Tourism in Russia

Tourism in Russia has been growing rapidly in the years following the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991. Most of the tourism is centered on the cities of Moscow and St. Petersburg, since these cities are the sites of some of the most famous attractions of Russia.

Tourists are attracted by a very rich cultural heritage and rather tumultuous history of Russia, and this is reflected in the popularity of Russia’s most famous attractions. Popular tourist destinations in the major cities include the following:

§ The Tretyakov Gallery (Moscow)

§ The Bolshoi Theatre (Moscow)

§ The Red Square (Moscow)

§ The Kremlin (Moscow)

§ St. Issac's Cathedral (St. Petersburg)

§ The canals and waterways of St. Petersburg, located on the river Neva. St. Petersburg is sometimes known as the «Venice of the North» and is famed for its «white nights» during the summer

§ The Summer Palace of Peter the Great (outskirts of St. Petersburg)

§ The Russian Museum, the largest repository of Russian fine art in St. Petersburg.

The Russian countryside tends to be quite rural and undeveloped. Vast stretches of tundra, taiga, woodlands, and steppe stretch across vast expanses of the Eurasian continent — Russia is a country that spans 11 time zones.

In the countryside, there are many little towns with old castles. Some notable cities and towns, which have their own own rich cultures and traditions, include Kalinigrad (formerly Königsberg) on the Baltic Sea coast, Novgorod (a famed midieval town), Tver, Nizhni Novgorod, Ekaterinburg, Rostov and Kazan.

Tourists are also drawn to the cruises on the big rivers like Volga, Lena or Yenisei as well as journeys on the famous Trans-Siberian railway, the third-longest continuous service that stretches from Moscow to its eastern terminal of Vladivostok at the coastline of the Pacific Ocean. Other destinations include the Golden Ring region towns of Yaroslavl, Vladimir, Rostov, Suzdal.

Russia, as a whole, may be the coldest country in the world, parts of the country have temperate climates, and most of the country has temperate weather during the summer. The coasts of the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea occur near the temperate mediterranean climate zone due to its adjacency to the Mediterranean Sea. A popular vacationing destination is the city of Sochi, known for its beaches.

The Crimea is also a favourite vacation resort; even though this autonomous region is in the Ukraine, many people associate it with Russia because of its long historical connection to Russia. Yalta is the best known vacation center, though Sevastopol is also well known.

Russian cuisine is rich and varied, due to the vast and multicultural expanse of the country. It draws its foundations from peasant food of the rural populations and tends to be dominated by cabbage, sour cream, root vegetables, and seasonal produce, fish, and meats.

Some of the more distinctive Russian dishes include borscht, pirozhki, shashlyk, and pelmeni. Russia is also famous for its caviar, though severe overfishing has threatened the fisheries (primarily sturgeon) that provide the source of this delicacy. Despite these attractions, travelling in Russia presents many logistical challenges for foreigners, particularly those coming from Western countries. First and foremost challenge that greets new visitors to Russia is the language barrier.

The Russian language uses the Cyrillic alphabet, so reading and interpreting signs often present a challenge, since these signs frequently do not have the transliteration equivalent written in the Latin alphabet familiar to most Westerners. Furthermore, English is not spoken or understood except in the major cities, and even then, most people know perhaps just a few words if at all (though this is slowly changing).

So, the way people live in the modern society requires new standards of communication and that is why it is an essential demand of the contemporary society to be able to speak foreign languages (including Russian for foreigners), because it is the direct access to the world cultural treasures, ability to understand and accept other nations’ values while you are travelling.