Kamchatka is a totally different animal. You need buckets of cash for that. Vladivostok is beautiful kind of like a Sam Francisco feel. Although the architecture is standard Soviet conference gray. It used to be a closed city so locals even now are excited to see foreigners. This is the best city on your list. Khabarovsk is surprisingly pleasant and vibrant. It has a nice river front and nightlife. Dunno the status of the Yakutsk railway but that is rough country. During the summer it's basically swampland. The city itself is worth a visit if you'd find Sakha culture interesting. It's a weird sight as most of the town is on stilts. Check on summer though as this is pure wilderness and the sub Arctic mosquitos are no joke. They can kill an unclothed human in 8 minutes. Look up the Lena pillars and see if that interests you. Baykal is one of the most amazing places on earth. I'm sure you'll find whatever you need there. Irkutsk is pleasant but small and very geared to tourism. It's more a place to rest and jump off to Baykal. Tomsk and Tobolsk are pleasant enough small stopover towns. Novosibirsk is a booming megalopolis compared to just about everything east of the urals. Perm and Yekaterinburg are good if you're w history buff. Perm has a gulag and Yekaterinburg is where the czar was shot. Now I know you said you wanted cities close to the rail line. But I'm interjecting my own bias here. You should really consider looking into the Altai and Tuva. These are absolutely stunning places that easily rival the Himalayas for beauty and drama. But they have basically zero tourism. For good or ill. You can watch people hunt for dinner with eagles and eat it with them. The Tuvans are like a wild Buddhist outpost of throat singers. This is really off the tourist track though. Go with a reputable tour company. The Tuvans are known to get drunk and stab people at night. Plus there no public transport or good roads
I would rank Baykal Vladivostok and Tobolsk as the only must sees on the rail line. It's your trip but I'd think long and hard about the Altai, Tuva and Sakha Also if you aren't going to take tours you need to learn to read Russian and some basic phrases. English is not common and outside major tourist routes is non existent. It's the equivalent of dropping into Iowa without a word of English
awesome man! I will refrain from further thread jacks, Ill PM if any further questions. I had a feeling Vlad would be sweet from what I read up on it. Khabarovsk looked pretty too, so good stuff, might be able to afford 3-4 days in each. I think of St Pete and Moscow, which ive already been, Kazan, Lake Baikal, and Vlad are the ones im looking forward to next. I get the logistics and reasons behind not doing stadiums in Novosibirsk, Khabarovsk, and Vladivostok, but man that would have been pretty sweet for purely "world" reasons, and really getting Asian in on the fun too.
Cyrillic is not that tough to learn. I learned it in about a week. The meaning of words however, that can be tough, never mind the correct grammar and sentence structure. Fortunately Rosetta Stone has Russian readily available. For Bulgarian I've had no such luck.
I can't say anything for Rosetta Stone but if you are going to travel away from the host cities and away from major cities and tourist infrastructure at least some Russian will make your life way easier. All the host cities will have English volunteers and won't be much of an issue. Cyrillic is indeed pretty easy to learn. It's just like the Latin alphabet in structure
The subway system in Russia, holy hell, i was beyond impressed, its honest to god the most efficient ive ever rode on. You miss a train? meh, whatevs, next ones 2-5 minutes out. I knew exactly where I was at all times in both cities, didnt overshoot a stop once. London on the other hand........starting on victoria street, trying to get off on Fulham/Hammersmith, I end up in East London. I cant figure out the friggin English subway, yet the one in cyrillic......money. It seems like lots of tourists were scared of getting on the metro too for fear of getting lost. Dont! its so easy, a complete waste of money paying for a cab in either city unless you are getting to/from one of the airports. And food......YELP/tripadvisor are your friends. I knew a couple who went on a cruise who just went to the places recommended from the company, they said it was awful, and it validated the food stereotype in my head. So I was a little worried after that, but I ate at restaurants highly rated on yelp.........i did not have one bad meal the whole trip. I was particularly infatuated with Georgian food. I have no idea how that stuff hasnt taken off yet, right up there with turkish food for me. Hachapuri is probably the greatest dish you have not tried in your life, and you need to make it a thing if you havent been to that area of the world. I think i ate it for lunch 5 days in a row in St Pete at the same place, and regret nothing. Lavka Lavka gets a huge shout out from me in Moscow, that place is incredible. ate there every dinner I was there except my river cruise (another cant miss IMO) Next time i go to the big two i want to get a Siege of Leningrad tour. Prices are steep, but a good tour guide who covers Lake Lagoda, the road of life, focal points of the siege, gotta do it. I did all the palaces, churches, and museums i could stomach last time. Next time I want to get to know the cities a little better. Moscow was fine, I could do a week there a summer and be okay with it, but I fell in love with St Petersburg to a degree I wasnt expecting. If you offered me a summer in vienna vs a summer in st pete, Id choose the later all day every time. If money wasnt an issue id spend every june there without hesitation, thats a city i really want to get to know well one day.
Food from the Caucasus and Central Asia is really underrated in my opinion. Assuming you aren't vegetarian.
Assuming you are on mobil and couldn't see it, but Cat 1-3 are in USD and Cat 4, which is only available to Russians, is listed in Rubles. Prices seem a bit high, especially for the group stage. Hopefully they offer good TST prices.
Category. They only offer 3 categories of sections to choose from and then your seats are randomly assigned within those Cats. The system works out pretty well, surprisingly.
TSTs will be the same prices as what are listed. TST is just a different lottery bucket. For me, $100-200 for a World Cup ticket to see our boys play.....worth every penny.
Cat 1 is usually sidelines. Cat 2 is weird and small but usually corners. Cat 3 will likely be end line. Cat 4 are scattered end line and upper decks.
I think there was a fee that pushed it up. I dunno why I remember like $110 in my head. Or I've just played too many contact sports
New to the thread here. Hi everyone. I did a venue series in Natal in 2012 and was able to do flights, tickets, meals, hotel, excursions, etc. for $3000, but I started booking things about 12-14 months out. I'm hoping to keep prices in the same range this time around. I'm leaning towards Kaliningrad, though I'd probably stay in Lithuania during the five day break between the first game in K'grad and the second game. Has anyone started doing any planning or budgeting? There are a few beach towns nearby, but it doesn't seem like there's much else to do other than drink and watch soccer. Both of which are perfectly fine, by the way...
I would not go to kalingrad The beaches are cold and windy even in summer. It's a massive military installation so you won't be able to wander around freely. Other than s reconstructed German cathedral there's nothing to see there. If you want to a beach vacation go to Sochi.
Thanks - and if we were to stay in Lithuania on the Curonian Spit, would that change your opinion about doing a venue series in Kaliningrad? I haven't heard the greatest things about Kaliningrad, but it's close to Europe, it's cheap, and it's not going to be swarmed like Moscow, SP, or Sochi.
Only issue would be getting a multi entry visa and probably spending an hour at the border each way. But that part of Lithuania is quite pleasant and charming. Although two weeks there seems long, unless you really like peace and quiet.