Homestays are centrally located and represent the best value
in Russia. You receive your own room (some can cater for up to four people
although most are suitable for two) which is MUCH cleaner than any other comparative
budget accommodation and you are not in a dorm with people you don’t know.
In addition, you receive breakfast and can organise (and pay
directly) for lunch and/or dinner, a huge saving when
compared with having to buy your meals in restaurants. Being central suburbs
there are 'local shops' and markets around the apartment complexes. Here you can
stock up on snacks etc on your journey to the centre and that bottle of
Georgian red on the return home, thus saving a lot of money when compared to the
costs in the centre of the cities, or near major hotels.
Probably the most important aspect of homestay is the fact that you experience
everyday contemporary Russian life. Isn’t that one of the main reasons why we
all travel?
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| Breakfast is included and you can organise other meals direct with hosts | Apartments have some uniformity, but then some have different layouts. | |
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| One example of a homestay bedroom | One example of a not so typical homestay host. Different house to picture on left, but same layout |
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Main course |
Size and style of homestays vary across the country. They can be more grand and larger in size within the cities of Moscow and St Petersburg. We can cater for families using some of the larger homestays. In addition, we have a catchment of vegetarian hosts. We include breakfast in the costs. You can negotiate directly with the hosts if you want other meals and pay them directly at your agreed rate. Hint - much cheaper than main restaurants!
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| A close in St Petersburg suburb. Typical design from the post WW2 Soviet era. Don't forget St Petersburg was devastated during the WW2 siege and area surrounding the older centre were heavily destroyed. | Some homestays in St Petersburg can be in the older areas | An
inner Moscow suburb with Stalin period apartment design. Click here to read some notes from Brent who stayed in this building. |
Some comments from a recent traveller..
Hi Helen
Arrived back from my trip on the weekend – spent a few days in Germany with Amanda which was rather special as she is going to stay for another year at least.
We had the very best trip to Russia – thanks so much for the organizing.
Your office were very good – though we did wonder when we arrived at Moscow and had not seen our driver for an hour or so – good practice for me as I had to use my Russian language skills – and he had been in a traffic jam so eventually arrived. We had an excellent location just about 3 metro stops from the centre of Moscow. It was rather fun as our homestay host was in hospital readying for an operation so her neighbour let us in and helped us – and our homestay host or I should say hostess (Olga) rang us from the hospital and told us that her son Nik would come in and stay nights and arrange our breakfast – which he did. He turned out to be a journalist (not good with English) – a little shy of us – but very nice – even ended up giving us his magazine where he was an editor – so pretty much we had the use of the apartment and could come and go. Olga rang us quite a few times and was very lovely – we were sorry we did not meet her.
Our guide was excellent too, as was the one in St Petersburg.
I could not believe for a day or two that I was really in Russia and loved Moscow – we walked and rode the metro’s so much and really felt we were part of the scene, rather than tourists. Had a trip to Sergiyev Posad, about 40kms out which was great.
We will keep in touch with the ladies in Russia – just want to say a huge thanks – it was the trip of a lifetime.
Amanda still had an English map of Moscow city which she said you gave her a couple of years ago – if you do still have one that you can spare, would you mind sending me one please.
Kind regards
June
From: Gabrielle
Sent: Monday
Subject: Thanks
Hi,
On behalf of Luke, Lina, Justin and myself I'm saying a huge thankyou for organising our trans-Mongolian trip. It was a fantastic journey. Everything went really smoothly. The only miniscule hiccup was when we got off the train in Ulaan Batar and couldn't find the person that was supposed to collect us. But after roving the platform for a while we hooked up with the only man left holding a placard and discovered that he was our driver (the name on his placcard was Briaskase, work that one out!).
The homestays were all good, with the outstanding one being at Listvyanka. The lady looking after us was really wonderful, warm and trusting and her cooking delicious. The train ride was surprisingly comfortable. Particularly the long trip from Irkutsk to Moscow. The train was quite new and kept immaculately clean. All the stops along the way gave us a chance to stretch our legs and fend off cabin-fever. Travelling in a group of four realy turned out well with sleeping arrangement on the train (we met a few people along the way who felt a little envious of our "private" cabin). All the info you provided for us was very accurate and therefore invaluable to our smooth journey. When we first considered this trip we were doubtful as to the economy of pre-arranging all our accomodation, train tickets etc. but as we were travelling and comparing notes with other travellers we realise that we got a fantastic deal and that knowing exactly where we were going to be staying and for how long eased a lot of potential stress. So thanks again for all your help, advice and professional service. We've been recommending you to anyone interested.
Regards
Gabrielle
PS. We caught a boat from Japan to China and met an American (Ted) who had
booked his train journey through you.
