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Walking routes in Moscow

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      Nikulin at the wheel, the clock with animals and the Apothecaries' Garden

      ⏱ 1 h 10 min🚶 2.6 km🍽 1📍 4 stops
      🐢 A little — under 3 km

      A photo “at the wheel” at the Nikulin monument, the famous fairy-tale clock on the Obraztsov Theatre and a walk through the oldest botanical garden. You can finish with a late lunch.

      👶 With kids🎨 Art⏱ An hour or so
      👶 3–6, 7–12 years · ✓ stroller-friendly

      The theatre has a lift (map at puppet.ru, administrator's help +7 495 699-33-10). There are no lifts at Tsvetnoy Bulvar and Sukharevskaya — better to take a bus or taxi along the Garden Ring.

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      1. 1
        🚶 Tsvetnoy Boulevard
        A short boulevard with a small park and a fountain between the Garden Ring and Trubnaya Square; the circus and the Central Market are nearby.
        Start at the Nikulin Circus: find the monument to Yuri Nikulin by the old car and take a photo “at the wheel”. Then a 7-minute walk to the theatre
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Tsvetnoy Boulevard
        © Roman Balabin · CC BY-SA 3.0
        • The boulevard follows the bed of the Neglinnaya: in 1819 the river was put into an underground pipe.
        • The name comes from the flower market that worked here from 1851; before that the boulevard was called Trubny.
        • The Mir concert hall (no. 11) occupies an octagonal building of 1881 built for showing panoramas.
        • The poet Valery Bryusov lived in mansion no. 22 in 1878–1910.
        • On Tsvetnoy Boulevard the Vayner brothers set the murder of detective Vasya Vekshin in "The Era of Mercy".
      2. 🚶 on foot
      3. 2
        ✨ Obraztsov Puppet Theatre and the animal clock
        Садовая-Самотёчная ул., 3
        🎟 partly ticketed · the animal clock is free, performances require a ticket
        The country's main puppet theater on the Garden Ring, with a famous fairy-tale clock on its facade and a puppet museum.
        We look from outside: on the facade is a clock with animals — every hour one of twelve characters comes out of a little house, so time it for the top of the hour. The show and the museum are separate
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Obraztsov Puppet Theatre and the animal clock
        © Чръный человек · CC BY 4.0
        • The facade clock was made in 1970 to a design by the sculptors Dmitry Shakhovskoy and Pavel Shimes; the mechanism was designed by Veniamin Kalmanson.
        • Every hour one of the 12 little houses opens and a fairy-tale character comes out to the tune of "Vo sadu li, v ogorode", and at exactly noon all 12 open.
        • The theater was founded in 1931; in its first years it had no stage of its own, and sets were carried on a cart pulled by a gelding named Kater.
        • The building on the Garden Ring was originally built for Stanislavsky's Opera and Drama Theatre; construction was stopped and the building was reworked for the puppeteers by 1970.
        • The 1950 show "An Unusual Concert" has been performed more than 10,000 times in over 90 countries.
        • During the war the theater sent 16 concert brigades to the front, which gave 328 performances.
        • The theatrical puppet museum has more than 4,000 exhibits, from antiquity to the present day.
        • Since 2006 a bronze monument to Sergey Obraztsov with his favorite puppet Carmen has stood by the theater.
      4. 🚶 on foot
      5. 3
        🌳 Apothecaries' Garden (Aptekarsky Ogorod)
        пр-т Мира, 26, стр. 1
        🚪 entrance from Prospekt Mira
        🎟 ticket
        Russia's oldest botanical garden, founded under Peter I, with a pond, greenhouses and centuries-old trees.
        A walk through Russia's oldest botanical garden: avenues, a pond and greenhouses (tickets at hortus.ru; the paths in the greenhouses are narrow). From here it's a 5-minute walk to the restaurant. Yekaterininsky Park is currently closed for improvements until the end of 2026
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Apothecaries' Garden (Aptekarsky Ogorod)
        © MBH · CC BY 4.0
        • The garden was founded in 1706, when the state garden of medicinal plants was moved here from beneath the Kremlin walls.
        • Peter I planted a spruce, a fir and a larch here himself; according to legend, one larch survives to this day.
        • The first director in 1735–1742 was the botanist Traugott Gerber, after whom the gerbera flower is named.
        • In 1805 Moscow University bought the garden for 11,000 silver roubles.
        • The Palm Greenhouse was built in 1891.
        • The white willow growing here is considered the oldest tree in central Moscow.
      6. 🚶 on foot
      7. 4
        🍽 Ribambelle Family Restaurant · 🧸 play area
        Ботанический пер., 5 (у Аптекарского огорода)
        ▮▮▮▯▯
        A late lunch: a play town with entertainers while the parents eat. Book a table on weekends
        🍴 A restaurant-club for families with a big play town, entertainers and workshops for kids. What to order: salmon tartare, duck leg confit.

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