Any Guide Books on Russia ???

Andrew,

You might check The Lonely Planet series of Guidebooks, as I believe they have books for that area.

Rick has only started tours in St. Petersburg / Estonia this year, but I doubt there will be any Guidebooks in the near future, especially for the former Soviet Republics.

Cheers!

Lonely Planet publishes probably the most extensive guidebook on Russia. The best guide to the Baltic republics I have found was part of a larger Europe-wide edition published by The Rough Guide. Good luck with Ukraine and Moldova!

As you have probably surmised by now, Rick Steves does not personally answer these questions. We are all unpaid amateurs who share our experiences and knowledge. But as to your question of why Rick does not currently publish a Russia guide... I'm going to make an assumption here. More than most travel guidebook series, Rick prefers to do as much of his research first hand as possible. While this gives his books a very personal touch and allows for some carefully selected hotels and restaurants, by necessity, it limits the scope of the books. Given that so many fewer Americans travel to Russia and the former Soviet Union than to other areas of Europe, it probably is not economically feasible for him to devote the same resources of time and money for a guidebook that will ultimately have a much lower appeal.

There was a RS guidebook titled 'Russia & The Baltics' that went out of print in 1998. However, there are excerpts from the book online. Click on Plan Your Trip, then click on Eastern Europe, scroll down and you will find information on St. Petersburg, Moscow, Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius.

I went to Russia last year and had a great time. I actually had a copy of the old Rick Steves book, and honestly, it is quite outdated now (it has been 10 years since it was printed). No offense to Rick, his other books are excellent and I always travel with them!

We mainly used the 2008 Lonely Planet Moscow (where we spent most of our time), but it had one MAJOR problem: all the road maps and street plans are in Latin lettering (Russian words, of course) rather than Cyrillic. Needless to say, nearly everything is written in Cyrillic script in Russia. I wrote LP about this and they plan to fix it in new editions, so maybe the 2009 book is correct. Other than that, it was an excellent book.

LP produces a separate Ukraine guide while Moldova is combined with Romania into another guidebook. The 3 Baltic states are covered in one guidebook.

At my local library yesterday I saw new city only guides to Moscow and St. Petersburg (all LP books).

From what I understand, it is difficult for an independent traveler to have an easy time traveling in Russia. Visas are also a hassle. Maybe Rick will do a guide when the tourism industry there opens up more.

It is difficult for an independent traveller in Russia, but I managed 4 years ago. However, I did take Russian at night school before I left and learned the Cyrillic alphabet. I wanted to be sure I got on the correct train and walked into the correct toilet.

I had my travel agent here pre-arrange my visa, and she arranged my hotels, hostels, train tickets and private guide for two days of my 15 days. I would say that independent travel in Russia is difficult also because the Russians have no experience with this themselves. I saw many tours of Russians touring within their own country. Independent travel was not allowed during the Soviet Days.

As for guide books, I took along torn out pages from Let's Go Eastern Europe, and a DK guide for St Pete's and another DK guide for Moscow. These DK guides are full of nice pictures, but they're heavy and I would never take one for travelling without pre-booking as these DK guidebooks are short on fundamentals. Lonely Planet books are possibly better.

"difficult for an independent traveler to have an easy time traveling in Russia." Completely independent, yes, that is very difficult. But you can easily travel independently if you use a knowledgable travel agency to book everything for you.

And for an independent traveler to Russia, I second the recommendation to learn the Cyrillic alphabet (it isn't hard, unlike the Russian language!). Not so that you can pronounce the words perfectly, but so that you can recognize key words, like the names of towns, streets or businesses. For example, the Russian word for restaurant looks like "PECTOPAH" when written in Cyrillic, but the pronunciation is similar to English.