Russia Travel

Pronounced Vih-bork, this Gulf of Finland port and rail junction, 174km northwest of St Petersburg and just 30km from the Finnish border, is an appealing provincial town dominated by a medieval castle and peppered with decaying Finnish Art Nouveau buildings and romantic cobblestone streets.

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Upon reaching the industrial shores of Vo- ronezh, your first reaction may be to swallow in dread. Black, belching smokestacks line the riverbank, and in addition to the smog, an opaque gritty pessimism hangs over the town. Indeed, Voronezh is a city scraping and clawing its way out of the Soviet era, with few immediate signs of success. Construction is rampant in this large city, giving rise to everything from gleaming new churches to cookie-cutter apartment buildings - but all the scaffolding cannot conceal the poverty that afflicts most citizens here.

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Due to its prominence up until the 17th century, the Vologda region has a rich history and plenty of lovely old churches. Its capital, Vologda, is especially worth the trip from Moscow or Yaroslavl, but also in this region are the World Heritage-listed frescoes of Ferapontovo and the official home town of Father Frost, Russia’s equivalent of Father Christmas.

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About 450km northeast of Moscow, Vologda is a pleasant provincial city with a high concentration of churches and monasteries, many lovely parks and wide avenues, and a low-rise city centre with a good number of 18th- and 19th-century wooden houses. The tranquillity in summer is disturbed only by Vologda’s large, but fortunately slow and clumsy, mosquitoes.

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Volgograd was founded in 1589 as Tsaritsyn, a mighty fortress at the convergence of the Volga and Don rivers. Nothing is left of ancient Tsaritsyn, however, due to events in more recent history.

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The Volga region (Povolzhye - literally ‘Along the Volga River’) is the heartland of Russia. ‘Mother Volga’, the majestic river that dominates the region, is one of the nation’s most enduring and endearing symbols. The cultural legacies of Russian merchants, Tatar tribes and German colonists are displayed in the ancient kremlins, spire-topped mosques and Lutheran churches along the river banks. The Volga was the site of WWII’s fiercest battle, now marked by a jaw-dropping monument.

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It has the rep, everyone around the Far East seems to look up to it, and Vladivostok is indeed pretty good to look at for a couple days. Some streets are a bit drab, but the setting is remarkable: a series of peaks and peninsulas curl around Golden Horn Bay (bukhta Zolotoy Rog; named after Istanbul’s similar-looking harbour), which is home to huge icebreakers and the Russian Pacific Fleet.

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High up on Vladimir’s slope above the Klyazma River sits the solemnly majestic Assumption Cathedral, built to announce Vladimir’s claim as capital of Rus. These days, Vladimir - 178km east of Moscow - feels more like a modern, provincial town than an ancient capital. Nonetheless, the grandeur of medieval Vladimir shines through the commotion of this busy, industrial town. Exquisite examples of Russia’s most formative architecture, along with some entertaining museums, make Vladimir one of the jewels in the Golden Ring.

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The fate of this provincial town 350km east of Vologda changed forever in 1998, when (for obscure reasons) Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov declared Veliky Ustyug to be the official home of Ded Moroz, gave the town a large sum of money, and said ‘Make it so’. Ded Moroz translates as Father Frost, and he’s the Russian equivalent of Santa Claus.

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The Valaam Archipelago, consisting of Valaam Island and about 50 smaller islands, sits in northern Lake Ladoga. The main attractions here are the 14th-century Valaam Transfiguration Monastery(Valaamsky Spaso-Preobrazhensky monastyr; 38182, 38233; www.valaam.ru) and the beautiful tree-covered island on which it stands, with its many bays and headlands. The island can be reached by boat or hydrofoil, mid-May to mid-October.

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