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Despite the great loss of 4000 tropical fish in September, the Discovery World Aquarium in Sochi –  now larget in Russia and one of few of this kind in the World – did open in time before the New Year.

The Aquarium located in Adler district of Sochi. There are 29 aquariums hosting around 4000 fish of 200 kinds, and it is expected to welcome 1.2 million visitors each year. I believe it’s reachable.

photos (c) Alexandr Valov

You can find more photos from the Aquarium and opening ceremony in Alexandr’s photo album.

* Gross income from tourism in Sochi in 2009 was $738 000 000 (22,5 bln rubles), which is two times higher than during last year.

* Sochi was visited by around 4 800 000 tourists in 2009.

Source: Sochi mayor’s report from December 21, 2009

Other facts about Sochi »

Only 3 airlines have direct flights to Sochi — Russia’s largest summer resort, from Saint-Petersburg — Russia’s second largest city, a home to over 4.5 million people… in the middle of the summer season. One of them flies with a stop in Krasnodar (that adds several hrs to your travel time), and another one of the three only flies 4 times a week.

Compare this to 12 (!) airlines (that I know of, there could be more) that have direct flights between Sochi and Moscow.

Many other cities have it worse than St. Petes, there either no flights, or flights only a couple of days a week. There’s no competition, and because it’s the middle of the vacationing season there are no special deals. This makes Sochi one very expensive destination to fly to.

Consider this: s Saint-Petersburg – Sochi round trip flight in the first half of August with convenient weekdays (weekends) and departure times on “Russia Airlines” – the only one that has direct, non-stop flights daily – costs 548,00 EUR ! And this is with 5% off for buying tickets online already calc’ed in.

At the same time there are plenty tours (which include travel, accommodation, and, often, food) offered to Egypt, Turkey, Bulgaria, and resorts in other countries for approximately the same price or even lower… while I couldn’t find anything similar for Sochi, or any other resort on Russia’s south.

And comparing these prices to the deals available on inter-European flights from low-cost European airlines, all this drives me crazy.

A couple of photos I found on Flickr today…

Sochi – Cheltenham’s sister city

“Cheltenham’s sister cities.” (c) Dave Hanmer

Sochi’s sister cities, or twin cities…

Luring you in…

(c) Masha Kuvshinova

Sign reads: “Holiday romance is your dream! It will realize in Sochi! Come…” :-)