Moscow - Suzdal - Vladimir - Sergiev Posad - St. Petersburg - Novgorod - Village of Shuvalovka Tour

Day 1.  Moscow

Arrival to Moscow, meeting with a guide at the airport.Transfer to "Cosmos" hotel. Check in for 2 nights.
Short sightseeing tour of Moscow including Red Square, Lenin´s Mausoleum, St.Basil´s Cathedral, Moscow University, Bolshoi Theater, Christ the Saviour Cathedral, Tverskaya Street and the Arbat. Free time.

Optional evening performance in the Bolshoi theatre.

Day 2.  Moscow

Buffet breakfast at the hotel.
10am - Meeting with the guide. Excursion to the Russian famous confectionary.
"Red October" has 5 production departments. On the main territory there are: a hardboiled sweets department, a sweet department, a chocolate department and retail department, and in near Moscow Yegorievsk there is a department producing jam and candied carrot, citrus and other fruits, berries and vegetables widely used in the production of hardboiled sweets and candies. "Red October" uses for production only natural products doing without synthetic preservatives and substitutes. Total range of raw materials used amounts to about 100 types. The best varieties of nuts are purchased in the USA, Turkey, India, China.

Second part of excursion: You will stroll across Red Square, perhaps the most recognizable symbol of Russia along with St. Basil’s Cathedral.
You will walk through the GUM department store, the largest shopping center in all of Russia. GUM was built in 1893 and it sits opposite the Kremlin on Red Square. The building is characterized by a vast glass ceiling, ornate bridges, and stucco design work.

In the afternoon you’ll walk cross the square and through Alexander’s Garden along the Kremlin wall to the Kremlin entrance. Free time for shopping, picture taking. Transfer to the hotel. Free time.

7pm  Excursion "Moscow By Night".
Getting about Moscow with visit to Red Square, panoramas of the ancient Kremlin, Newmaiden Convent and panorama of Moscow from the Vorobyov's Hills. Panoramas of the ancient Kremlin, Gorky Park and Park of the Victory on the Greeting Hill with their illuminated fountains. Panorama of lit up Moscow from the Vorobyov's Hills. 
 
Day 3.  Moscow

Breakfast at the hotel.
10am - Meeting with a guide at the hotel lobby.
We’ll begin our tour of the Moscow Kremlin complex and the Diamond fund. (optional Armory museum)
The Moscow Kremlin is the center of Moscow and of Russian politics. Visiting the The Cathedral of the Assumption, built in 1479, was used for the coronation of the tsars and The Cathedral of the Archangel, completed in 1509, was used for burying them.

Following our tour we’ll proceed to the Old Arbat pedestrian walking street. The Old Arbat is lined with shops, cafes, street vendors and artists. It is a favorite among Russians for meeting and strolling during the long summer days. You’ll see the house of great Russian poet Pushkin and the memorial dedicated to him and his wife Natalie Goncharova.

7pm - Evening performance in the Bolshoi theatre. (new stage)

Day 4.  Moscow

Breakfast in the hotel.
Local coach and guide for full day sightseeing: visit to the vodka factory "Crystal" (Crystal) with testing.

Excursion to Kolomenskoye - museums, wine cellar + tasting, honey farm + tasting, folklore performance (wedding-game, scomorokhs, welcome, songs, etc.)

Transfer to the Old Circus. The Old Moscow Circus on Tsvetnoy Boulevard is one of the oldest circuses in Russia.
At present time the Circus employs several hundreds of the artistes who perform the acts of practically all known circus genres. Many of the artistes hold the honorary titles of People's Artistes and Honored Artistes of Russian Federation Their high artistic and professional level is proved by the fact that every year the artistes of the Great Moscow Circus take part in the most prestigious international festivals and contests winning highest awards. The whole programs and separate acts tour every year in more than 20 countries of the world performing not only in the circuses, but on the theatre stages, in the cabarets and in the theme parks.

Day 5. Vladimir - Suzdal

Breakfast at the hotel.
Meeting with the guide at the hotel lobby. Transfer to Vladimir. Arrival to Vladimir.
Sightseeing excursion round Vladimir (visiting the Cathedral of the Assumption with frescoes by A.Rublev, the St. Dimitry Cathedral and the only Golden Gates in the fortification walls of Russia, the museum of glass and rock crystals. Excursion to Bogolyubovo and ancient residence of Duke Andrew).

Transfer to the next town of the Golden Ring Suzdal. (32km)
Sightseeing tour round Suzdal with visit to the Monastery, the Suzdal Kremlin, the Cathedral of the Nativity and Metropolitans chambers. Transfer to Moscow

Day 6.  Sergiev Posad

Breakfast at the hotel.
Excursion to Sergiev Posad.
Sergiev Posad is located 71 km north of Moscow at the confluence of the Koshura and Glimitsa rivers. The town was renamed for the revolutionary, Vladimir Zagorsky, and has now been changed back to its former name. The town developed from the settlement that grew around the Trinity Monastery in 1762, one of the largest in Russia. The monastery houses the Russian Patriarch's temporary residence. Evening transfer to the railway station. Departure for St.Petersburg.

Day 7.  St. Petersburg

Arrival to St.Petersburg. Transfer to the hotel “St.Petersburg”. Free time.
Excursion around the city. Free time for shopping, picture taking.

Optional evening performance in the Mariinsky theatre.

Day 8.  St. Petersburg

Breakfast at the hotel.                            
Meeting with the guide at the hotel lobby.
Half-day tour to Peterhof (former summer residence of the Russian Tsars.) The great architects and best gardeners of the XVIII-XIX centuries designed the palaces and garden ensembles.

Second part of excursion: Boat excursion.
Return to the hotel. Free time.

Day 9.  St. Petersburg

Breakfast at the hotel. 
Meeting with the guide at the hotel lobby
The Palace-and-Park Ensemble Tsarskoye Selo - a former residence of the Russian emperors - is a spectacular monument of architecture and art of gardening of XVIII-XIX centuries. Its three parks cover 600 ha housing over a hundred of buildings from magnificent palaces and monuments to intimate pavilions and sculpture. The compositional center of the ensemble in the Catherine's Palace with collections of exquisite decorative objects, furniture.
Return to St.Petersburg

7pm - folk show.

Day 10.  Novgorod Veliky

Breakfast at the hotel. Check out
Meeting with the guide at the hotel lobby.
Departure to Novgorod Veliky.
Novgorod - one of the most ancient cities of Russia located in its North-West, near the site where the Volkhov river takes its waters from Lake Ilmen, emerged as a political center of Slavic and Fino-Ugric tribes in the mid-9th century, while as a town it was formed in the middle of the 10th century.
Excursion in Novgorod (sightseeing, cathedrals, churches). Transfer to St.Petersburg.

Day 11.  St. Petersburg

Breakfast at the hotel.
This morning we begin with a guided tour of the famous Hermitage State Museum. It was built in 1754-62 as the principal home of the tsars, and was later rebuilt in 1839 after the original was destroyed by fire. One of the world’s great art museums, it is housed in the tsar’s  former Winter Palace, overlooking the imposing Palace Square. Tsarina Catherine II began the collection, and those following added much more. One can spend many hours wandering  around the museum's 500 rooms and exhibits; to see everything reportedly requires walking 14 miles. There are entire rooms devoted to each of the Grand Masters.

Second part of excursion:  St. Isaac's Cathedral with its 331-foot gold-covered cupola (which required 220 lbs. of gold) and its domed interior, a cornucopia of golden frescoes.
Free time for shopping. Picture taking

Day 12.  St. Petersburg, Shuvalovka village

Breakfast at the hotel
Excursion to the Russian Village of Shuvalovka, only thirty minutes driving distance away from St.Petersburg, you find yourself in the midst of a fairy tale. In 1714 Peter I gave this land to a community of farmers with a finish name Korkuli, numbering five homesteads. The estate changed hands many times over centuries. One of the owners was Count Ivan Shuvalov. Only the name and the land itself have survived on which his sprawling estate once stood. Nowadays visitors to this hospitable Russian village are welcomed to the Crafts Center, the traditional Hut, Blacksmith’s and Potter’s workshops and Sobranie restaurnt (you will taste the traditional Russian food, listen or perhaps even dance to Russian folk music.

Day 13.  St. Petersburg

Breakfast at the hotel.
Сheck out. Transfer to the airport. Departure from St.Petersburg.

Price starting from USD 1 998

Included:
- accommodation in hotels in a shared double room
- registration fee
- breakfasts
- airport-hotel transfers
- hotel-airport transfers
- excursions (incl. transportation, entrance fees and services of an excellent English-speaking guide) in St.Petersburg, Moscow, Novgorod, Sergiev Posad, Suzdal, Vladimir, village Shuvalovka
- tickets to the Bolshoi theatre
- tickets to the circus
- visa support
- insurance
- bank fee