Sochi – St. Petersburg – Moscow
13 day /12 night
1 day: Arriving to Sochi and transfer to the Hotel
2 day: Excursion: “Olympic Park” Ah-Tsu goge, Adventure Park – 6 hours
Drive along the picturesque seaside highway External inspection of the Olympic Park and the surrounding area (Fisht stadium, Bolshoi, Iceberg, Shayba ice palaces, Adler Arena skating center, Ice Cube curling center, Main Media Center) and the only racetrack in Russia Russian Grand Prix Formula 1. An obligatory photo stop for a memorable photo against the backdrop of the Olympic torch and ice palaces.
Drive along a beautiful mountain highway Photo stop in the Ah-Tsu gorge, the mountains of which separate the Black Sea coast from the Western Caucasus;
A visit to Russia’s only adventure park at the height of AJ Hackett Skypark Sochi and a walk along the world’s longest suspended pedestrian bridge, Skybridge (height 207m, length 439m) For the most daring - park attractions (Bungy-69 and Bungy-207 bungee jumping from a bridge, SochiSwing swing, zipline and zipline flights) for an additional fee (optional)
3 day: Krasnaya Polyana - 6 hours
Just 50 kilometers from the shore of the warm sea, in the necklace of the Caucasus Mountains, in the valley of the beautiful Mzymta River, lies the famous village of Krasnaya Polyana, where an amazingly beautiful highway with dizzying canyons and gorges leads:
A trip along the new highway - a unique structure of extraordinary beauty (The cable way is extra)
External inspection of the Olympic facilities - a ski jump complex, ski resorts, bobsleigh and luge track.
A ride on a gondola cable car in one of the ultra-modern mountain resorts of Krasnaya Polyana
Delicious lunch in a café (to pay direct)
During the excursion it is also possible: (to choose in advance and pay direct)
• Walks of various durations on the cable cars of mountain resorts of your choice - Gazprom, Rosa Khutor, Gorki Gorod
• Tasting of products from the “Gifts of Krasnaya Polyana” series - balms, tinctures, healing herbal infusions that have received awards at international exhibitions.
• Visit to the enclosure complex of the Caucasian Biosphere Reserve
• Visit to the water park (OCC "Galaktika" or "Mountain Beach")
• Visit to the cosmonautics museum, interactive zones, ice skating rink, etc. in OKC "Galaktika")
• Activities in rope parks (Panda Park, Gorki Gorod, Aviary complex)
• Visit to the cultural and ethnographic center “My Russia”
• Hiking, horseback riding, cycling along mountain trails, karting in the mountains.
• Playing airsoft and other activities
4 day: Transfer from hotel to airport for flight to St. Petersburg.
Flight Sochi – S. Petersburg 4 hours
Arriving transfer St. Petersburg airport to hotel.
Evening visit ballet theatre on own (to book in advance)
5 day: St. Petersburg City tour 4 hours
You will see a unique architectural phenomenon called the Historic Center of St. Petersburg, which was entirely included in the list of World Heritage Sites. This was one of the first cases in UNESCO's practice when the status of monument was granted to a huge landscape, where hundreds of thousands of people live. You will see the monumental St. Isaac's Cathedral, the Admiralty, the Neva River with its granite-clad banks, the Sphinxes brought from Egypt on the University Embankment and aristocratic palaces facing the Neva, the Spit of Vasilyevsky Island with the Rostral Columns, the Winter Palace and the Palace Square, the Summer Garden and the Field of Mars, the Mikhailovsky Castle, the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood, picturesque palaces of Nevsky Prospekt, Kazan and Smolny Cathedrals.
Visit to the Peter and Paul Fortress, the original citadel and historical core of the city from which it grew. Between the first half of the 1700s and early 1920s it served as a prison for political criminals and is often nicknamed – the “Russian Bastille”. We will visit the Peter and Paul Cathedral, which has a 122.5 m bell-tower and a gilded angel-topped cupola. The cathedral used to be the main cathedral of the Russian Empire for a long time, where all the tsars and tsaritesses of the Romanov dynasty were buried.
Lunch on own (1 hour)
In the afternoon:
Visit to the Hermitage Museum. (2 hours) The State Hermitage Museum is a world-known museum of art and culture. Its collections, only a small part of which is on permanent display, comprise over three million items. The exhibition halls feature works of Italian Renaissance artists, including Giorgione, Titian, Veronese, and Leonardo da Vinci; Italian and Spanish fine art including Tintoretto, Velázquez and Murillo; Dutch Golden Age and Flemish Baroque painting, including the large collections of Van Dyck, Rubens and Rembrandt, and many other paintings and sculptures. The collections occupy a large complex of six historic buildings along Palace Embankment, including the Winter Palace, a former residence of Russian emperors.
00.15 Night trip Boat Trip on River Neva (without guide) (the bridges opens and you can go under them) “must have” excursion in St. Petersburg in the summer at night. A comfortable boat with panoramic windows and open space with restaurant and live music will pass under a variety of bridges across Neva River. Even familiar views look in a different way when viewed from the water. Peter the Great ordered buildings in St. Petersburg to be built facing the rivers. Thanks to this we still can enjoy the most elegant facades of St. Petersburg’s palaces and mansions by a boat trip. (the restaurant offer menu a la carte to order separately and pay localy
6 day: 09:00 – 14:00 Visit to Peterhof - a summer residence of the Russian Tsars.
This incredibly beautiful palace and park ensemble is often called "Russian Versailles". We will visit the richly decorated Grand Palace of Peterhof and the unique in its technical solutions Lower Park with fountains, which was arranged on a landscape ideally created by nature for round-the-clock water flow. This made it possible to create about 150 permanently operating large and small fountains on the territory of more than 100 hectares. A distinctive feature of the Peterhof palace and park ensemble is its proximity to the sea.
14:00 – 15:00 Time for lunch and transfer back to hotel
7 day:
Visit to the famous imperial residence Tsarskoe Selo, created by architect Rastrelli in the Russian Baroque style, which is characterized by majestic ensembles and huge size of buildings, powerful proportions, abundance of color and gilding. We will visit the Catherine Palace, created by Peter the Great for his wife, but it received its present form during the reign of Catherine the Great. Fascinated by antique art, the Empress wished to decorate her apartments in accordance with fashionable tastes and entrusted their decoration to the Scottish architect Charles Cameron, a connoisseur of antique architecture. The interiors he created were characterized by exquisite beauty. The most famous is the Amber Room, the jewel of the Catherine Palace, justifiably called one of the wonders of the world.
Duration of the tour including transfers: 5 - 6 hours
The transfer is to the museum Faberge
In the afternoon
Visit to the Fabergé Museum in Saint Petersburg. The museum's collection contains more than 4,000 works of decorative applied and fine arts, including gold and silver items, paintings, porcelain and bronze. A highlight of the museum's collection is the group of nine Imperial Easter eggs created by Fabergé for the last two Russian Tsars.
Duration of the tour including transfers: 2 hours
8 day: Transfer from hotel to train station in St. Petersburg
S. Petersburg – Moscow by high speed train (4 hours)
Transfer from Moscow train station to hotel
9 day: 09.00 – 18.00
09:00 City tour of Moscow
You will drive along the famous embankments and streets of the historic city: Boulevard Ring and Garden Ring, Kutuzovsky Avenue; you will see the Bolshoi Theater, the Moscow Manege, Stalin's High-rise buildings, the Triumphal Arch, Sparrow Hills, the building of Moscow State University, the Luzhniki Olympic Stadium, the Novodevichy Convent, the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour, modern skyscrapers of Moscow City and many others.
13:00 – 14:00 Time for lunch on own
1 Visit to VDNKh (All-Russian Exhibition Center) and the Memorial Museum of Cosmonautics, a museum dedicated to space exploration. The museum contains a wide variety of Soviet and Russian space-related exhibits and models which explore the history of flight; astronomy; space exploration; space technology; and space in the arts. The museum's collection holds approximately 85,000 different items.
Duration 9 hours
10 day: 09.00 – 18.00
09:00 Visit to Red Square and Alexander Gardens. Red Square is one of the oldest and largest squares in Moscow. Owing to its historical significance and the adjacent historical buildings, it is regarded as one of the most notable and important squares in Europe and the world. In addition, it has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1990. It is located in Moscow's historic center, in the eastern walls of the Kremlin. You will see famous buildings such as Saint Basil's Cathedral, Lenin's Mausoleum and the GUM (State Department Store).
Alexander Gardens stretch along all the length of the western Kremlin wall for 865 metres between the building of the Moscow Manege and the Kremlin. The gardens were originally called the Kremlin Gardens, but after the coronation of Alexander II in 1856, the gardens were renamed the Alexander Gardens. Towards the main entrance to the park is the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier with an eternal flame. It contains the body of a soldier who fell during the Great Patriotic War at the nearest point the forces of Nazi Germany penetrated towards Moscow. Post Number One, where the honor sentinels stand on guard, used to be located in front of Lenin's Mausoleum, but was moved to the Tomb of The Unknown Soldier in the 1990s.
13:00 – 14:00 Time for lunch on own
Visit to the Moscow Kremlin: you will see the unique architectural ensemble of the Moscow Kremlin. Cathedral Square is the heart of the Kremlin. It is surrounded by six buildings, including three cathedrals (During your tour you will be able to visit two cathedrals: one with guided tour and another on your own). The Cathedral of the Dormition was the main church of Moscow, where all the Tsars were crowned. The gilded, nine-domed Cathedral of the Annunciation was originally the personal chapel for the tsars, and its abbot remained a personal confessor of the Russian royal family until the early 20th century. Between the Great Kremlin Palace (only outside view) and the Ivan the Great Bell Tower there is the Cathedral of the Archangel Michael, where almost all the Muscovite monarchs from Ivan Kalita to Ivan V of Russia were buried. The other notable structure is the Ivan the Great Bell Tower (only outside view), which is said to mark the exact center of Moscow and resemble a burning candle. Completed in 1600, it is 81 meters high. The Tsar Cannon is a monument of Russian artillery casting art, cast in bronze in 1586 in Moscow. Mostly of symbolic impact, it was never used in a war. Between the Ivan the Great Bell Tower and the Kremlin Wall there is the Tsar Bell, the largest bell in the world, weighing 201,924 kg.
11 day: from 09.00 til 18.00
Visit to the Trinity Lavra of St. Sergius, a lavra (an especially venerated monastery) and the most important Russian monastery, being the spiritual center of the Russian Orthodox Church for many centuries. The monastery is situated in the town of Sergiyev Posad, about 70 kilometres from Moscow. It’s the largest center of educational and publishing activities of the Russian Orthodox Church and the seat of the Moscow Theological Academy. According to the Statute of the Russian Orthodox Church, the archimandrite of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra is the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia. In terms of importance, the Trinity-Sergius Lavra can be compared to the Vatican.
At the beginning of the 20th century, Sergiev Posad was called "the toy capital of Russia". There were more than 30 artels producing toys made of wood in the city. For an additional fee you can visit the Matryoshka doll workshop in Sergiev Posad, which continues and multiplies the traditions of the old masters. (to order in advance)
Duration of the tour including Matryoshka doll workshop: 9 hours (Lunch is available for an additional surcharge).
12 day: 09.00 – 15.00
visit the factory of carved artistic products in Khot’kovo, about 60 km from Moscow, one of the oldest and leading Russian enterprises for the production of jewelry and artistic and decorative items made of mammoth tusk. The factory staff will be glad to tell you about the work of the factory, about its masters, about the peculiarities of making carved bone products. The excursion through the exhibition halls and production facilities of the factory covers the issues of material, mammoth fauna and its extraction, history of Khotkovo craft and technology of bone carving. If you wish, you can additionally order a master class on bone carving, which allows you to get an idea of some tools and carve a small souvenir by yourself.
Duration of the tour including transfers: 6 hours
13 day: Departure transfer to Moscow airport
The sequence of excursions can be changed due the technical reasons