The Arktika Train: Moscow to Murmansk

Today I want to present you the Artika train (Artic train), that takes you from Moscow to Murmansk, above the Artic Circle, and/or back. Murmansk is by far the largest city north of the Arctic Circle (with a population of around 300.000 people) and is a major port on the Arctic Ocean. It is located in the extreme northwest part of Russia, on the Kola Bay, an inlet of the Barents Sea on the northern shore of the Kola Peninsula, close to Russia's borders with Norway.

August 23, 2017 0

Sixty: the highest restaurant in Europe

Sixty operates both as a restaurant and as a cafè. That is one of the greatest features of the place and a truly fantastic opportunity not to miss if you want to enjoy one of Moscow's most spectacular views on a budget! You can actually go to this establishment pretty much at any time during opening hours and, provided it is not already full, you can then just enjoy a cup of coffee (or tea, if you are feeling very Russian or very British) and no one will even raise an eyebrow because you are not raking up a substancial bill.

August 22, 2017 0

De-icing at Domodedovo

When temperatures plummet below zero Celsius (32 Fahrenheit) a very time consuming (but absolutely critical) operation that planes have to go through before departure is that of de-icing.

August 19, 2017 0

Crime and Punishment in the Moscow Metro

The Dostoyevskaya station on Moscow Metro line 10 has a very interesting story. The construction of the station started in the 1990s though soon it was halted due to insufficient funding. Building resumed only in 2007 when money flow resumed and right and left rail tunnels were built, but then in April 2009 the lack of funds forced the Moscow Metro authorities to delay the station's opening to May 2010 and then again to June 2010.

August 13, 2017 1

Shopping “to dive for” in Moscow

The Aviapark is the largest shopping mall in the whole of Europe and it is located, of course, in Moscow. The numbers are mind-boggling: 329 store (three-hundred and twenty nine!) under the same roof, with a huge supermarket and pretty much everything you might ever look for.

August 11, 2017 2

Sad news, a sad realization, and an important lesson

Unfortunately, as you can see from the picture above (picture from Russian Wikipedia, slightly edited), late on Monday, August 7, 2017, the building collapsed. After the first signs of the beginning of the collapse, the local police fenced the perimeter and therefore there has been no injury as a result of the collapse. At 23:45 the roof of the lower section and the southern wall of the semicircular section both collapsed.

August 10, 2017 0

The very Gehrysh Planeta KVN in Moscow

The former “Havana” Movie Theatre, now transformed in the Planeta VKN Youth Center. The three big letters you see on the front of the building are actually not "KBH" as one instinctively reads them in English (or Latin alphabet), but they are the Cyrillic letters KVN. They stand for Klub Vesyólykh i Nakhódchivykh or Ka-Ve-En, which translates into “Club of the Funny and Inventive”.

August 8, 2017 0

Where to eat the best pizza in Moscow

I really do believe that Eataly Moscow has become the best place where to enjoy an authentic Italian pizza in the Russian's capital. The pizza Margherita (the most classic one) costs just shy of 500 Rubles, which at the time of writing, thanks to a favourable exchange rate for foreigners, makes it even a bit less expensive (around 7,5 Euros, 8 USDs or thereabout) than the same Pizza in Eataly Torino!

August 6, 2017 0

Admiring the Coronation Egg at the Fabergé Museum

The Coronation Egg at the Fabergé Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia. This, perhaps Faberge’s most iconic egg, was presented by Emperor Nicholas II (the last Emperor of Russia) to his wife, Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, as a memento of her entry into Moscow on May 26th, day of their Coronation in the Uspensky Cathedral.

August 3, 2017 0

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