Day 12: The All-Russian Exhibition Center

The All-Russian Exhibition Center was originally opened as an agricultural fair in 1939, renamed after World War II to the Economic Achievements Exhibition (VDNKh, the name of the metro stop), and renamed again after the collapse of the Soviet Union to the present All-Russian Exhibition Center (VVT).  It still has a very “fair” like atmosphere with carnival games, pavilions, kiddie rides, and a Ferris wheel.

The park itself is very large, so we took one of the mini train rides to the far end of the park and worked our way back

Jasper loves trains, particularly Thomas the Tank Engine, so naturally he was pretty pumped up for this!	A Yak-42 which you can climb into for 150 rubles ($5).  The sign said free admission for war veterans, though somehow I don’t think that applies to American war veterans…

One of the pavilions we walked through was currently focusing on agriculture (everything from infomercial-style gardening tools to tulip bulbs).  It was extremely grand and looked like it might have been used for various rallies in the past.  Ironically, the actual name for the pavilion is the “Space” pavilion.  Some of the other pavilions are named after the former Soviet Republics (e.g. the “Armenia” pavilion") housing everything from a go-kart track to electronics shops to paintings.

The inside of the space pavilion.  All of the agricultural shops/kiosks are located at the entrance at the far end while the area we are standing in contains a large dome with “Glory to the Heroes of Socialist Labor” inscribed in the wall and a partially covered up picture of a man I couldn’t make out.  This pavilion has seen better days, though it is in better condition than the Nazi Party Kongresshalle in Nuremberg.

The People’s Friendship Fountain, located inside the All-Russian Exhibition Center. The sixteen gilded women are each clad in the national dress of their respective Soviet states, with enormous sheaves of wheat in the center to represent the bountiful produce of the worker’s paradise.

We ate lunch at a “Кофе Хаус” – literally and phonetically, “Coffee House” open-air restaurant.	One of the amusement-park type rides located throughout the exhibition center.

On our way back towards the entrance, we ran into the most amazing thing ever: an instant pizza machine!  Sure enough, you put 200 rubles into the machine, press a button, and it cooks your pizza in about two minutes!  Even though we’d just finished lunch, we couldn’t pass up a novelty like this…

Hot pizza at the press of a button?  Sounds like a great idea to me!	Om nom nom!

A statue of Lenin in front of the central pavilion building – and yes, the building still has “Union of Soviet Socialist Republics” inscribed beneath the hammer and sickle.

We went over to take a ride on the Ferris Wheel, which was built to celebrate Moscow’s 850th year back in 1997.  The seven-minute ride was somewhat of a letdown – you can clearly see the All-Russian Exhibition Center grounds and the Ostankino TV Tower, but the exhibition center itself is pretty far from the city center so you can’t see any of the famous sites like Red Square or the Kremlin from there.  When it was first built it was the tallest Ferris wheel in Europe at 240 feet, though this has since been superseded by others such as the London Eye (440 feet).

The real highlight (at least for Dad and I) was a full-motion racing simulator which we cost about $8 per ride.  Some background first: Dad loves cars – driving them, taking care of them, you name it, he loves cars.  One of his dreams is someday after he retires is to have a full-motion racing simulator so he can still experience the joy of driving as he gets older without endangering his personal safety, the money invested in a car, or other pesky things like that.  I saw this display at the fair and I knew this was the ride for him!  You wear 3D glasses and are strapped into the chair, which rotates and moves (in concert with the screen) to give you the feeling that you’re actually racing, and it is really immersive.  We each gave it a shot and had an absolute blast!  My heart was still racing five minutes after we were done, that’s how real it felt.

One word: Awesome!	Somehow I knew that yelling at the simulated drivers wouldn’t help, but I did it anyways.

Our final stop before returning to downtown Moscow was to see the iconic “Worker and Collective Farm Girl” statue, which is clearly visible from as far away as the Cosmos Monument due to its height and prominent location on top of a building.  The building beneath it is a museum of the exhibition center, but being Monday the museum was closed.  After this, we made our way back to the metro to head to Arbat Street, a pedestrian street lined with shops, eateries, and street performers and is considered one of the most touristy places in Moscow outside of the Kremlin and Red Square.

This 80-foot tall sculpture was originally made for the 1937 World’s Fair, now perched on top of a 100-foot tall building.  This statue is also used as the symbol for the Soviet film studio Mosfilm (which by the way features free Mosfilm videos on their YouTube channel with English subtitles).