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Take a trip to Christmas on the retro train!
Take a trip to Christmas on the retro train!
The Christmas retro train has become one of the symbols of the Russian Christmas Festival. It is also for tradition: before the October Revolution, the Shuisko-Ivanovskaya railroad used to run a special train on Christmas Day and during the celebration of the Shuiskaya Icon of the Mother of God.
There are 4 types of coach classes:
Dining-car
Retro coach
Standart coach with area for children
Lux coach
Dining-car
Retro coach
Standart coach with area for children
Lux coach
What Can Travelers Expect?
Journey by steam traction, as the railroaders call it, takes you back in time and creates a magical atmosphere. Just imagine: at departure, a mighty locomotive, wrapped in a cloud of steam, ringing out the surroundings with a resounding, tinkling whistle. The forgotten music of travel is reviving: the sound of the “cut off” point of the steam engine, that forgotten "choo-choo" sound that we know only from cartoons or old movies. The cars swaying and jerking gently, responding to the steam engine’s movements. Dense clouds of exhaust steam flying outside the window, and on a sunny day you can also see little rainbows. In the dark, the train looks even more fabulous: the cozy lights of the windows, the floodlit column of smoke.
During the trip you will learn how the railroad between Shuya and Ivanovo-Voznesensk (now Ivanovo) was built, the history of the stations, the features of traffic in pre-revolutionary times, the traditions of rail travelling. You will listen about all these topics during the audio tour created by railway historians: Maria Kalish, a senior researcher at the Museum of Moscow, and Yuri Egorov, a coordinator of the Archnadzor public movement, candidate of technical sciences and author of various articles and guidebooks. Travelers will be able to talk with them live on December 25 and January 6-9.
Special mention about the end points of the Christmas train journey should also be made. They are the stations in Ivanovo and Shuya, both renovated in 2020.
The grandiose Ivanovo railway station, built in 1933 in the style of constructivism, impresses not only by its size, but also by its bright spaces of the Blue and Red Halls, where elements of different eras are carefully recreated. The simple lines of constructivism, the stucco decoration of the Stalinist style of the 1950s, and elements of the late Soviet modernism of the 1970s and 1980s are all complemented by modern prints inspired by the famous soviet propaganda textiles.
Shuya railway station takes you to a completely different era. This fairy-tale little building with carved platbands and a brick patterned doorway was built in 1896. During the restoration in 2020, the building acquired its original appearance.
The waiting room and ticket office were transformed, the original ceilings and cast-iron columns were restored, and the station clock, an integral attribute of railroad stations, was returned to the rooftop tower.
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