We started with one umbrella
In 2014 Anna Sokolova stood on Palace Square with a blue umbrella and two Australians who had emailed her the night before. Twelve years later there are nine of us, and the umbrella is still how you find us.
We are a small, licensed tour operator based in St Petersburg, on Ulitsa Kuybysheva, with guides who live in Moscow, Suzdal, Kazan and Irkutsk. We run every tour on this site ourselves. We do not resell other companies' excursions and we never send you out with a guide we have not met.
Groups stop at eight because that is the number of people who can stand in a Hermitage gallery and still hear a guide speaking at a normal volume. It is also the number that fits around one table at lunch.
How we work
Every booking starts with a conversation. Nothing is charged until you have seen the plan.
Tell us your dates
Approximate is fine. Say what you care about, whether that is art, food, trains or ice.
Get a plan within a day
A guide replies with a day-by-day plan, the price and honest notes on what is closed or better in another season.
Look for the blue umbrella
Your guide meets you at the agreed spot, on time, with tickets in hand and lunch already thought about.
Meet the guides
All nine of us are licensed by the Russian tourism register and guide in English. Three also guide in German, one in Spanish and one in Mandarin.
Anna Sokolova
Founder, St Petersburg
Art historian and former Hermitage docent, eleven years guiding. Knows which gallery is empty at eleven.
Dmitry Volkov
Moscow
Former Kremlin museums guide. Knows which Kremlin cathedral has the quietest corner at noon.
Olga Beketova
Siberia and Lake Baikal
Grew up in Irkutsk. Runs the winter ice trips and knows exactly where the ice sings.
Rustam Khairullin
Kazan and the Volga
Born in Kazan's old Tatar quarter. The family lunch on our Kazan tour is at his aunt's table.
Maria Lebedeva
Golden Ring
Lives in Suzdal, restores icons in winter, and knows every bell-ringer between Vladimir and Rostov.
Sergei Andreyev
Trans-Siberian
Has crossed the country by train more than sixty times and still takes the window seat.