Just a few minutes' walk away from the Arbat Hotel is Ulitsa Arbat, one of Moscow's most famous streets, and long a center for Moscow's cultural elite and intelligentsia. Pedestrianized in the late 1980s, the street is now home to a tourist market, street performers and scores of cafes and restaurants, many with street seating. Among the most famous residents of the area were Alexander Pushkin, Russia's revered national poet, the experimental composer Alexander Scriabin, and the great modernist novelist Andrey Bely, all of whom have museums dedicated to them along Ulitsa Arbat.
A bit further along Plotnikov Pereulok from the Arbat Hotel is Gagarinsky Pereulok, at the end of which are the Prechistensky Gates, from where you can see the monumental Cathedral of Christ the Savior. The Cathedral was originally erected in the 19th century as a monument to the victory over Napoleon in the War of 1812. In 1931 it was demolished by order of the Soviet regime and a swimming pool built in its place, but in 1990 the Moscow city government under Mayor Yury Luzhkov pushed to have it rebuilt.
The area around the Arbat Hotel is dominated by the towering neo-gothic skyscraper of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, about 200 meters from the hotel. One of the "Seven Sisters", the skyscrapers built after World War Two as symbols of the Soviet Unions victorious revival, the Ministry was completed in 1953 and stands at 172 meters.
Major attractions |
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| Distance: | 2 kilometers |
| Taxi: | 10 minutes Show driving route |
| Public transport: | It takes around 25 minutes to reach the Kremlin on foot from the Arbat Hotel. Alternatively, take the metro from Smolenskaya (the station on the pale-blue line across the Garden Ring from the hotel) and travel two stops east to Aleksandrovsky Sad. Turn right out of the metro station and walk straight on about 200 meters to reach the main visitor entrance to the Kremlin in the Kutafya Tower. Show transit route |
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| Distance: | 2.5 kilometers |
| Taxi: | 10 minutes Show driving route |
| Public transport: | The fastest way to reach Red Square from the Arbat Hotel by public transport is to take the metro from Smolenskaya Metro Station (on the dark-blue line, around six minutes' walk from the hotel) and travel east on the dark-blue line two stops to Ploshchad Revolyutsii, which is around 100 meters from the northern end of the square. You can also walk to Red Square in just over 30 minutes from the Arbat Hotel. Show transit route |
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| Distance: | 2.8 kilometers |
| Taxi: | 15 minutes Show driving route |
| Public transport: | The trip to the Bolshoi Theatre by metro will take only 20 minutes door-to-door, and to ensure you arrive on time for evening performances, this is definitely the most reliable way to travel. From Smolenskaya Metro Station on the dark-blue line, travel east two stops to Ploshchad Revolyutsii. Exit via the interchange station Teatralnaya to emerge about 50 meters from the theatre on Teatralnaya Ploshchad ("Theatre Square"). Show transit route |
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