The Golden Ring travel guide

Places to visit in the Golden Ring

Sergeev Posad

Situated 70 km (44 miles) north of Moscow on the Yaroslavl road, Sergeev Posad makes for a perfect day-trip from Moscow. It is built around the Trinity Monastery of St Sergius, founded in the mid-14th century by St Sergius of Radonezh – a holy man revered for his role in uniting Russia against the Tatars. Today, the remains of St Sergius are kept in the white stone Troitsky Sobor (Trinity Cathedral), also noted for its splendid icons painted by Russia’s celebrated master Andrei Rublyov and his school of icon painters. Behind Trinity Cathedral, the Riznitsa (Vestry) displays the lavish gifts amassed by the monastery over the centuries.

Pereyaslavl-Zalessky

This small town on the main road between Moscow and Yaroslavl, 50 km (30 miles) northeast of Sergeev Posad, was founded in 1152 by Prince Yuri Dolgoruky and is famous for being the birthplace of Alexander Nevsky. The highlight of Pereslavl-Zalessky, or Pereslavl Beyond-the-Woods, is the Kremlin with its solid Spaso-Preobrazhensky Sobor (Cathedral of the Transfiguration of the Saviour), one of the oldest edifices in Russia, built in the mid-12th century. A?bust of Alexander Nevsky stands across the square together with three other churches, including the once-beautiful, but now badly run-down Tserkov Petra Mitropolita (Church of Peter the Metropolitan), built in 1585.

Rostov-Veliky

Rostov-Veliky, or Rostov the Great, is one of the Golden Ring’s finest towns with its rustic Kremlin and monasteries that dot the landscape. Situated 220 km (137 miles) northeast of Moscow on the shores of Lake Nero, Rostov-Veliky is also the Golden Ring’s oldest town. Entering the town from the south offers a fairy-tale panorama of the Kremlin and the Monastery of St Jacob across Lake Nero. The town has retained much of its pre-Revolutionary charm, and has been relatively untouched by the building boom marring Moscow. Founded in the 12th century on the shore of the lake, the breathtaking Kremlin is framed by a 1-km (1⁄2-mile) -long wall and has a large central square which is full of ­flowers during the summer.

Yaroslavl

Yaroslavl, 250 km (155 miles) northeast of Moscow, is by far the largest town on the Golden Ring with more than 620,000 inhabitants. As Yaroslavl grew into a major trading centre, rich merchants eager to compete with Moscow donated huge sums for the construction of churches all over the city. One of Yaroslavl’s finest churches is the redbrick Tserkov Bogoyavlenia (Church of the Epiphany), built in the 17th century just off Bogoyavlenskaya ploshchad. Opened recently after being used as a storage facility for decades, this elegant church is decorated with the city’s traditional hand-painted ceramic tiles and has rich frescoes and a carved iconostasis.

Suzdal

Some 100 km (65 miles) south of Kostroma, Suzdal was first chronicled in 1024 and became the capital of Yuri Dolgoruky’s Rostov-Suzdal principality in the early 12th century. In the 19th century, the railway constructed between Moscow and Nizhny-Novgorod bypassed Suzdal, sparing it from industrialisation. Today the town has over 100 architectural landmarks dating from the 13th to the 19th century over an area of just 9 sq. km (3 sq. miles).

One serene delight is the working Pokrovsky Monastyr (Intercession Convent), founded in 1364. The convent’s history is retraced in a museum on the left of the main entrance. The three-domed Pokrovsky Sobor (Cathedral of the Intercession) was built in the early 16th century.