Russian Travel Digest

22 March 2019 - Thomas Cook Group announces that it has agreed to enter into a joint venture agreement with Ionic Invest, to buy the tour operator of Biblio Globus, one of the largest tour operators in Russia. The joint venture, in which Thomas Cook intends to assume a 30% minority stake, will give Thomas Cook a leading position in a growing market, help to further diversify the Group's customer base, and enable it to secure additional flight capacity to support the future growth in its existing Russian business...

Among Russian tourist Myanmar is less popular country in Southeast Asia. However, Myanmar (several years ago known as Burma) is successfully increasing tourism popularity, although not so fast as, for example, neighboring Vietnam,   According to the official tourism statistics of Myanmar, in 2016 this country hosted 5,487 Russian tourists, which is 0.43% of the total tourist flow. This, however, is more than the number of Austrians (4,857) or New Zealanders (5,026), who arrived in Myanmar that year...

Laos is a singular country of the Indochinese Peninsula, which has no coastline, so beach lovers have nothing to do here. Those, who are interested in untouched nature and treasures of ancient cultures, go to Laos. There are many beautiful Buddhist temples and palaces in Laos. Thus, the city of Luang Prabang with its royal palace and the Wat Phou Buddhist temple near the city of Champasak are included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. The cave city, which is located in the north of the country on the Mekong River, also is very popular among tourists...

Thailand is in the TOP 10 foreign countries visited by Russian tourists. According to the annually published data of Rosstat, Rosturism and the Ministry of Tourism and Sports of Thailand, the country was visited by: 2015 year - 675,089 Russian tourists 2016 year - 866,597 Russian tourists  2017 year - 1,094,000 Russian tourists  2018 year - 1,700,000 Russian tourists  At the media briefing held during ASEAN Tourism Forum 2019 in Vietnam it was announced by the representative of the Ministry of Tourism...

Singapore Airlines was named the "Best Asian Airline" in Russia and the CIS countries by the Business Traveller for the third year in a row. Singapore Airlines already received this Award in 2016 and 2017. The ceremony took place in Moscow on November, 15, 2018.   Business Traveller Awards are given annually for outstanding achievements and innovations in the field of business tourism. In 2018,  37 nominations were presented in 5 categories: "Airlines", "Airports", "Destinations - Business Traveler's Choice", "Hotels", "Arsenal"...

From April 29, 2019, S7 Airlines will start flights from Pulkovo to the Italian island of Sardinia. The flights will be operated to the city of Olbia and will become a novelty in the new schedule of St. Petersburg air harbor. The flights of S7 Airlines from Pulkovo to Sardinia will be performed on Mondays and Fridays. "On Mondays, departure from Pulkovo Airport is at 09:35, arrival in Olbia - at 12:35 local time. The return flight departs at 13:35 and arrives in St. Petersburg at 18:30. Departure from St...

Thailand is the most popular foreign destination for the Russian travelers this New Year festive season, the Russian Association of Tour Operators (ATOR) has said. Among the domestic destination Sochi turned out as the most popular winter resort, the tourism industry Association revealed. “Thailand’s beaches and Sochi’s ski resorts competed fiercely for Russian travelers this New Year festive season, being the top destinations of choice for tourists from European and Asian parts of the country...

TUI Russia tour operator has developed a flight program in Cyprus for the summer of 2019. The company will have its own charter program from Moscow to Paphos as a novelty of the season, and the total cost of tours in this area may be reduced by 10%. The charter flights of the tour operator TUI Russia on the wings of Ural Airlines from Moscow (Domodedovo) to Larnaca will be operated until April, 24, weekly on 3 and 6 days, and from April 26 to September 30 - already daily. In addition, flights to Larnaca are scheduled from St...

By the results of 2018, Greece hosted a record number of foreign tourists. The Russian market showed a good result - it is on the 6-th position in the TOP-10 key source markets of Greece.  The past year ended with a new historical record for Greek tourism: Greece was visited by 33 million foreign visitors, which brought for the country's economy more than 16 billion Euros of income. In an interview with local media, the Minister of Tourism Elena Kuntura highlighted the huge contribution of tourism to the Greek economy...

Most Russian tourists said, when choosing a ski resort, first of all they pay attention to the height of mountains and weather conditions (50%) at the resort, as well as a variety of tracks for different levels of skiing (44%). These are the results of a survey, which was conducted by online booking service Ostrovok.ru, in which more than 1,000 tourists took part. In this case, women, unlike men, think that it is more important that the resort has a large number of tracks suitable for clients with different levels of skiing - 53% against 41%, respectively...

The seasonal decline in sales in the post-New Year period affected all Caribbean destinations. However, the prices for Mexico fall more than others - for some dates they fall even below the level of more budgetary Cuba.  Thus, the minimum cost of a nine-day tour to Mexico with departure from Moscow in the second half of January starts from 85 thousand Rubles (1,125 Euros) for two persons. Observers connect this with an increase of charter traffic on the Caribbean destinations, which has led to its excess...

In 2018 a record number of Russian tourists visited Vietnam: more than 600 thousand people. However, the dynamics of growth in tourist flow from the Russian Federation showed a clear slowdown, the last months of the year even showed a decline  According to the Vietnamese National Tourism Administration (VNAT), in 2018 606,637 tourist arrivals from the Russian Federation were recorded in the country.  Russia showed the sixth result among all foreign markets by the number of tourists, following after traditional Asian neighbors of Vietnam - China, Korea, Japan, Taiwan, as well as the USA...