Maryam

Translated from Arabic

Spent a week in Moscow with the children in July. The parks are huge and well kept, Gorky Park became their favourite by day three. We were not prepared for how green and walkable the city centre is. The metro is the best I have ever used, every station is different and they treat it like a museum. People stopped to help us with directions more than once

Abdulrahman

Translated from Arabic

Saint Petersburg in June was beyond what I expected. The white nights mean you lose track of time, we walked along the Neva at one in the morning and it was still light. The Hermitage takes a full day and we barely saw half of it. Found halal food easier than people had warned us. Coming back next year for the Peterhof gardens

Selin

Translated from Turkish

Russian food was the surprise of the trip. Pelmeni, blini, all the soups when it gets cold. I was alone for ten days between Moscow and Kazan and never felt unsafe even late at night. People were warmer than I had been told to expect. Kazan was the part I would tell anyone to see, the mosque and the church next to each other on the same square is something you do not see anywhere else

Lin Chen

Translated from Mandarin

Visited in February to see Russia in the snow. Red Square in the morning before the crowds is something I will remember always. St Basil's looks bigger in real life than in photos. We went to a banya which we did not understand at all, but the locals laughed with us not at us and showed us what to do. Twenty minutes in there in minus fifteen outside is a feeling you cannot get anywhere else

Arjun Mehta I

Translated from Hindi

Travelled to Moscow and Saint Petersburg with my parents and wife. As vegetarians we had been told to prepare for a difficult ten days but it was the opposite. Borscht, blini with mushroom, the salad selections, and the Georgian restaurants everywhere in Moscow. My father, who eats only vegetarian food, never went hungry once. The Bolshoi was the highlight for my mother, she had wanted to see it her whole life

Camille

Translated from French

Spent ten days in Saint Petersburg in the autumn just for the museums. The Hermitage alone deserves three visits and I gave it two. The Russian Museum was the unexpected one, I went on a whim and stayed five hours. Caught a ballet at the Mariinsky for less than the price of a dinner in Paris