blouson tour auto optic 2000

Cars, Speed, Ego: Inside France's Tour Auto Optic 2000

By Michael Hainey

Some years ago, my friend Sam was based in Munich, revamping a magazine. One morning in early June, he called me in New York with a command: “We’re taking a road trip in my car.” If you’ve seen *The Graduate,*you know Sam’s car: a 1966 Alfa Romeo Spider 1600 Duetto, that glistening two-door convertible with a rear-view mirror the size of a butter knife which Dustin Hoffman races through the streets of L.A. in a desperate bid to find Elaine.

I bought the cheapest Lufthansa ticket I could find. Two hours after landing, Sam and I were speeding toward the Brenner Pass, climbing toward Italy. We spent the first night in the Alps, near St. Jodok am Brenner, on the Italian-Austrian border, in a friend’s rustic chalet, cooking spaghetti and draining a bottle of pinot nero. Come morning, we barreled into Italy where, for the next two weeks, we rambled through the country, spinning our way from Lake Como to Siena to the Cinque Terre. The Alfa Romeo, I learned on that trip, was like the most-perfect guide—a chrome-accented native who not only was comfortable on the back roads but seemed to have connections wherever we went. Every time we parked in front of a café or bar, the reaction was the same: Smiling locals wandered over to gaze at the car and take a photo of their kids beside it.

It was at a café in Noli, a small town on the Riviera, that an older man told me why Italians were so enamored with our ride. In the 1960s and ’70s, the Alfa Ro- meo and other sexy Italian roadsters and racers of that era—the Ferraris and Fiats—were seemingly everywhere. Brilliant machines in racer red, British green, and cobalt blue, all buzzing the back roads and autostradas. “But,” he said, “we took them for granted.” He went on to explain that one day, models like the Duetto were gone, no longer in production. “Seeing this car, it’s like seeing the most gorgeous girl from your youth. And she has re- turned. But she is still as perfect as the day you last saw her. You have aged. She has not.”

A drivers stops to greet spectators. Each car in the rally must have both a driver and a navigator—and some have a team following close behind, prepared to service the vehicle.

On that vacation, I discovered a crucial distinction between road trips: Any car can be transportation, but only a few cars can truly transport you—to a state of mind, to romance. I saw that truth on display this April when I walked into the Grand Palais in Paris and found more than 200 masterpieces of mid-century auto de- sign, all shipped there by their owners from the United States, the U.K., Italy, and elsewhere in France in ad- vance of the Tour Auto Optic 2000, an annual (and exclusive) five-day road rally that takes drivers through some of France’s most spectacular countryside and down some of its most remote roads. Everywhere I looked, I saw beauties from the 1920s through the 1980s, all the storied bloodlines of European motoring: Porsche, Maserati, Ferrari, Lamborghini, Audi, Lotus, Jaguar. (Here’s the truth about the Optic 2000: It’s like any club in that it’s open to everyone—if you meet the requirements. To drive in the Optic 2000, drivers must own a model manufactured between 1951 and 1973. Which leads to another fact: Many of these cars now sell at auction for what some people spend on Picassos.)

Most Americans are unfamiliar with European-style rallies like the Optic 2000, Goodwood in the U.K., and Italy’s equally storied Mille Miglia, which trace their lineage back to the early 20th century. In the United States, we like to watch our cars go round and round really fast on closed courses; in Europe, these heritage events are more refined. Drivers compete in three segments: Two timed-stage categories held on a race track and on a closed course at different points along the route, and straight-up driving on open public roads. And the spectatorship along the routes mirrors the glamour of the cars. The crowd is a mashup channeling the Royal Ascot, a British fox hunt, and Steve McQueen in Le Mans. As Steven Read, the owner of a gleaming red Ferrari 250 LM, told me, “We like to think of it as competitive tourism.”

A 289 AC Cobra hardtop leaving the grounds of the château.

Arati Menon

Hannah Towey

Maya Silver

Because the Optic 2000 is limited to classic cars, or what the French call VHCs (véhicules historiques de compétition), there is an inherent exclusivity: Some esti- mate the total number of qualifying cars worldwide at just 3,500. The appeal of the race, however, is not just in watching the cars spin through small villages and towns (as with the Tour de France bike race, the course is altered every year to take drivers on a new route). For the com- petitors, it is about the camaraderie. Each team consists of a driver and a navigator. Some teams this year were first-timers, but others have been doing it for decades, like the British/American duo of Fred Hampton and John Logan, who were driving a 1972 orange Porsche 911.

“What we love,” Logan told me, “is that it goes on open roads. It’s the best of its kind and the last of its kind.” And then there was Jon Pinösch and Michel Buzzi, two white-haired Swiss gents in their 60s who have been best friends since boarding school. Here they were in their tenth year in the rally, driving a 1965 Lotus Elan, a car that is impossibly chic (and made famous by Emma Peel in the original Avengers )but no bigger than a tray table. And since it is a roadster, it also has no roof. So what happens when it rains? “We get wet,” said Pinösch. “But that’s all part of it. For us, it’s about the bonds we form together and with the other people we see at each of these. I only wish I had more than two arms and two feet so I could drive more than one car at a time.”

Which is not to say the driving doesn’t get competitive. Cars. Speed. Ego. Beautiful roads. Wealth. Can one concoct a more potent mix of ingredients? There are prizes (not money, just bragging rights), and people take it all very seriously—studying not just the course for days beforehand but also how they travel. The hard-core take pride in what they call “arrive and drive”—wearing one pair of clothes and a jumpsuit for the whole trip. Since many of the cars have small trunks and the goal is to re- duce the weight they carry, stripping down the wardrobe to the minimum is something to boast about—and a connection with the heritage of long-ago drivers. On the road, days fall into an intense, precise schedule, where every minute adds up. Teams set off by 7 A.M., and the driving day is often 12 hours, broken up by a 30-minute lunch at an abbey or château nobody has time to admire. Sometimes drivers who are less experienced get a dose of what the vets call “red mist”—where your competitive nature makes you drive beyond your skill set. If you are lucky, you miss a turn. If you’re not so fortunate, you run the risk of wrapping your investment around some ancient oak tree in the Dordogne.

Classic Porsche and Jaguar models fill the halls of Paris’s Grand Palais, which had its first motor show in 1901. At the Tour Auto Optic 2000 exhibition, the public is invited to view the 223 cars that will compete in the rally.

But that seemed far away in the early-morning light of Paris, as I watched a sparkly string of gasoline-powered masterpieces make their way out of the Grand Palais, cheered on by café-toting spectators. As the cars headed along the Seine and out into the countryside, the ever-cranky and give-no-quarter drivers of Paris had their royalist roots awakened; suddenly, they were yielding to these monarchs of the highway.

The allure of this world was epitomized by Macha Vananty, a 27-year-old fashion executive from Switzerland. It’s not enough that she looks like Audrey Hepburn in *Two for the Road:*Her grandfather had raced in Europe in the '30s, and this year she drove for the first time with her father, Dominique, in his 1965 Porsche 911, serving as his navigator. As she told me in the days after the rally, what she loves about this race—and the concentrated amount of time with her dad—is the rarity of the experience. “I spent seven days traveling nearly 1,200 miles in a tiny space. It was true happiness. I had so many father-daughter moments, but I was touched most of all by the lovely people we saw, smiling and waving at us along the route. Friends having a glass of wine by the road, kids dreaming about these old-fashioned beauties roaring through their streets.”

This story was updated to correct the name of Macha Vananty.

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125 Photos Prove The Tour Auto Optic 2000 Is The Ultimate European Road Rally

Photography by Mathieu Bonnevie

There only are few things in the world that we count the days for, but for most of the petrolheads interested in vintage metal there is at least one event that’s worth a calendar countdown: the Tour Auto Optic 2000.

Throughout the months leading up to this massive French road rally (which is an homage to the original Tour de France Automobile), some of the participating cars are revealed, as well as a large part of the five-day route, just in case one needs a little material for their next daydream involving sports cars and winding roads. Here are some figures that might stoke these fantasies further: the Tour Auto involves more than 2,000km of the best driving roads France has to offer, driven over the course of five days and linking cities from Paris to Megève to Nice, 230 classic cars in participation, 10 special stages and four bonafide racing circuits. Enough to sound like one of the best road trips in the world?

Peter Auto, the organizing body of the Tour Auto Optic 2000, gave the rendezvous point to all the teams and their cars in Paris at the Grand Palais on Sunday, April 22nd. A marvelous place even without the cars, the green lattice of arches and buttresses and domes is full of airy light and complex architecture, and the glass roof overhead allowed plenty of sun to shine down on the excited gathering taking place below.

Full of cars in just a few hours, it was a already quite the scene before the first engines were fired in earnest. Heavy trucks came first to unload their cargo like huge transporters full of priceless steel and aluminum and fiberglass. Not all arrived in such fashion though, and soon after the remaining cars were arriving all around the exterior of the Grand Palais, queued to enter this gorgeous staging area.

For a few hours the Grand Palais turned into a different type attraction than it is for the rest of the year for the tourists walking around, and in the evening the doors were closed on the grouping of cars waiting within, all perfectly aligned and segmented by provenance or marque or alongside former competitors.

The following day was time for technical verifications, final prep work, and of course, the application of the event liveries. It was also the opportunity to nose about in the isles to have a closer look at the cars that would soon be leaving Paris en masse. The Grand Palais is such a beautiful background to watch the lineups of Alpine A110s, Porsche 911s and 356s, Ferrari 275s, Jaguar MK2s, Cobras, BMW 3.0 CSLs, you name it. For the 2018 running of the event, the Peter Auto group decided to dedicate the edition to extinct Italian marques with a fine selection of Oscas, muscled DeTomasos, tiny Autobianchis, and a rare Siata thrown into the mix.

But beside this highlighted handful of Italians in that corral, some rarities of different origin were impossible not to ogle as well, cars such as an incredible Shelby Daytona Cobra and a Ferrari 250 Mille Miglia. Watching all these cars side-by-side getting ready to hit the road got everyone excited to leave Paris, but we would have to wait one more day.

On Tuesday, in the very early morning, the procession of starting cars woke up the city as we left the Grand Palais to reach the Château de Courances, just south of Paris, for the official starting line of the Tour Auto. 7AM, with road books in hands, the cars set off in the direction of Besançon, in the east of France. We crossed numerous landscapes with blooming fields and hillsides signaling the coming summer, and of course, plenty of picturesque villages. You can’t imagine the number of people stopped on the side of the road waiting for and watching the infinite convoy of racing and classic cars! Eventually we stopped and had lunch at the Circuit de Dijon-Prenois after the first special stage of the week. We ended the day with a huge mechanical overhaul on the paddock of Besançon and we already counted the first cars to abandon the Tour. The Tour Auto is a tough race after all, going from sunrise to the sunset for a five days in a row; winning is great, but the most important thing is to simply finish.

Day 2, Wednesday, saw us driving through the first mountain roads of the week, with two special stages and the Circuit de Bresse, pretty intense for the cars and drivers! Just before we arrived in Megève the road book made us climb the Col de Aravis which offered snow but also one of the best sunsets I’ve been witness to, during a driving event or otherwise. I was looking forward to this road all day, but sadly it was quite cloudy when we arrived for the sunset. However, a lucky gust of wind blew away the offending clouds and allowed the sun to pop out for a few minutes just as it was setting behind the mountains. A memorable moment, to say the least!

The next morning we set off in our convoy again, and we quickly reached the South of France, arriving in the city of Avignon. Once again, breathtaking narrow mountain roads were chosen for the route, and picnic baskets allowed the pilots and co-pilots to stop here and there for lunch as they pleased, giving exceptional scenes: where else in the world can you see a 911 3.0 RS stopped in a mountain pass with the wing used as a picnic table?

The second part of the day was a bit more hectic because of an incident that forced the cancellation of one of the planned special stages, and so the cars bypassed it and instead went straight to the next stop, one of the most beautiful racetracks of France: Lédenon. The day ended in a medieval-era palace in the heart of Avignon: the Palais de Papes. We would have spent the whole night here if we were not already so exhausted!

The journey on Day 4 was a huge loop of driving that would reach Aix-en-Provence through the vineyards and the typical Provencal roads. The first special stage of the day offered a wonderful view on one of the most famous mountains of France: the Mont Ventoux. The lunch place of the day allowed me some time to walk around the parking lot, inspecting the cars that I’d seen shined up and pristine a few days earlier, now covered in dirt and bugs and sporting a few new stone chips earned along the way. This is how I like them the most: when they are used! The day ended at the country’s famed Circuit Paul Ricard, recognizable for its red and blue run-off lines.

Of course, the final day had to come at some point, but if we were sad to see the end of the week on the horizon, it was great fun getting there: it usually takes about two hours to reach Nice from Aix-en-Provence, but with the Tour Auto the journey was cast out across an entire day of exquisite driving. It was certainly a busy one, with three special stages meaning no leftover time for a circuit like in days past.

The Day 5 drive started in the village market and soon put our pack of cars in the mountains again, and at some points along the cliffside roadway, we were quite literally in the mountains as we scurried along under the stone archways and through the tunnels cut into the intense landscape.

Just before we could see the Mediterranean Sea, the final stage of the Tour Auto took the road of the mythical Col du Turini! The Rallye Monte-Carlo atmosphere was pretty surreal at times, and whenever we were alone on the road it really felt like time had skipped back a few decades. Our arrival in Nice was met a huge surprise when we saw James Cottingham and Andrew Smith pushing their GT40. They led the Tour Auto from the beginning, but they unfortunately broke their gearbox in the penultimate stage of the week! The Champagne was instead showering in front of a tiny Lotus Elan 26R with huge smiles on the faces of its excited pilots, Raphaël Favaro and Yves Badan. However it may have felt to finish first, it’s hard not to think of everyone involved as having won simply by participating.

These are great photos. It was always interesting who is involved in the transportation of such cars to the place of the event, are these special companies like https://shipcar24.com/ that can do this, or is it done by the owners of the car?

Wow, just spectacular. I am feeling much envy at this moment!

Cracking set of pictures and a great article. Having also followed Tour Auto across France and taken lots of pictures, the route and the entry really ensure no one set of pictures is the same!

Superb and well written article too. One for the travel list.

I see a few Autobianchi a112s and a Fiat but not much evidence of the other small Italians, would love to have seen an Autobianchi transformable, quite possibly the cutest car ever built ;o)

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Tour Auto Optic 2000: A historic rally

No need to introduce the legendary Tour Auto Optic 2000. Each year, just over 200 participants come together to rally from Paris to Biarritz behind the wheels of their racing cars of yesteryear. It would be no surprise to see a 1951 Nash-Healey Roadster on the road, or a 1971 Ferrari Dino 246 GT or a Porsche 911 Type 996.

A sporting production in a historic setting

The starting point of this legendary race is located in the centre of the capital and more specifically at the Grand Palais, which Options Décoration sets up and organises for these classic cars before they set off on their grand adventure. It takes our teams three days, during which they work tirelessly to fit out this famous sporting event without impairing the historic monument which plays host to this occasion. From the installation of the floor through to the assembly of stands for sponsors, along with signage, partitions and buffet tables, etc. We carefully blend aesthetics with practicality by using special materials, designed for the automobile industry and the site hosting the event.

Car makes no longer around

One of the distinctive features of the Tour Auto 2017 lies in the participation of several car makes that no longer exist these days. You perhaps recognise some of them, such as BSH, CG, DB, Hotchkiss, Ligier, Panhard or even René Bonnet. Spotlight on 3 such brands!

Panhard: Panhard & Levassor was a French make established in 1891. Specialising in luxury vehicles with cutting edge technology, it reached its peak in the 1920-1930s with the launch of its its iconic model, the Dynamic, which was extremely innovative for its time. Unfortunately, due to insufficient financial resources and too small a range, Panhard ended up disappearing in 1967. Today, this prestigious name only now appears on military vehicles, “Panhard défense” which equips the French army with light vehicles.

Hotchkiss: In the beginning, Hotchkiss was a weapon and munitions manufacturer located in Aveyron in 1870. At the beginning of the 20th century, the brand entered into car manufacturing and positioned itself between mass-production car manufacturing and luxury vehicles with the slogan: “la voiture du juste milieu” [“the happy medium car”]. The Second World War seriously impaired production which only resumed in 1946. Anecdotally, it was in a convertible Hotchkiss that Général de Gaulle made his first trips through liberated Paris. Unfortunately, the Hotchkiss momentum was stopped short due to several mergers and the production of private vehicles ceased definitively in July 1954.

René Bonnet: Initially associated with Charles Deutsch, René Bonnet launched his own brand in 1962 and released its flagship model: the René Bonnet Missile. Small and light, with a composite body, this small cabriolet maxed out at 150 kph (93 mph)! Unfortunately, the model did not evolve further due to a new René Bonnet project, the Djet. Success was not on the cards and in the end, René Bonnet was forced to sell his company to Matra in 1964.

Source : https://www.auto-ies.com/

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The Tour Auto Optic starts on Tuesday 31 August with 230 cars in Paris. Alexandre Gouble sent us the first pics on arriving cars.

The 5-day-adventure will begin in brand new setting: The Grand Palais Ephémère on the Champ-de-Mars in Paris.

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The Tour Auto Optic 2000 is one of the most prestigious historic racing events in the world. As early as 1899, l’Automobile Club de France organised its first edition, as a mix of road stages and circuit clocked runs, with regularity sections between the stages. Gaining a certain degree of popularity with time, the ‘old’ edition of the Tour reached its high point in the early ‘70s when a number of the then Formula 1 drivers took the start of the race in parallel with their regular GP and Endurance duties.

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Moscow Metro Tour

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Description

Moscow metro private tours.

• 2-hour tour $87:  10 Must-See Moscow Metro stations with hotel pick-up and drop-off
• 3-hour tour $137:  20 Must-See Moscow Metro stations with Russian lunch in beautifully-decorated Metro Diner + hotel pick-up and drop off. 
• Metro pass is included in the price of both tours.

Highlight of Metro Tour

• Visit 10 must-see stations of Moscow metro on 2-hr tour and 20 Metro stations on 3-hr tour, including grand Komsomolskaya station with its distinctive Baroque décor, aristocratic Mayakovskaya station with Soviet mosaics, legendary Revolution Square station with 72 bronze sculptures and more!
• Explore Museum of Moscow Metro and learn a ton of technical and historical facts;
• Listen to the secrets about the Metro-2, a secret line supposedly used by the government and KGB;
• Experience a selection of most striking features of Moscow Metro hidden from most tourists and even locals;
• Discover the underground treasure of Russian Soviet past – from mosaics to bronzes, paintings, marble arches, stained glass and even paleontological elements;
• Learn fun stories and myths about Coffee Ring, Zodiac signs of Moscow Metro and more;
• Admire Soviet-era architecture of pre- and post- World War II perious;
• Enjoy panoramic views of Sparrow Hills from Luzhniki Metro Bridge – MetroMost, the only station of Moscow Metro located over water and the highest station above ground level;
• If lucky, catch a unique «Aquarelle Train» – a wheeled picture gallery, brightly painted with images of peony, chrysanthemums, daisies, sunflowers and each car unit is unique;
• Become an expert at navigating the legendary Moscow Metro system;
• Have fun time with a very friendly local;
• + Atmospheric Metro lunch in Moscow’s the only Metro Diner (included in a 3-hr tour)

Hotel Pick-up

Metro stations:.

Komsomolskaya

Novoslobodskaya

Prospekt Mira

Belorusskaya

Mayakovskaya

Novokuznetskaya

Revolution Square

Sparrow Hills

+ for 3-hour tour

Victory Park

Slavic Boulevard

Vystavochnaya

Dostoevskaya

Elektrozavodskaya

Partizanskaya

Museum of Moscow Metro

• Drop-off  at your hotel, Novodevichy Convent, Sparrow Hills or any place you wish
• + Russian lunch  in Metro Diner with artistic metro-style interior for 3-hour tour

Fun facts from our Moscow Metro Tours:

From the very first days of its existence, the Moscow Metro was the object of civil defense, used as a bomb shelter, and designed as a defense for a possible attack on the Soviet Union.

At a depth of 50 to 120 meters lies the second, the coded system of Metro-2 of Moscow subway, which is equipped with everything you need, from food storage to the nuclear button.

According to some sources, the total length of Metro-2 reaches over 150 kilometers.

The Museum was opened on Sportivnaya metro station on November 6, 1967. It features the most interesting models of trains and stations.

Coffee Ring

The first scheme of Moscow Metro looked like a bunch of separate lines. Listen to a myth about Joseph Stalin and the main brown line of Moscow Metro.

Zodiac Metro

According to some astrologers, each of the 12 stops of the Moscow Ring Line corresponds to a particular sign of the zodiac and divides the city into astrological sector.

Astrologers believe that being in a particular zadiac sector of Moscow for a long time, you attract certain energy and events into your life.

Paleontological finds 

Red marble walls of some of the Metro stations hide in themselves petrified inhabitants of ancient seas. Try and find some!

• Every day each car in  Moscow metro passes  more than 600 km, which is the distance from Moscow to St. Petersburg.
• Moscow subway system is the  5th in the intensity  of use (after the subways of Beijing, Tokyo, Seoul and Shanghai).
• The interval in the movement of trains in rush hour is  90 seconds .

What you get:

• + A friend in Moscow.
• + Private & customized Moscow tour.
• + An exciting pastime, not just boring history lessons.
• + An authentic experience of local life.
• + Flexibility during the walking tour: changes can be made at any time to suit individual preferences.
• + Amazing deals for breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the very best cafes & restaurants. Discounts on weekdays (Mon-Fri).
• + A photo session amongst spectacular Moscow scenery that can be treasured for a lifetime.
• + Good value for souvenirs, taxis, and hotels.
• + Expert advice on what to do, where to go, and how to make the most of your time in Moscow.

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Moscow Metro Tour - With Ratings

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• Sightseeing Tours

Moscow Metro Tour

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Tour Information

Key Details

• Free Cancellation
• Duration: 1 Hr 30 Mins
• Language: English
• Departure Details : Get to the Biblioteka imeni Lenina (Lenin's Library, Red Line) or Alexandrovsky Sad (Alexander Garden, Light Blue Line) metro station. Use any exit. Find the Kutafia Tower of the Kremlin. The guide .. read more

The Moscow Metro has a long history to it. Also, the city has an extremely beautiful subway. It is very well maintained and is also extremely decorated. Each station and spot has a different artistic aspect to it. On this tour, experience the efficiency of Moscow Metro.

• Roam around the Revolution Square, with magnificent sculptures of the Soviet people
• Visit the Kurskaya Station Lobby, the Hall of Fame of the WWII
• Be awestruck at the Komsomolskaya , with impressive mural mosaics of Russian glorious victories
• See the artistic side of Novoslobodskaya , with the stained glass, although under the ground.

Know More about this tour

Take our Moscow Metro Tour and discover why our subway is recognized as the most beautiful in the world!

"They used to have palaces for kings, we are going to build palaces for the people!" said one of the main architects of the Soviet subway.

With us you will see the most beautiful metro stations in Moscow built under Stalin: Komsomolskaya, Revolution square, Novoslobodskaya, Mayakovskaya. Our guide will tell fascinating stories and secrets hidden underground, urban legends and funny stories.

How many babies were born on the Moscow metro? Where is the secret Metro 2? How deep is the Moscow metro? And where did Stalin give his speech in November 1941? Join out Metro tour and find out!

• Metro ticket

Cancellation Policy

• If you cancel between 0 hrs To 24 hrs before scheduled tour departure, the cancellation charge will be 100%
• If you cancel between 1 days To 180 days before scheduled tour departure, the cancellation charge will be 0%
• Please note that in case of No show, the cancellation charge will be 100% of the listed tour fare.
• Please note tours booked using discount coupon codes will be non refundable.
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Tour Details

Moscow metro tour: architectural styles of the subway.

Duration: 2 hours

Categories: Culture & History, Sightseeing

This metro tour of Russia’s capital and most populous city, Moscow, is your chance to get a unique insight into the beautiful and impressive architecture of the city's underground stations. Admire their marble walls and high ceilings representing Stalin's desire for glory after World War 2, and see first-hand how the interiors change with the rise of new political eras. Your guide will lead you through the complex network, which is one of the most heavily used rapid transit systems worldwide, with over two billion travelers in 2011.

Opened in 1935, Moscow’s underground system, now 190 miles (305 km) long with 185 stations, is today one the largest and most heavily used rapid transit systems in the world. On this Moscow metro tour, discover the impressive architecture of Moscow’s underground stations and learn how they reflect the Soviet era.

Getting around by metro, your local guide will take you through parts of Moscow’s infamous history. Stop at stations built during the time of the USSR (Soviet Union) that are praised as one of the most extravagant architectural projects from Stalin’s time. After World War 2, he was keen on establishing Stalinist architecture to represent his rising regime and a recognized empire. Learn how when his successor started the de-Stalinization of the former Soviet Union in 1953, the extravagancy of the architecture was toned down.

Discover how the unique character of each station reflected several different eras. While stations like Kievskaya and Slavyansky Bulvar have pompous halls and high stucco ceilings brimming with extravagant decorations, those built later, like Volzhskaya, are lightly adorned with sparse furnishings. Architect Alexey Dushkin and painter Alexander Deyneka were just two of the many artists who made these magnificent landmarks possible.

Revel in Moscow's glory days, as well as the years of scarcity, on this fascinating Moscow metro experience. Conclude your tour at one of the central stations in Moscow. If you're lucky, you may even find the secret entrance to the unconfirmed Metro-2, a parallel underground system used by the government -- a mystery which has neither been denied nor confirmed today.

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Culture Shock Rating

We have a wide range of tours designed to give you an insight into the destination you're travelling in and there is something for everybody. The culture shock ratings considers the destination visited, transport used, activities undertaken and that "Wow, I'm really not at home now!" factor. While generalisations are always tricky, a summary of our gradings is as follows…

This is the least confronting of our tour range. Transport used on the trip is either private or a very comfortable public option, the activities included are usually iconic sites and locations that are not all too confronting.

The tour can include a mix of private and public transport providing a level of comfort that is slightly below what you would experience at home. Sites visited are usually iconic sites, tours can also include market visits, visits to communities etc that provide the traveller with a fantastic insight into destination.

Expect to rough it for parts of this tour, whether it's a packed public bus where you are forced to stand, a visit to a local market, a local community, you are sure to have an experience that is very different from what you're used to at home.

The comforts of your home town and the environment you are used to are more of a rarity. Expect some challenging transport options, visits to local sites and areas that don't resemble anything at home.

You're out there in the global community! You are likely to be exposed to the elements, travel in whatever means of transport is available and basically take it as it comes, whatever comes! It can be tough.

Physical Rating

Our physical rating gives you an idea of how much huffing and puffing you can expect on the tour. While generalisations are always tricky, a summary of our gradings is as follows…

These tours have very limited physical activity. Usually climbing in and out of the transport provided, walking through sites, markets etc included in the itinerary.

These tours have a bit of physical activity but nothing that should challenge you too much. This could be climbing on and off public transport through to a walk through the destination you're travelling in, they can include walking only tours or a combination of walking and transport.

These tours involve a bit of physical activity from walking up and down hills in the destination you're travelling in or the surrounding areas. Climbing on and off local transport or riding a bike up to 30 kms along predominantly flat terrain or jumping in a kayak for a gentle paddle on flat water.

These Tours will provide you with some solid physical activity. Whether its bike riding, walking, trekking, kayaking or riding on public transport you will need to have a good level of fitness to enjoy this tour.

Be prepared for some serious physical activity. These tours are our most challenging and involve some serious walking, hiking or bike riding. Can involve step climbs by foot or pedal and some challenging public transport options in the destination you are travelling.

Luxury Rating

Some trips are like a stroll on the beach, while others have you trekking alpine passes. Some of you thrive on camping out on the savannah, while others may prefer a hot shower and a comfortable bed in a lodge. Follow the grading systems below to find the right trip for you.

To help you choose the trip that's right for you, we've broken all of our trips down into four service levels. Measuring the comfort level of the accommodation and transport. So whether you're travelling on a budget and want to save money by using public transport, or prefer upgraded accommodation and are happy to pay a little more, then we have a level for you.

This is grassroots travel at its most interesting

Authentic experiences with some of the comforts of home

For those who like to travel in comfort

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