The picture below is from a photo-essay on abandoned cities (towns that dried up after the fall of the Soviet Union) on www.englishrussia.com. Truth be told, you don't need to journey out to distant places to find cool, abandoned buildings like this one. Just head out into podmoskoviye and you can find plenty of abandoned factories and warehouses that you can explore and vandalise to your heart's content. Sure, it might not have the same eerie feeling, but all abandoned industrial buildings are fun to explore.

While almost every member of KTP is somewhere in faraway lands, I'll take a minute and speculate on the topic what are the most interesting towns in Russia. Of course, I understand that it's 100 per cent subjectively: first, I haven't attended lots of Russian towns, among which peculiar Pskov, Ufa, Habarovsk and Vladivostok (and many others). Second, everyone has his own criteria of town 'quality'. For me it is not even the places to see, but the best balance between places to see and opportunities to stay and even live. Russia lacks simple facilities, you know.

But, as far as I'm quite and experienced traveller and a journalist, I think, my list can live.

So here it is.

» Read More