Experience Russia | Express to Russia

The Central Museum of Railway Transport of Russia

There are some of the oldest railway collections in the world here, so for anyone with an interest in trains and railway transport this should be on your list of what to see in St. Petersburg.

The State Russian Museum of the Arctic and Antarctic

The numismatic collection of the Museum contains 4000 pieces including the coins dated back to XVI - XVII centuries, honor medals used to award polar explorers of the USSR, Norway, the USA and other countries. A unique collection consisting of 15 medals to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Tchelyuskin Epopee and devoted to the polar pilots- the heroes of the USSR are also on display.

The National Pushkin Museum

The National Pushkin Museum in St. Petersburg was the first national museum dedicated to the poet Alexander Pushkin. The main goal of the creation of the Pushkin Museum was to concentrate in it "all materials connected with life and creative work of Alexander Pushkin".

The Russian Museum of Ethnography

The museum began to acquire its first collections from the mid-1890s as part of the Ethnographic Department of the Russian Museum. The museum opened in 1924 to the public and in 1934 it became an independent institution, renamed the State Museum of the Ethnography of the Peoples of the USSR in 1948. It acquired its current title in 1992.

Peter the Great Museum of Anthropology and Ethnography (Kunstkammer)

This museum is definitely not for the faint-hearted, young or pregnant! Deformed foetuses in jars are the most popular attraction, but the etymological exhibits with cultural artefacts from the Americas, Oceania, Asia and Africa aren’t to be missed.

State Museum of GULAG History, Moscow

Stalin’s repression against his own people happened on an unimaginably vast scale, and the GULAG system lay at its heart. Over four decades, twenty million convicts passed through this notorious system of forced labor camps. This tragic period in Soviet history and the stories of the inmates are told in Moscow’s State Museum of GULAG History, founded in 2001 by a survivor of the camps.

Gatchina

The area south of St Petersburg where Gatchina Palace and Park is located is much older than the city itself. At the turn of the 15th century, it was a small village named Hotchino, inhabited by people from Novgorod, which was later occupied by Livonia and Sweden during a series of 17th century wars. Gatchina eventually became a Russian settlement again during the Great Northern War against Sweden (during which Peter the Great also acquired the territory on which he would found St Petersburg).

State Museum of Lev Tolstoy, Moscow

Count Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy, known in English as Leo Tolstoy, is considered to be one of the greatest writers of all time. His novels dealing with the ambiguities and nuances of life have become household names of Russian literature.

Mikhail Bulgakov State Museum, Moscow

Mikhail Bulgakov was one of Soviet Russia’s most high-profile playwrights, novelists, and short-story writers, known for his piercing satire of life in the USSR. The Mikhail Bulgakov State Museum is located

State Polytechnic Museum, Moscow

The State Polytechnic Museum in Moscow is one of the oldest and best science and technology museums in the world. It reflects milestones of science and engineering advances in Russia and represent man’s thirst for knowledge and progress.

State Museum of A.S. Pushkin, Moscow

The State Museum of A.S. Pushkin is a scientific, cultural and educational centre and one of the largest literary museums in Russia, dedicated to Russia’s favourite poet, Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin.

Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center, Moscow

The Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center chronicles Jewish culture and history in Russia from the reign of Catherine the Great up until the present day.

The Central Naval Museum, St. Petersburg

As with many of St Petersburg’s most important sites, the Central Naval Museum owes its existence to the ingenuity of Peter the Great. The acorn of the idea that was to blossom into one of the foremost nautical museums in the world first set root during the young tsar’s European tour. Seizing every opportunity to expand his exhaustive store of knowledge, the ever ambitious Peter immersed himself in the shipyards of the two most adept navies at the time, the British and Dutch— both handily under the rule of his long-time friend, the Prince of Orange. There he uncovered the technique of ship modelling which would form the basis of the Naval Museum’s collection.

The State Darwin Museum, Moscow

The Darwin Museum's scientific and education activities continue to be developed today, and the unique collections started by Kots still inspire and fascinate visitors over a century later. 6,000 exhibits on display illustrate the origin, development and diversity of life on Earth; the science and evolution of the behaviour of animals and their distribution on the planet; and the origin of Man and history of his relationship with Nature.

Orlov Museum of Palaeontology, Moscow

Old or young, the mere sight of the fearsome creatures that once roamed Russia is guaranteed to induce goose bumps. The skull of a sabre-tooth tiger is unnervingly life-like— its intact canines seem to glisten with saliva— even the skeleton of an extinct species of moose is positively hair- raising in all its 4.5 meters from hoof to antler-tip. Naturally, the museum has its stock of Siberian woolly mammoths, and a giant rhino adds an exotic twist to the otherwise distinctly Russian collection.

The Kremlin Armoury, Moscow

The bejeweled carriages, audaciously large diamonds and even the painstakingly-painted tea sets seem to exude an aura of shameless wealth and privilege. Even the most ardent of capitalists could sympathize with the indignation that spurred the Bolshevik protests upon seeing this flagrant display; especially when one considers that this four-thousand-strong amalgamation of exquisite treasures represents but a fraction of the Romanovs’ riches!

Museums