Moscow Guide
The northern suburbs
Moscow's northern suburbs lack the eclectic charm of the inner city, and even if you wanted to wander about, the distances are too vast. Instead, they have a scattering of interesting museums and sights that call for a targeted approach, relying on the metro to get you within striking distance of each attraction.
Foremost among them is the VVTs, a huge exhibition park that has been likened to a Stalinist Disney World, near the iconic Space Obelisk and Worker and Collective Farm Girl monument. The eighteenth-century Ostankino Palace – a shrine to aristocratic romanticism – stands not far away, as do Moscow's Botanical Gardens and TV Tower.
Nearer the centre of town, an odd assortment of museums and theatres merits a few sorties beyond the Garden Ring, including the the fairytale Vasnetsov House, Dostoyevsky's childhood home and the Durov Animal Theatre, which offers one of Moscow's weirdest performances.
Further west, you can see football or ice-hockey matches at the Dinamo or TsKA stadiums, or watch trotting-races at the Hippodrome. When the weather is fine, Muscovites come to swim, sunbathe and party at Serebraniy bor, a chain of lakes fringed by pine woods and dacha colonies.