Must-see attractions in Tomsk

  • Memorial Museum

    Tomsk

    The gloomy basement of this former NKVD (proto-KGB) building is now a museum dedicated to the unspeakable horrors that took place here. Look out for the…

  • University & Siberian Botanical Gardens

    Tomsk

    The classically colonnaded main buildings of the university lie in resplendently leafy grounds, giving Tomsk the sobriquet ‘Oxford of Siberia’. Most of…

  • Ploshchad Lenina

    Tomsk

    Central pl Lenina isn’t really a square so much as a jumbled collection of beautifully restored historic buildings interspersed with banal Soviet concrete…

  • Tomsk Regional Museum

    Tomsk

    Housed in the splendid Atashev Palace, this modest museum has a 2500-year-old bear amulet and an interesting exhibit on the Great Tea Trail. But it's the…

  • Resurrection Hill

    Tomsk

    This dimple-sized hill was the location of Tomsk’s original fortress, and the replica of its central wooden spasskaya bashnya (savior's tower), which…

  • Tomsk Historical Museum

    Tomsk

    Up on Resurrection Hill, this museum's moderately interesting collection of old artefacts, clothing and recreations of old homes is well-presented, with…

  • Chekhov Statue

    Tomsk

    On the riverbank, this cheeky Chekhov statue was sculpted in bronze for the 400th anniversary of the city’s founding. Rubbing its well-polished nose is…

  • WWII Memorial

    Tomsk

    A Tomsk landmark, this moving mother-and-son monument is at the very southern end of pr Lenina. The beautiful birch-tree park (Лагерный сад) here is a…

  • Tomsk Art Museum

    Tomsk

    Well worth popping into for its wide range of permanent and temporary exhibits. The highlight is the collection of 19th- and early 20th-century Russian…

  • Voznesenskaya Church

    Tomsk

    This Gothic edifice with five gold-tipped black spires has great potential as a Dracula movie set. A truly massive bell hangs in its lurid-pink belfry. In…

  • Iverskaya Chapel

    Tomsk

    Topped with a golden angel and right beside a Lenin statue, is the Iverskaya Chapel whose celebrated icon is dubbed ‘Tomsk’s Spiritual Gateway’.

  • Dragon House

    Tomsk

    Grand wooden mansions stand along ul Krasnoarmeyskaya including the late-19th-cenury Dragon House which is home to a clinic and a couple of dragons.

  • Russian-German House

    Tomsk

    The spired, bright-turquoise Russian-German House (1904) is among several grand wooden mansions along ul Krasnoarmeyskaya.

  • Catholic Church

    Tomsk

    Up on Resurrection Hill, this pretty Catholic church dates to 1883. There are often a couple of nuns around the compound.

  • Prospekt Lenina 56

    Tomsk

    This lovely old house marks the start of a street that's home to a number of attractive wooden buildings.

  • Former Trading Arches

    Tomsk

    The former trading arches sit just west of the Soviet-built Tomsk Drama Theatre.

  • Per Kononova 2

    Tomsk

    This is where the doomed communist mastermind Sergei Kirov lodged in 1905.

  • Peacock House

    Tomsk

    The fan-gabled Peacock House (early 20th century) is a classic landmark.

  • Lenin Statue

    Tomsk

    This frustrated Lenin statue, now relegated to a traffic circle, points at the ugly concrete of the Tomsk Drama Theatre, apparently demanding ‘build more…

  • Red Mosque

    Tomsk

    This modest mosque, dating from 1904, was used as a vodka factory by the atheist Soviets, but was reopened to worshippers in 1997.

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