Over 100 Sochi cafes and restaurants where selected to service IOC delegates and journalists during their February visit. All menus will be translated to English and stuff will prepare to service foreign guests. In addition to this, many cafes and restaurants are designing new “Olympic oriented” dishes. For example general manager of “Dan” restaurant gave some details on their preparations.

“Instead of simply giving our dishes names that symbolize the Games and sports, we decided to present a look back at the history: we found a lot of useful information about most popular items during past Winter Olympics over the Internet. By now we have designed three new items, and by the end of this week we’ll have twelve. Menus will include year of the Olympic games, host country, and course with description.”

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The Ukrainian government is looking into possibility of building a bridge between Ukrainian Crimea and Russian Krasnodar Krai (part of which is Sochi), reports Yuga.ru. Their logic is – Russia promotes Sochi, lets bring some of their visitors to Ukraine :) That sure makes sense… I always wondered why a bridge or a tunnel across Kerch (Kertch/Kerchensky) strait did not exist. Well, the money, I guess. But it always felt wrong (and it still does) that people have to drive around Asov Sea just to get to Crimea by land from south of Russia when it is so damn close. Today there is a ferry operating across Kerchensky and Tamansky peninsulas. However, it was reopened just a few years ago, before it wasn’t operating for 15 years.

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Russia officially joins Turkey’s Black Sea Harmony initiative to address new security challenges in region.
Actually this happened in the end of December, but I just found my bookmark today :)

Black Sea Harmony is a naval operation initiated by Turkey in March 2004 in accordance with UN Security Council Resolutions 1373, 1540 and 1566 aimed at deterring terrorism and asymmetric threats worldwide. (Wikipedia)

Ukraine has also announced last year that it is considering joining Black Sea Harmony, and the last i’ve read Ukraine’s participation process is in its final stage.

Good news, the Ministry of Justice of Russian Federation has finally approved the use of e-tickets in civil aviation in Russia. This, of course, should mean faster, more convenient way for travelers to get on the airplane.

After German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, President of Armenia Robert Kocharian met today with Vladimir Putin in Sochi. They discussed Russian investments in Armenian economy and new ways of economic cooperation, in areas such as nuclear energy, exploration of uranium fields in Armenia, oil refining, modernization of industrial enterprises in Armenia, construction of new railways.

Ski lifts operated by “Alpika Service” in Krasnaya Polyana resort restarted their operations, though many cafés, restaurants, and rental shops on the resort were still closed. Meanwhile this interruption had cost a lot to everyone – tourists, travel agencies, businesses in Krasnaya Polyana, and Russia’s Olympic bid. The latter even irritated President Putin, who’s currently working in Sochi. It was definitely bad time, but on the other hand it was probably the best time for “Alpika” to bring the issue out to the public. Weather it will help them or ruin it for them is still a question.

February 8 – 10 Sochi, once again, will welcome the Winter Music Conference (SWMC-2007), the goal of which is to help several hundreds of Club Music professionals from Russia and neighbouring countries to establish new business contacts and discuss popular electronic and dance music trends.

The day-time program includes over 13 hours of presentations, discussions groups, and workshops on today’s hot topics of the night club and music industry. During night-time program, best night clubs and bars in Sochi, Adler, and Krasnaya Polyana will let Russia’s hottest DJs in to present their new programs.

Official website of SWMC is swmc.ru (in Russian)

The biggest news of the day yesterday, and it was a bad one, was that the only winter resort in Krasnaya Polyana, operated by “Alpika Service”, has stopped its operations by the court order. Yesterday morning all lifts were stopped, cafés and restaurants closed. Why? Official reasons – violations of health and fire safety rules. But according to general manager of “Alpika Service”, Petr Fedin, regional administration has put a lot of pressure on them and wants to take the land away. According to Mr. Fedin, pressure on “Alpika” has increased after administration changed in Krasnodar Krai, and after Sochi had become an Olympic candidate city. Numerous fire, health, tech, ecology, and financial inspections occur a lot more often now then usual. Fedin says “Alpika” recently had 24 inspections in 10 days :-O Apparently all this pressure come over land dispute, between “Alpika-Service” and “Ecotur” – company headed by Krasnodar Krai governor’s assistant. The topic of the dispute is 10 hectares of land next to the downhill ski trails.

All this smells dirty, as it most likely is. Meanwhile weather in Krasnaya Polyana is perfect for skiing/snowboarding, lots of fresh snow, yet many tourists have to leave since no lifts are operational. The lifts are still not working, though the resort is expected to resume its operations tomorrow, Jan 24th.

Recently Russian federal government agreed to establish several so called “tourist-recreational zones” – popular tourist areas that will have considerable tax breaks. It was done to make those areas more attractive for the investors. I knew Black Sea coast region was one of few zones selected, but I wasn’t sure if Sochi would be on the list, since there is a separate federal program to turn Sochi into year-round resort.

However, today I read in an article on RBC Daily that Sochi’s going to be in one of those zones. According to the article, this Black Sea coast zone will include Sochi, and our neighbours Anapa, Gelendzhyk, and Tuapse region, and will require more investments then other zones in Russia. 181 billion rubles (US $6.8 billion) will be invested into the region (that’s both federal and private investments) over the next 20 years through this federal program. The biggest projects here will be hotel constructions for 110 000 people. The “numbers” are still unsigned plans, however.

I found following copy of an AFP article on gamesbids.com forums, but oddly enough I couldn’t find the original. Anyway, this goes together with my previous article about Sochi Bid team’s idea of using ancient Greek mythology during our Bid and Olympics.

PARIS, Jan 16, 2007 (AFP) – Russian Black Sea resort Sochi are hoping that their bid to win the rights to the 2014 Winter Olympics will be aided by an unlikely source – Greek mythological hero Jason and his band of merry Argonauts.
Dmitry Chernyshenko, the bid’s chief executive, told AFP there was a ship taking the same path from the ancient kingdom of Thessaly (in eastern Greece) to Sochi or Colchis as it was known then, as Jason did to pick up the Golden Fleece, as part of their bid to persuade the majority of IOC members at the vote in Guatemala City on July 4 that they deserved to host the Games.
“Basically the gold for the Golden Fleece was taken from the River Mzymmta,” said the charismatic 38-year-old Russian former advertising magnate, whose bid faces off against Austrian resort Salzburg and Pyeongchang in South Korea.
“It is not a bad thing to have such an historical link to the originator of the Olympic Games (Greece) and we have organised for a boat to sail the same route as the original ship the Argo did as part of our campaign to win.” ….

Starting February 7, Aeroflot Russian International Airlines opens regular direct flights between Sochi and Frankfurt, Germany.

Flights on the route will be performed once per week on Wednesdays:
– flight SU103 Sochi (Adler) – Frankfurt – departure from Adler at 11:50 a.m., arrival at Frankfurt am Main at 01:35 p.m.;
– flight SU104 Frankfurt – Sochi (Adler) – departure from Frankfurt at 03:00 p.m., arrival at Adler at 08:35 p.m. (local time).

Opening of the regular air communication between Sochi and Frankfurt will make it possible to connect the actively developing resort with the largest transportation hub of Europe, which will imply the increase of tourist traffic to the Black Sea coast of the country, secure the growth of investments into this region, and enhance the Europeans’ interest in the South of Russia.

From official Aeroflot press release.

Ok, I didn’t even know this, but just found out that the Voronya Cave (aka Krubera-Voronia Cave) located in neighbouring Abkhazia is the deepest known cave in the world! Yesterday, a group of Russian speleologists on their expedition already hit mark of 1770 meters.

Travel.ru reports that Austrian Airlines are looking to add new routs from Vienna to Russia. Volgograd, Nizhny Novgorod, Voronezh, and Sochi are the destination cities that are being considered.

15 billion rubles (~US $565 mil) will be spent on improving communications infrastructure in Sochi, if the city Olympics bid wins. If not, then 4 billion rubbles (~US $150 mil).

The completion of seven out of ten planned projects does not depend on IOCs decision on where 2014 Winter Olympics will take place. The remaining thee, most expensive ones, will only be completed if Sochi gets the Games. More fiberoptic lines, HDTV and digital radio projects, A Tetra mobile radio communication network for 100 Olympic family user groups (10,000 subscribers), and electrical and postal communications projects are part of program federal government is committed to. Read the rest of this entry »

Organizers of the Moscow International independent film festival “Supernova” are planning to move the festival, which takes place during summer, to Sochi. Sochi is already a home to one of the Russia’s biggest film festivals – “Kinotavr”.