And last, but not least, its eclectic mix of Soviet history and European vibe in people and architecture offers a soft introduction to Eastern Europe before you venture north to see Lenin's mausoleum.
Mr Yeltsin has been preoccupied lately with a much more straightforward attack on the communist legacy, proposing that its main relic, the preserved corpse of Lenin, be removed from a mausoleum in Moscow's Red Square and buried conventionally.
Russian President Boris Yeltsin's chief of staff, Aleksandr Stalyevich Voloshin, said in an interview in Wednesday's edition of "Komsomolskaya Pravda" that Lenin's body, currently on display in the mausoleum on Moscow's Red Square, would soon be moved and buried.