Cheap sightseeing on Moscow’s Metro
Written by Amanda Kendle
You often hear these horror stories of Moscow being one of the most expensive cities in the world these days – and while that’s probably true if you have to live there, I still believe that as a traveler you can enjoy a stay in Moscow without destroying your budget. Choosing a homestay over a hotel is one way – more on that in a future post – but there are also many great sights to see that are cheap or even free.
And one of my favourite things to do in Moscow is to check out the incredible underground train stations. The Moscow Metro system has been around since the 1930s and a number of the inner city stations are decorated in such a way that they’re even more interesting than an art gallery. It’s said that the Soviet government wanted to prove the advantages of socialism to the people by investing vast amounts of money in these artistic metro stations – I’m not sure I would have been convinced, but the legacy for today is fascinating.
You can ride all over the Moscow metro system for as long as you like on one ticket, so touring around to see all the best stations is easy – although it might take you at least half a day, so it depends whether you like spending so long underground! Some stations have mosaics, others bronze sculptures, and others are decorated with stained glass windows, and the most common themes are socialist ones. I’ve explored the system on two different trips to Moscow and always liked to try to count how many tractors I saw!
Most good guide books give a good list of the stations that are worth stopping at, and some of my favourites include:
- Kievskaya: full of mosaics
- Revolution Square: bronze statues of soldiers
- Arbatskaya: look for the chandeliers
- Mayakovskaya: hammer and sickle motifs as well as mosaics
- Novoslobodskaya: stained glass windows of composers and artists
Moscow was actually one of the *cheaper* destinations for me in Russia – it has a semblance of a budget travel infrastructure, with quite a few hostels to choose from now. What killed my budget in Mother Russia was going deep into Siberia and needing to stop over somewhere – often the only choice was a tattered old Russian business hotel up at inflated foreigner (or at least, non-Russian-speaking) rates.
My tip: explore the cities by day, and get overnight trains as often as possible to save on the hefty accommodation costs…
Moscow is great for the holidays!
TransSibTrav, all you needed to do was do some homestays! I used a homestay agency to book me places all along the Trans-Sib route and paid hostel rates to stay with sweet old Russian ladies who made me breakfast. It was great!
[...] for visiting!A few weeks ago I mentioned a cheap sightseeing activity in Moscow – exploring the metro stations which have been decorated like art galleries – and a couple of people were worried about the high [...]
[...] for two reasons. First of all, many underground metro stations in both Moscow and St Petersburg are like art galleries – you can see communist-era mosaics in one, stained glass installations in another and bronze [...]
[...] for two reasons. First of all, many underground metro stations in both Moscow and St Petersburg are like art galleries – you can see communist-era mosaics in one, stained glass installations in another and bronze [...]