in a slender chain just 25 kilometres from the region’s capital, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. There are five of them: Aag (2,310 metres above sea level), Arik (2,156 metres), Koryaksky (3,456 metres), Avachinsky (2,751 metres) and Kozelsky (2,189 metres). Two of those giants are active: the locals affectionately call them “Koryaka” and “Avacha”. Downhill skiers and snowboarders come in the winter, spring and even summer, while mountain climbers conquer their steep slopes all year round.

The beautiful Klyuchevskaya Sopka Volcano (4,750 metres above sea level) is the pride of the region, the highest active volcano in Eurasia. This giant erupts regularly every 4-6 years, with the last eruption complete with lava recorded in 2017.

Many tourists, mountaineers and fans of extreme sports fl ock to its foothills and try to reach its summit.

Anyone who steps into this magical land is overwhelmed by its pristine nature. You can see all kinds of animals here: bears and foxes, wolves and hares, sheep and deer. Kamchatka is also famous for its marine resources and is justly called the “Salmon Paradise”.

You can come here at any time of year. The mountain summits are snow-covered virtually all year long, giving sportsmen and tourists the opportunity for year-round skiing, heli-skiing and snowmobiling.

Kamchatka residents celebrate Volcano Day every year. It takes place in the middle of August, when Kamchatka’s nature frees itself from the shackles of winter and lets travellers reach its most secluded nooks and crannies untouched by civilization. The celebration’s key event is the climb of the Avachinsky Volcano. On Kozelsky Volcano, among ranges and snow-covered ridges, creative and extreme workshops, master classes and demonstration lessons take place.

You can reach these “domestic” volcanoes by all-terrain transportation either on your own or as part of a tourist group. It is easy to choose a travel company: the Travel and External Aff airs Agency of Kamchatskiy Krai’s website (agtur.kamgov.ru/reestr-turoperatorov) off ers a list of travel agents.

Getting THERE

How to get there
The distance from Moscow to Yelizovo airport in Petropavlovsk- Kamchatsky is 6,773 km or 8.5 hours by air. There are regular fl ights to Kamchatka from Moscow, St. Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Samara, Novosibirsk, Magadan, Krasnoyarsk, Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, Irkutsk and Anadyr, as well as charter fl ights from the United States and Japan.

Where to stay
Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky has many hotels, from economy to luxury, as well as guest houses,  inihotels
and hostels. They welcome guests all year round. During highsummer season, it is better to book a room in advance.

What to buy
As for souvenirs, it’s worth looking at wooden fi gures of traditional Kamchatkan talismans – peleken the jolly man, and kutkh, the embodiment of the spirit of the raven.

I had excellent company. The group of over 60 people consisted of managers and staff from the major tour operator TUI Russia, other travel agents, and officials from government tourism agencies. Our visit had been carefully prepared, with the support and active involvement of the regional government and Kamchatka’s tour operators, who together had organized this business tour with the title “Kamchatka – Winter Adventures”.

We stayed in Bel-Kam-Tour Hotel, in the resort and spa district of the village of Paratunka, 40 minutes’ drive from the regional capital. For guests from Central Russia, the most unusual feature of the hotel were the four outdoor pools with thermal waters at a temperature of 36-37ºC. The water flows into the pools from the hotel’s own 1600m borehole. When it’s -5ºC outside, with snow lying all around, you can float in the pools and gaze at the starry sky above you – it’s fantastic! Rooms at the hotel start from $110 for double occupancy per night, and there are also separate bungalows. Rates are roughly the same at the Avacha Hotel in the center of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, where we spent the two final nights of the trip.

Another peculiarity of a trip to Kamchatka is the jet lag. Due to the change in time zones, we were all waking up regular as clockwork at 4am. For me, this continued to be the case when I got back to Moscow. For about a week afterwards, I woke up at the same time and couldn’t get back to sleep again.

On the next day, we were taken to the Avachinsky Volcano, which is situated just 30km from Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky and is the most popular of the peninsula’s volcanoes with tourists. The roads to the volcano aren’t passable by car, so we were transported in snowcats – big trucks on caterpillar tracks. Most of the group then transferred to snowmobiles pulling narty (long sleds). This was where the need for warm clothing became apparent – on the open slopes the wind whips straight through your coat, and we had to cover our faces with ski masks and goggles.

Frequent changes in weather on the peninsula make exact planning impossible, as was proved that day when a storm blew up that stopped us from reaching the peak of the volcano. We did, however, manage to get to the base owned by Alpika and Kamchatintour, where there was a delicious hot lunch awaiting us.

Water flows into the pools from a 1600m borehole. With snow lying all around, you can float in the pools and gaze at the starry sky above you.

The guest houses where travelers sleep summer and winter are very basic – rooms for 4-6 people with bunk beds and toilets in the yard. The electricity comes from a generator, and there are no roads. Tour managers are confident that if the government can get utilities out there, the conditions for tourists will be a little less spartan. Businesses are eager to develop the site.On that note, Kamchatka really has a lot of snow. The depth of snow cover in the mountains reaches as much as 20 meters, and it stays till July, so there’s a lot to offer downhill skiers.

On the following day, we had a helicopter tour. Take-off was delayed by an hour due to the weather. At the heliport we found ourselves alongside travelers waiting since morning for flights to the north of the peninsula, which can’t be reached any other way. The company Vityaz-Aero, the only operator in the area, boasts a fleet of 30 Mi-8 helicopters with experienced pilots, and built the heliport and terminal itself. Helicopter tours are organized by Vityaz-Travel, and an hour-long flight around the volcanoes costs roughly $320.

During the day, we got a bird’s-eye view of the Avachinsky, Koryaksky, and Zhupanovsky volcanoes, as well as the famous Three Brothers cliffs – a landmark of Avach Bay, where we made a landing on the beautiful shores of the Pacific Ocean and got the chance to take loads of stunning photos.

Perched on the ridges of ice were endangered sea eagles, while right on the deck we were serenaded by Vasya the sea lion, who jumped out of the water.

Yet another adventure came with our boat trip on the Almaz motor vessel. Due to ice swept into Avacha Bay by the wind, the boat couldn’t get out to sea on its own. A tug had to be found to clear a path and guide the Almaz out of the bay. Even so, we were still unable to reach our final destination, but we did get the chance to have an excellent meal – the menu included caviar, fresh seafood, and an exceptional ‘ukha’ fish soup. Heading out onto deck, we were able to enjoy extraordinary views of the ocean shackled in ice and a dimming sun setting through the clouds. Perched on the ridges of ice were endangered sea eagles, while right on the deck we were serenaded by a Stellar sea lion we christened Vasya. He jumped straight out of the water with a fearsome roar to beg us for fish. Eagles and sea lions can only be seen this close on winter sea cruises. In summer, the sea lions move hundreds of kilometers from human habitation, while the eagles perch on their nestswhich they rarely leave, and can therefore only be seen with powerful binoculars. Interestingly, when we fl ew out, the bay was clear again without a single piece of ice. Th at goes to show you how quickly weather can change in Kamchatka.

Our third day proved no less interesting. We visited the Kaynyran ethno-village (in the Koryak language, the name means “bear corner”), where there’s a kennel for sled dogs. Here they keep more than a hundred dogs, both huskies and the local Kamchatkan sled dogs. We went sledding with dog teams and were fed shurpa with hot tea made from Kamchatkan herbs in a traditional yaranga – a reindeer-hide tent. A Koryak ensemble performed a vibrant mix of songs and dances for us. In their tradition, they represent diff erent animals and birds in their dancing, while the favored musical instrument is a shamanic drum.

Two other groups from our party were introduced to the traditions and lifestyle of the indigenous peoples of the peninsula at the Children of the North community project, before visiting the Snow Dogs and Kamchadal sled-dog kennels.

At the Kaynyran ethno-village, we were taken dog-sledding and fed shurpa with herbal tea.

One more place that can be thoroughly recommended for travelers is the Volcanarium interactive museum of volcanoes in Petropavlovsk-Kamchatscky. Th ere you’ll learn just how interesting volcanoes can be, with explanations of what you’d see if you found yourself inside a real crater, you’ll take a tour through a lava cave and witness live experiments with fi re and crystals. As a souvenir, you can take home a little piece of volcanic lava.

Getting THERE

How to get there

The only way to reach Kamchatka is by air to the regional capital, Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky. Yelisovo Airport is situated 30km from the city.

What to see

The main attractions of Kamchatka are its volcanoes, geysers, hot springs, and wonderful nature reserves. The Paratunka thermal springs are situated an hour’s drive from the regional capital. The Valley of Geysers is one of the biggest geyser fi elds in the world, located within the Kronotsky Nature
Reserve, which is only accessible by helicopter. If you want to see bears in their natural habitat, head for the South-Kamchatka Wildlife Sanctuary around Kurilskoye and Dvukhyurtochnoye Lakes.

What to eat

Among the culinary highlights are: Kamchatkan ukha (fi sh soup) made with fresh-caught fi sh; fi shcakes stuffed with mashed potatoes, onion and spices; reindeer meat; and the yukola snack (dry-cured fish). The cuisine of the indigenous peoples can be
quite unusual for European tastes.

What to buy

A local market is an essential stop for all visitors, to buy fresh red caviar from Atlantic or Chinook salmon, and mouthwatering smoked fish – sockeye, chum, Coho, and Chinook salmon. A kilogram of Chinook salmon caviar costs $58, while the fi shitself goes for around $17. Another popular local delicacy is Kamchatka king crab.

TEXT: ANNA MAKAROVA

It is best to start your journey in Moscow or St. Petersburg. The jewel of the itinerary is Nicholas II’s residence at Tsarskoye Selo. It is located 25km from St. Petersburg. A tour of the private chambers of Nicholas II and his wife Alexandra Feodorovna provides the opportunity to discover the artistic tastes of the last Romanovs, and to see the Emperor’s official office.

From here, visitors have a choice of how to continue their journey in the footsteps of the imperial family – to the Urals or to Siberia.

In the Tyumen Region, situated in Siberia, there are several iconic sites that will be of interest to all lovers of history. For example, in the old Siberian city of Tobolsk, the imperial family lived in exile from August 1917 until April 1918. In April 2018, the Museum of the Family of Emperor Nicholas II opened in a house where the Tsar once lived. The museum holds some personal artifacts from the members of the royal family, as well as a large quantity of documents and photographs. The interiors of the museum have also been restored to replicate their appearance during Czarist times.

Another fascinating and mandatory stop on the journey is the Grigoriy Rasputin Museum in the village of Pokrovskoye (80km from Tyumen). Not only was Pokrovskoye the birthplace of Rasputin, one of the most notorious and mysterious figures of Russian history, it was also on the route along which the imperial family were taken to Tobolsk.

In Yekaterinburg, the capital of the Urals, tourists can visit the Churchon-Blood, built on the site of the Ipatyev House where, on the night July 17, 1918, the royal family members were shot. Another place of pilgrimage is the working Monastery of the Holy Imperial Passion-Bearers in Ganina Yama. The monastery was built 15 years ago on the site of the mine shaft into which the bodies of Nicholas II and his family were flung. All the slain were canonized by the Russian Orthodox Church in 2000.

Getting THERE

How to get there
A plane ticket from Moscow to either Yekaterinburg or Tyumen will cost $65-100, depending on the quantity of luggage and the date of travel. The fl ight from St. Petersburg to Yekaterinburg takes 2 hours 40 minutes and will cost around $80. It is a 3-hour fl ight to Tyumen, costing around $160. From Tyumen, you can reach Tobolsk by car or bus in 4 hours.

Where to stay
There is a vast choice of hotels in Yekaterinburg and Tyumen to suit every taste. For example, in Tyumen the 4-star Double-Tree Hilton and “Eurasia” Hotels offer rates from $100 per night. The 3-star Georgievskaya Hotel in Tobolsk costs from $45.

Where to eat
Tyumen can boast the wonderful Chum Restaurant-Museum, where you can try reindeer tartar, braised bear meat, and marinated cloudberries. In Tobolsk, try the restaurant Ladeyny near the city’s Kremlin, with traditional Russian interiors and Siberian favourites like pelmeni meat dumplings, ukha fish soup, salted mushrooms, and stroganina, the local equivalent of carpaccio.

What to buy
Traditional souvenirs from Tyumen include anything connected with oil—the city’s major industry. Popular in Tobolsk are pine nuts, warm reindeer-fur boots, and carved fi gures made at local workshops that use mammoth tusk, reindeer
antler, and even spermwhale tooth for materials. In the Urals, goods made with local precious and semiprecious stones are popular.

Aniva Lighthouse

One of the most exciting excursions on Sakhalin is to the Aniva Lighthouse, located in the Aniva Bay on the southern edge of the island. The lighthouse was built in 1939 by the Japanese on the small Sivuchya Cliff, beside the rugged, inaccessible Aniva Cape. The area is beset with rip tides, frequent fog, and rocky underwater sandbanks. The lighthouse tower is 31m high, while the light itself reaches 40m above sea level. The tower consists of nine storeys. The lighthouse itself is no longer in use. Weather permitting, tour groups arrive at the lighthouse and are given a tour inside, with time for photos.

Giant Cape

On the southern shores of the Sea of Okhotsk, there is a genuine natural open-air museum. Giant Cape is home to stone leviathans, and an emerald-green wall that cuts through the surface of the sea with its rocky sides. The “exhibits” at this museum are the lagoons and caves standing right in the sea, and arches and columns of stone, carved out by the wind and the waves. At the heart of the exhibition is the visitor himself and his sense of being as insignificant as a grain of sand before these stone giants. From July to August here you can see one of the most extraordinary phenomena nature has to offer—the spawning run of the Pacific salmon.

Pacific Bay

At a distance of 130km from Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk lies Pacific Bay, is an extraordinarily beautiful piece of coastline sheltered from the cold winds. Located on the west coast of Sakhalin in the Gulf of Patience, “Pacific” Bay was given its name by the great Russian explorer Adam Johann von Krusenstern.
It is home to rare plants including sea roses, golden banners, spikenards, and mertensia. Sand can only be found along the shoreline of the bay, which for the most part consists of dark brown cliffs and large rocks jutting out of the sandstone. Another sight of interest is Zametniy Island, with its flat peak and broad base. There is no way for people to reach the rock, so instead it is always covered with a crowd of noisy gulls.

The Devil’s Bridge

This mysteriously named bridge is a unique piece of railway engineering that attracts thousands of tourists from all over the globe. It was originally built in the 1920s by the Japanese. Trains first travelled through a tunnel before emerging at the top of the hill to cross the bridge at a height of 38m above sea level. From the bridge, visitors get spectacular panoramic views of the island scenery. The tunnel that the Japanese carved into the cliff is almost 900m long, and makes a complete circle inside the rock. The upper part of the tunnel exits the cliff directly above the entrance. This unique feat of engineering was achieved long before the introduction of GPS or other modern position-finding technologies.

Frog Butte

The Vestochka district is considered Sakhalin’s energetic centre. Frog Butte is a wonder of nature over 20 million years old, and a place with an extraordinary energy. The massif is located 3km to the north-east of the village of Vestochka on the southern slope of Mount Gorbunov, and covers a total area of 12ha. The outline of the battered cliffs resembles a frog sitting on a hillock. Locals say that this is the exact energetic centre of Sakhalin. Whether that is true or not, according to Aynu legend the cliff was considered a temple of wisdom. It is also said that if you touch the Frog Butte and make a wish, it is guaranteed to come true.

Eustace Cape

On the east coast of the island, almost at its furthest tip, stands one of the most extraordinarily beautiful places, the Cape of St. Eustace. This rocky cape, surrounded by crystal-clear water, is only 51m high, but from it, spectacular panoramic views stretch out to the south, reaching Pavlovich Cape and Aniva Cape. Standing on the cape and breathing the delicious sea air, you have the real sensation of flight.

Busse Lake

Busse is a lagoon-like lake, where the focus of interest is a small island of oysters— the whole mass consists of nothing but oyster shells. Here you can feast on these seafood delicacies at the very best “nature restaurant”.

This sparsely populated eastern region, with only 490 000 inhabitants, is near the top of the list for production of oil and gas, and for its yield of fish and seafood. Several major international corporations have operations here, and the total volume of foreign investment has already reached over $55 billion. One of the priorities for the regional economy now is the development of tourism.

Travel to Sakhalin is becoming easier and more affordable, and the number of Russian and foreign tourists to the region grows year on year. Anyone who enjoys ethnographic, gastronomic, extreme, or health tourism will be able to find something of interest here. Awaiting you is pristine natural wilderness— around 2 000 species of plants grow on the island, which is also home to bears, reindeer, wolverines, sables, Siberian musk deer, otters, and minks. More than 200 species of bird nest on Sakhalin, and the island’s rivers are richly stocked with the highly prized humpback salmon.

The mild Sakhalin winters draw tourists to the slopes of the modern Gorny Vozdukh (“Mountain Air”) ski resort. Today, Gorny Vozdukh is widely acknowledged as the best downhill ski resort in Russia. On the slopes of Mount Bolshevik, there are 16 pistes covering all levels of difficulty, with snow cover maintained to very high standards. The favourable climatic conditions make it possible to ski and snowboard from the beginning of December until the middle of April, and allow the resort to host international-level competitions such as the FAR EAST CUP.

The Kuril Islands spread like a string of pearls from the southern tip of the Kamchatka peninsula to the Japanese island of Hokkaido, and are home to 36 active volcanoes. The view of Tyatya volcano is one of the most stunning in the Kuril chain, while visitors head to Kunashir Island to see the Mendeleev volcano and the extraordinary cliff formations. Among the weeds on the seabed around the islands a number of wrecked ships can be found that have long served as dwellings for a variety of underwater creatures. On the island of Iturup one of Russia’s tallest waterfalls, Ilya Muromets, can be found, with water falling from heights of up to 141m. The fishermen on Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands catch salmon, flounder, halibut, cod, and taimen, the Siberian giant trout. As for seafood, there are rich stocks of crab, prawns, and sea urchins.

Getting THERE

How to get there

There are regular flights between Khomutovo (Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk) Airport and Moscow, Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, Blagoveshchensk, Novosibirsk, and other Russian cities. There are also regular direct fl ights to cities in Japan, China, and South Korea. By sea, the main route to Sakhalin is the year-round Vanino-Kholmsk ferry connection. In summer, there are also ferries between Korsakov on Sakhalin and Wakkanai on Hokkaido (Japan).

Where to stay

Your tour of Sakhalin will begin in the regional capital, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk. This is a city of 199 000 people, with 42 comfortable hotels, and more than 350 cafés, restaurants, and bars.

Where to eat

The geographical position of Sakhalin and its rich maritime resources make the island a culinary mecca for lovers of sushi, sashimi, spicy rolls, and hundreds of other Japanese dishes. Hoe, pyanse, kimchi, haemultang, japchae, and many other Korean dishes are regular features on the menus of local cafés and restaurants.

What to buy

Fish and seafood at local fish markets—whelks, scallops, prawns, halibut, crab, octopus, squid, sea cucumber, and fresh, smoked, and cured red fish.

Photo: Kirill Voloshin

EXPERT OPINIONS

VLADISLAV SHULAEV,
Territorial Promotion Director of the AGT Communications Agency:
The Far Eastern Federal District, which is about the same size as Australia, also resembles that country in the diversity of its natural wonders. The district’s territory is home to four nature reserves on the UNESCO World Heritage list: the Volcanoes of Kamchatka, the Lena Pillars in Yakutia, the Bikin River Valley in Primorye, and Wrangel Island in the north of Chukotka.

The federal district holds a number of world records: the famous “Pole of Cold” in Yakutia; Klyuchevskaya Sopka, which is the highest active volcano in Eurasia; and the Trans-Siberian Railway, the longest railway in the world. For Europeans, the railway journey begins in Moscow, and for Asia-Pacific residents— in Vladivostok, which, by the way, was included in National Geographic’s Top 10 Oceanfront Cities worldwide.

Every region has its own traditional holidays, culinary festivals, and fabulous hunting and fishing opportunities. In the past decade, almost all of the Far East territories have acquired their own first-class ski resorts: Gorny Vozdukh [“Mountain Air”] in Sakhalin, Kholdomi in Khabarovsk Territory, Aldan in Yakutia, Gora Moroznaya [“Frost Mountain”] in Kamchatka, and Snegorka in Magadan Region. Finally, the Far East has preserved perhaps the largest areas of pristine wilderness, comprising millions of square metres of natural beauty.

In Khabarovsk Territory and Primorye, you can see colonies of birds and breeding grounds of sea animals all along the coast, and watch lotus flowers bloom. Vladivostok’s huge oceanarium, and Orto Doidu Zoo, the Bisonarium and the Living Gems of Yakutia nature reserve in the Sakha Republic. Seals, fur seals, and Stella sea lions will accompany tour boats in Avacha Bay in Kamchatka. An incredible opportunity to photograph bears from just three meters away awaits visitors as they fish for sockeye salmon at Kurilskoye Lake. All these wonders are brought together in a single grand tour itinerary entitled the Eastern Ring of Russia.

At the centre of historic Kolomna is a kremlin built in the early 16th century, one of the biggest and best defended fortresses of its era. The walls of the kremlin are up to 21m high in places, while the towers (of which seven remain) measure 31m in height. The Kolomna Kremlin covers a substantial area of 24 hectares, and it can take several hours to tour the whole site. Every part of the kremlin is fully accessible, and can be touched, photographed, and even climbed over.

Kolomna boasts a large number of small museums, including collections of samovars, gramophones, trams, and favourite toys, as well as the workshops of blacksmiths, confectioners, needle workers and other traditional crafts.

On a visit to Kolomna, it’s diffi cult to resist the temptation to try the local sweets. The town has seen the revival of the local pastille, made to original historic recipes and once again commercially produced. The pastille is a natural delicacy, with the main ingredient being whipped apple puree made from local late varieties.

A visit to one of Kolomna’s pastille museums is a unique interactive quest—you will come across merchants, violinists, heartsick students, and ladies in crinoline who will serve you tea made with herbs from the apothecary gardens.

Another culinary treat for which Kolomna is famous is the local kalach (a circular bread roll). Visit the local kalach bakery, and you can see an astonishing show that demonstrates the way the kalach’s unique asymmetrical shape is formed to give the roll a “handle”, and that illustrates the many Russian idioms that originate from the baking and eating of this true Kolomna miracle.

Getting there:
From Moscow, take a commuter train from Kazansky Railway Terminal to Kolomna.