Safe as Hotels

Where we asked our departing Managing Editor Robert Greenall, who has logged many a night in hotels across the breadth and depth of Russia, to sum up the Russian hotel scene. And to pull no punches...

Though the accommodation options for visitors to Russia have broadened considerably over recent years, many still have to rely on one particular public institution that often inspires more dread and loathing than expectations of comfort and safety. The hotel in Russia seems to have retained its stigma of cockroach-ridden fleapit, while acquiring additional charms, like in-house prostitutes, Caucasian mafia sleazeballs and extortionate prices, specially for foreigners.

Even the new, top-of-the-range Western-style hotels in Moscow and St. Petersburg seem to have started attracting their own type of ‘upmarket’ criminal. The Radisson Slavyanskaya in Moscow, hailed just a few years ago as a shining example of Russo-American cooperation and friendship, is now believed to have a higher percentage of gun-carrying people in its lobby areas than any other place in town. St. Petersburg’s Nevsky Palace coffee bar, meanwhile, became the scene of a shoot-out last year, where a British businessman was killed by stray bullets.

If these sobering facts should unnerve the gentle reader, it should be pointed out that, as with other areas of life in Russia, 99.9% of those visiting Russia on a short-term basis will not have any contact with organized crime. The mafia has better things to do than chase tourists.

What to expect

The accommodation industry in Russia has been slow to react to the transition to a market economy. Many cities are still encumbered with Soviet-era behemoths, which take advantage of the fact that private initiative, in the form of smaller, cleaner more stylish hotels, is virtually zero.

Only Moscow, St. Petersburg and a handful of provincial cities (Yaroslavl, Novgorod and Petrozavodsk are notable examples in central Russia) have broken out of this straitjacket and offer some variety in places to stay. The capitals, in particular, have a range of four- and five-star hotels whose quality matches that of similar hotels worldwide, though they are thinner on the ground and more expensive than in most other European cities.

If you have an expense account, or are prepared to pay $200-300 a night, these hotels will look after most of your needs, with business and support services, easy access to money changing, and top notch restaurants and bars. The down side is that these hotels in particular tend to attract undesirables like conniving taxi drivers and prostitutes.

There is little to choose between them. In Moscow, the Baltschug Kempinski has the reputation of being the most safe (and one of the best quality) and the Radisson Slavyanskaya the least safe (though the vast majority of its residents, who include President Clinton, have had no problems). Others highly-rated are the Aerostar, the Penta Renaissance and the small, friendly Savoy. In St. Petersburg, the Grand Hotel Europe, Nevsky Palace and Astoria vie for the top end of the market. International standard hotels in other cities include Novgorod’s Beresta Palace and Sochi’s Radisson Lazurnaya.

Mid-range and cheap private hotels are still few and far between, though they are often a godsend when they can be found, and again differ little from such hotels in the West. Unfortunately, their financial positions are not always stable, as with two St. Petersburg floating hotels which have had to weigh anchor in the last two years. Examples of more stable hotels are, in the mid-range, St. Petersburg’s Hotelship Peterhof and, at the lower end, Moscow’s one and St. Petersburg’s three youth hostels.

Most visitors to Russia planning to stay in hotels, however, will have to face facts — they will almost certainly have to use those 1960s and 1970s monstrosities or faded, creaking wrecks from various earlier eras, and, considering the service you get, stomach often outrageous prices ($50-150, depending on city and quality of hotel). Local authorities or tourist organizations frequently set tariffs, and keep them artificially high. Foreigners may therefore find themselves having to pay as much as three times what Russians pay for rooms. Though this practice was declared illegal after a court case brought by an American in Yekaterinburg this autumn, it will probably continue for some time.

This Soviet-style hotel remains by far the most common in Russia. Yet, within this broad ‘class’ of hotel, you can find anything from a (relatively) good quality Intourist hotel to a run-down municipal dive improved by a recent renovation. Admittedly, administrators try to do their best for foreigners (perhaps they see this as justifying price rules), providing them with rooms with decent plumbing, locks, televisions, radios, lamps etc. that work (in some rooms, absolutely nothing works). But the fact is that these places are generally bland, dim, cavernous, and the items described above work only grudgingly. Services like restaurants, bars and buffets are still often back in the dark ages.

Stiff competition in Moscow and St. Petersburg means that many hotels are trying to lift themselves out of this dim category. In Moscow, the notorious Intourist is to undergo a major overhaul, while the Cosmos, equally attractive to various kinds of criminals, nevertheless is of a sufficiently high standard to make tour groups feel reasonably comfortable. Individual travelers, meanwhile, might feel happier with smaller, more intimate hotels like the Budapest. St. Petersburg has a number of hotels, like the Pribaltiiskaya and Pulkovskaya, which cater to mid-range tourists.

Recent improvements aside, though, hotel accommodation is not the best option in Russia. The nation’s hospitality, after all, is not expressed best through its institutions, but through individual people. Therefore, when you’re visiting Russia, consider the growing range of bed & breakfast and homestay options — you can be sure of a better welcome.

— Robert Greenall

Hotel Tips

— When booking, always get a confirmation or reservation number, otherwise you might find yourself without a room.

— When checking in, you are often asked to pay in advance, but you may still have to leave your passport for registration. Collect it again in a matter of hours.

— Always leave valuables in the hotel safe or keep them on your person, not in your room. Give keys to the floor lady (older, traditional hotels usually have these) or to reception downstairs when you go out.

— Always keep your door locked. Be careful who you open your door to, and always ask who is there (kto tam?).

— Avoid prostitutes in hotels, whether they come knocking on your door or are sitting in the bar or restaurant downstairs. Some have been known to drug and rob foreigners.