November 2015.
This time we decided to go to the Russian resort of famous Sochi for a change. I wished to compare the current conditions of Russian resorts with the situation in Soviet Union, where I was in my childhood. The vacation turned out later autumn during November holidays.
We paid for the hotel “AquaLoo” forty thousand rubles. It includes room for seven nights, full meal and Water Park. I think, it’s quite expensive. Actually we wished to take half board, but there was not such option in hotel. You can take only full board. It is not convenient because we planned excursions almost every days. Also, that’s strange, but there is no option “without Water Park”, in spite of the fact that there are too many old people comes for sanatorium treatment. So, retirees do not remain without Water Park for sure 🙂 .
The people of different ages comes to sanatorium. There are purples with their teacher, young athletes with trainers, seniors and families with children.
In general, we liked the resort. Beautiful vegetation, many pavilions, sports and playgrounds. There are shops and cafes on site.
Also there were some unpleasant things, that so usual for Russia. The stage in the center of hotel area was destroyed, the bricks layed around this place and the pits were dug right on the footpaths nearby. All this were not marked or fenced. We could not understand if it was due to repair work, or just everything was ruined and nothing is going to be recover.
There are a lot of homeless cats and dogs on the territory of the hotel complex. My daughter made many pictures of them. She fond of cats. Some people may say that so many stray animals would relate to “unsanitary conditions”, but actually they are rather complementary of nature. So to speak, animal world of sanatorium.
Speaking about the living conditions, they were quite tolerable. We lived in building 3 (named “Pearl”) on the 4th floor. There was a fridge, TV, kettle, air-condition in the room. When we arrived we were given a large bundle of towels, four items per person. Maid warned us that she will counts them during checkout and she will charge us if the number of towels is less (Russian joke). The bed linen was not changed over 7 days. The room was quite clean. Every day there was “fast cleaning”, that included carpet vacuuming and bathroom cleaning. The insects like bedbugs, but very large, up to one and a half centimeters, flied into the room from the balcony. So, it was impossible to keep the balcony open.
There are several restaurants at the hotel. We were appointed buffet restaurant “Paradise”. You will not hungry there. The restaurant offers a lot of different dishes, but you will not see culinary delights there. That was quite strange that there were no natural coffee at breakfast or the coffee was cold because the boiler with coffee was switched off. For normal coffee we had to go to the cafe. Also there was no desserts, some baking was instead, which we did not really like and there was no hot milk.
The general, the impression that this hotel is a three star. As it was claimed, however.
AquaLoo Water Park.
Water Park belongs to the hotel and it is included in the price. Visit time is not limited.
Since we were there in November, only winter part, that includes seven slides, was opened. One of the slides was always closed for unknown reason.
In my opinion, there was too cold in Water Park, especially when we stood in line for slides. The doors everywhere were opened outwardly. Also the exit from waterpark was done not convenient enough. You should walk dressing outerwear and dirty shoes on the wet tiles in the same way as the way into waterpark. The door opened directly onto the street, so the people, who went from/into waterpark in wet bathing suits and sandals, shivered. I wander, what is there in winter? Also sometimes the mold covered the edges of swimming pools, several times we saw cockroaches in lockers. There were a problem with hair dryers, two hair dryers definitely were not enough.
On the contrary, the kids loved the water park, but the surprise for them was that slides was allowed only for those who swam well and older seven. Who could not swim well, was not allowed to ride even in arm ruffles. So my san had to learn swim in the pool of the same water park. Only after that he was able to try the slides. So, the benefit from the trip is obvious.
There is an aquarium and a crocodile farm in the hotel.
The aquarium “Shark reef”.
The aquarium is small and takes only 3 rooms. There is a small crocodile inside, many unusual fishes, some crabs and tortillas. Unfortunately, we did not found the description of all fishes in the aquarium. Some electronic screens did not work. Also the creens were hung too high for children. In my opinion, it would be better to have just papers with description s near each aquarium.
The Crocodile Farm .
Crocodile Farm occupies only one room. It is written that there are 200 crocodiles inside. Well, maybe so, given that they are crammed like herring in a barrel of 20 pieces in one tank.
The Excursions.
We bought the excursion at AquaLoo tour agency. The price was 800 rubles for transfer and guide. Also we visited the Greek house at the end of the excursion. The cableway cost was 1100 rubles per person. There was not snow in mountains in November. We just got the altitude of 2330 m, had a drink of hot coffee and came down. It took us approximately 2 hours and we had no time to work longer as the bus was waiting us. We could see more if we got the place by train. For example, we could try one of the bicycle paths that was working instead of ski trails.
We took a tour with transfer. Check-out was at 14:00. Maybe it’s good time for summer, but it gets dark early in November. We got to the park almost at 16.00 due to traffic jams. It began sunset when we bought tickets and came inside the park. Despite “off-season” time, there were half-hour queues at the most extreme attractions. So, again, it’s better to spend some time learning how to get public transport to the park.
Sochi Park is not a big if you compare it with the USA versions of theme parks, but it’s worth to visit it. The park is nice decorated. There are beautiful fountains and play areas for children with characters of Russian tales, many southern plants. You can go to the Dolphinarium, that is included in the entrance fee. There is not many attractions inside, only three or four slides can be interesting for teenagers and young adults. There are long queues for these attractions. Our visit coincided with Halloween or baba Yaga birthday. Actually, we do not like pumpkins rags with painted eyes that supposed to act like ghosts and hunged in the most inappropriate places, as they spoiled the beautiful views of the park. Such rag was pulled even on Ruslan (from Pushkin tale), so, we could not be photographed with this exhibit.
Finally, we decided to use public transport. We went to Riviera Park by bus number 155 “Lazarevskoe- Sochi”. The trip takes a half an hour due to traffic jams. The bus was full. We had to stand all the way.
The park was founded in 1898 by businessman Vasily Khludov. The park is very beautiful. It is interesting just to walk along the trails and enjoy southern greenery, there are about 240 species of plants, including rare plants.
Also there are different attractions for children in the park. In my opinion, the cost of them is a bit expensive. Although there are discount tickets (they looks like plastic card) for several rides. Than more rides than cheaper, but you must be careful here. The attractions belong to different companies. The ticket is valid only on the attractions of the company who sold it, and only one day.
We liked Reviera Dolphinarium even more than the dolphinarium in Sochi Park. It’s because of wonderful dolphin performance. There is also a small zoo and aquarium. We decided not to go into aquarium to save time, but we have visited the zoo. Zoo was very small, but there we found the animals that had never seen before. They are the Sugar glider and Goeldi’s marmoset.
That’s all we managed to see for the seven days of autumn vacation. Budget of the trip was about one hundred thousand rubles.