Regarding accomodation I plan to take it cool. Normally things start to clear up a couple of months before the tourney starts. I´d book hotels in St Petersburg and Moscow now if being able to do that at decent prices.Everything else will follow I assume.
I don't know about "obsession", but booking.com has been my 'go to' site for years now. I spend about 3 months out of each year on international travel, often to smaller places in Asia, and I've used them more times than I can count and never had an issue. I do always check their rates against the direct rates and they're usually lower or at worst the same. It puts all of the lodging options in one sortable list, has good filters, offers free cancellation (they do sometimes offer lower non-refundable rates), guest ratings, photos (provided by the hotel so can be misleading). Also, the map is really good, where you can mouse over and get the hotel name, rate and rating. It's just super convenient and in my recent experience gives as good a rate as you'll get. Of course, once you've chosen the hotel cross check with the hotel's site to see if you can get a better deal, but in my experience the best you'll do is the same deal. Careful though because booking.com's rate includes the taxes and services charges which sometimes can be close to 30% extra per night. The direct sites always add it at the end when suddenly the price jumps way up. So I'm not obsessed with it, it's just a good tool, especially when you're going to smaller towns and cities.
Does anyone know if the area by the university is safe to get a hotel/apartment? Or where can we get this info? I believe fanfest will be set up at the university.
How much is everyone paying for accomodation? I am yet to book and have a budget of around 10500 Rubels per room per night.
Wow nice Personally trying to save some costs where I can so I can spend more in Russia and because I'm travelling for two weeks around the Baltics too. Therefore staying in three hostels and two guesthouses. I'm expecting to pay for one more place later in Russia for whatever reason at a way higher rate (eg. change in plan or a cancelled reservation). Paid already: 7 nights in Kaliningrad (#26, #36, #45) for 11,550 RUB (167 EUR) 4 nights in St. Petersburg (#61) for 10,416 RUB (151 EUR) Booked (placeholders): *2 nights in Kaliningrad (#8) for 1,800 RUB (26 EUR) **4 nights in Moscow (#15, #19) for 2,680 RUB (39 EUR) ***5 nights in Moscow (#51, #56) for 7,600 RUB (110 EUR) - Those are total costs and the booked ones are all cancellable. - *depends if group stage draw is good for match #8 (otherwise I plan to spend a few days in Berlin to watch Germany in the fanmeile if the dates work out). - ** I will stay in unless I organise something with my friends (eg. hotel or airbnb) for matches #15 & #19. - *** I will cancel unless I get a major case of World Cup Fever (likely) and decide to hunt for R16 tickets instead of travelling for ten days through the Baltics en route to St. Petersburg for match #61. - I don't have a ticket to match #15 yet but will try very hard in the remaining phases. - I've bought my flight home but buying flights to Russia and one internal flight hopefully on Friday night after the group stage draw
Just booked 5 nights in Moscow for the final via they Fifa site. 1400 euros which whilst not really cheap is very reasonable for a 4 star in any european city centre. They had other cheaper options as well.
Not sure why you quoted my old post, but that was my plan before the US's catastrophic collapse in October. Once that happened, I completely changed my strategy and went all out in the FCFS phase and got tickets to all 7 of my targeted matches without regard to the draw. I still have that hotel for the first 3 nights in Moscow but they are booked for the following 2 nights that I need. I hope something opens up, or I find another hotel with those 5 nights open. Right now the hotel selection is really limited in Moscow.
I just got the following email from my hostel in Moscow (not the dodgiest of the bunch - score of 8.7 with 1,200 review in Booking): Anybody can comment on this? I'm pretty sure they just want to offer my cheap booking to somebody else at higher prices (but just this fact makes me want to go to a different hotel). However, I've also found other references to this "toughened" registration rules -> https://intermarkrelocation.ru/about/news/russia-toughens-registration-rules-/
I don't think they are trying to be dodgy or anything nor kick you out. As they say it is required by law (and been discussed here a few times) but I've only ever heard so far of hotels and hostels registering their guests. Maybe they are lazy or it is just part of the low cost model they operate in? I know atleast one of the hostels I'm staying in register guests but it's good to know you can do it yourself if needed.
Thanks for confirming this is a known procedure. It surprised me as it's the first time I heard about it and I thought the government wanted to keep it easy for fans traveling to Russia during the world cup, rather than dealing with "Migration office employees do not speak English and are very strict." (although perhaps the intention of the government was to put the responsibility with the hotels and not the gusts, as you said). I just didn't like the tone of the email, and the fact that as soon as they sent this email they also sent a cancellation request from Booking.
Lazy low cost hostel or trying to force you to cancel booking. I'm not an expert, but software price to automate this registration is about 220 USD per year https://federalhotelservice.ru/cont/stoimost-cns-57/ Plus 30 cents per guest operation.
Thanks, I just booked another one a bit more expensive (with free cancellation so I can keep an eye for others) but I think it's worth it if I don't have to deal with the migration office myself. By the way, my girlfriend will join me at some point but doesn't plan to watch any matches. Is it worth buying a low demand group phase ticket just to get her a fan ID? The problem is that she will arrive just before semi-finals, so obviously after all group matches have been completed. Or perhaps it's better to go through normal vista steps (she is French).
Maybe you can change one of your tickets to her name later to get her an ID. Let's move to FAN ID Topic with this question: https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/russia-2018-fanid-thread.2078430/
I’ve also used booking.com quite a bit, and enjoy their flexible free cancellation policy. However, lately, the last few years I have been noticing cheaper rates through TripAdvisor, who also posts booking.com rates along with others. So you get to choose which rate you want. The gripe I have with booking.com is I have tried more than once to give them my business, and let them price match, which they guarantee. They have never ended up matching, so I end up canceling them and booking via TripAdvisor.
certainly checking around and price comparisons makes sense. I too use Trip Advisor as they tend to have more guest ratings that tend to be more honest sometimes too. I usually read the 1 and 2 star ratings to see what the main complaints are. Booking.com is just my place to start as I am familiar with and like their interface. Once I have narrowed the choice down, then go and double check other places.
What's the deal with hotels at the smaller venues? I've searched for hotels in Rostov and Samara, but there is literally nothing available. I find it very hard to believe that either they are all sold out, or that every single hotel is holding back space for a later date.
Same here, mate. I’m trying to book a hotel in Saransk, but it seems to be 100% occupied already. Probably the hotels are holding the rooms... =\
I tried to individually go into hotels in Ekaterinburg and it shows group stage "booked" but the rest of the days completely available. I am thinking a lot of the hotels are holding on to rooms for some purpose. Can anyone tell me if this is true?
Check the fifa official hotels against the hotels you’ve looked at. They probably have them only available thru fifa official
Still seems mad after so many tickets sold and the draw been made that FIFA list 302 hotels but only about 70-80 actually available. Why do hotels join up for this and not just sell through the normal channels?
same story everywhere. I am almost sure they are holding back the rooms. Maybe they were waiting for the draw and now are doing some analysis on how high they can jack the rates based on what teams are playing around certain dates. I have booked a few backup places on booking.com and hotels.com but they are overpriced and not that nice for what they're asking. They have a good cancellation policy though, so hopefully some inventory will be released at some point soon.