Travel Notes

Save the Kremlin

The walls of the Smolensk kremlin became the object of an tender recently when the regional government invited businessmen to come up with ways to put them to effective use. The walls were built during the time of Boris Godunov and were a key defense point on Russia’s western frontier. Only 17 of the wall’s 38 original towers survive, and Smolensk, despite its history, has yet to become a top tourist destination.

No Stars

Russia still lacks a hotel system with recognized standards, according to the Russian Tourism Agency. Just 4 percent of Russian hotels have gone through the effort of getting a star rating. This spring, the agency rated 20 hotels across the country, and only one, in Kazan, received five stars. Two received a four-star rating, while the rest were given a mediocre three stars.

Hotels in Russia are notorious for overcharging guests for Soviet-style service and amenities. Star ratings are not required, and hotels have to pay to obtain them. To rate all of Russia’s hotels, guest houses and sanatoriums, and make it a required process, there would need to be changes in federal legislation, agency head Andrei Tyutyunnik told Rossiyskaya Gazeta.

Wall Remnants

Construction of an underground parking garage in central Moscow uncovered remains of the 16th century walls of the White City. The White City walls were built after the 1571 Mongol invasion and were located more or less along the perimeter of today’s Boulevard Ring. The walls were made of white stone and had 28 towers and gates whose names are still used (Arbat Gates, Pokrovka Gates, etc.) The walls were taken down in the late 18th century.

By the end of the year, the city may open an underground museum on Khokhlovskaya square (near Chistye Prudy) to display the remains of the medieval brickwork, RIA Novosti reported.

The Other Lenin

A new museum will soon open on board the Lenin, the world’s first nuclear powered ice-breaker. The ship has undergone seven years of renovations and will soon moor at Murmansk port.

Exhibits will be dedicated to Russia’s arctic regions and to its fleet of ice-breakers. Visitors will be able to learn about the ship’s reactors and nuclear powered turbines.

Lenin, a 134-meter civilian ice-breaker, was decommissioned in 1989 after 30 years service in northern seas, where it significantly widened the open-water season for Russian ships. The Lenin will also have a hotel and a conference hall, Interfax reported.

Staycations

The stalling world economy will likely impact Russian tourism. According to Intourist Holding, 22 percent fewer Russians are expected to travel abroad in 2009 versus 2008 – a fall from 8.4 to 6.5 million. Given the weakened ruble and the unstable job market, Russians are likely to prefer staying put and making their vacations more frugal. Already this year, New Year’s travel to massively popular Spain and Turkey was down 33 percent.

Senkevich Feted

A museum commemorating the USSR’s favorite traveler opened in Moscow this spring. Yury Senkevich was a scientist and explorer who hosted the popular TV program Club Puteshestvennikov (Travelers’ Club), begun in the early 1970s.

Millions of people tuned in every week to live vicariously through Senkevich, who told Russians of exotic places and travelled the world along with notable personages. He hosted the program for 30 years, garnering every possible award and even securing for it a place in the Guinness Book of World Records as the oldest program on Russian television. Club Puteshestvennikov went off the air in 2003, upon Senkevich’s death.

The Yury Senkevich Museum is essentially his study, filled with many of the souvenirs he brought back from all over the world. Senkevich’s family hopes to turn it into a gathering place for public lectures, for anyone who is an adventurer at heart.

Fabergé Fabergé

Russian businessman Alexander Ivanov has opened a museum devoted to Fabergé art in the German city of Baden-Baden, Bloomberg reported. The German spa town of 55,000 welcomes some 800,000 visitors a year, many of whom Ivanov hopes will visit the new museum, constructed at a cost of $22 million. It was in Baden-Baden that Dostoyevsky famously lost everything at the gambling table. Today the town welcomes 35,000 Russians per year. Ivanov estimated that his entire 3,000 piece Fabergé collection, which will comprise the majority of the museum’s exhibit, is worth $1.5 billion.