There was a joke for Bulgarian tourism from this period. Most of the big factories having established a resourt camps in certain places for their workers. So the joke was that a former partisan working at the factory was on vacation at one of these camps. And when he returned to work a month later, his colleagues were asking: - How was your vacation? - Just like in the war, the Germans were in the hotels, and we were in the woods.

My great grandparents were able to go to the USSR in 1962 under the premise of agricultural research. They were well respected potato farmers in the states, so they wanted to see how the soviets did it. They told me how everywhere they visited felt like it was staged, and questions were not encouraged. They ended up befriending a rural family who met the socialist ideals for production, and my great grandpa gave them advice on different tricks he had learned over the years. The father ended up carving a very intricate wooden toy of a bear pushing a board through a saw, and it even moved! I still have that proudly displayed in one of my cases, along with other interesting Soviet artifacts from their visit

My father, serving in the Soviet Black Sea Fleet, visited Algeria and Tunisia - this was almost the only opportunity for a simple young guy to see such exotic countries

I served 6 months in the Soviet Union (1972) as a U.S. Government (USIA) exhibit traveling around the USSR. I saw more things than any short-term tourist ever had a chance to see. It was a different planet!

One thing I remember about visiting the USSR: When checking into Moscow airport, it was illegal to export Roubles, so you had to change all your Roubles into Dollars before going through the customs/passport checks, and when you finally got through and wanted to buy a coffee while waiting for your plane, you had to pay in Roubles!

My Grandparents on my moms side travelled all over the world from the 70's to the 80's. They went to Italy, France, Egypt, Mexico, Brazil and the US to name a few. They took me and my older brother along on a few trips. When I was a kid it didn't dawn on me that this was unusual. Only later did I learn that my Grandpa managed to get the permits with his "connections" and a fair bit of bribery. Paid for in no small part thanks to his smuggling and manufacture of illegal western style clothes; jeans, leather jackets and a pair of leather underwear and pants for a Colonel. The soviet union was indeed a closed society for most people. But like everywhere else in the world, money talks.

In Soviet Russia, office visits tourists

From Hungary there was a group of people sometimes went on to perform in western countries. Germany, Austria. They were dancers, singers, etc. It was forbidden to bring back western currency without the state getting its share, so when the bus came back to the border the guards basically teared it into pieces. So before the border the performers all gave their money to the magician, called Rodolfo. He put it all in his pocket and sat down. The border guard came and told Rodolfo that he will search him. Searched, found nothing and eventually they were back on the road. Rodolfo then pulled out the money from his pocket and everyone was asking how did you do that? Where did you put the money? - When he searched me, it was in hs pocket. - he replied. I heard this story from his son-in-law.

My uncle told me about a garage in my hometown. This garage was opposite the docks in Hull UK and the garage owner was well known for pretty much exclusively buying Lada parts. Sailors from Soviet ships would come in to port, cross the street and exchange any and all Lada components for valuable foreign currency. One of my most treasured possessions is a hat that my grandfather gave me from the Soviet Union. He was a dock worker and told me he got it for £1 in the 1970s from a Soviet sailor who was in port. It's a holds great memories of my grandad and is a neat old thing to have in and of itself so it was really interesting to watch this episode and find out about how and why these little trades took place. Thanks.

My family in India had a pair of binoculars given by a Russian in the 70's. Always wondered why would a person bring something like binoculars from the Soviet union to another country given the general shortage of goods (luxury goods in particular). Thanks for explaining the origin of and the reason 9:15 of a memorable family heirloom. It still works as good as new to this day.

When I was kid, in the Sixties, my father was invited to Bulgaria, as he was a prominent cultural figure here in Finland. We were treated like royalties: We were given a certificate that allowed traveling around Bulgaria without any restrictions, a best model of VW for a car, free hotel stayings etc. When driving around Bulgaria, it must have been to the locals like today´s filmstars traveling with a Bugatti Veyron. The police normally demanded stopping at the checkpoints, but only once when they actually stopped us, they went pale when they saw the certificate, stepped back and saluted my father. My father muttered to us that "this is apparently the best piece of paper I have ever had..." Then in the Eighties, we had couple of school trips to Leningrad and Tallinn, Estonia. It was like going to another planet, and the lack of everything but Vodka was shocking. In Tallinn we exchanged money for Rubles, but as there was nothing to actually buy, we ended up with two plastic bags full of money. We decided to give them to our young female quide. She almost fainted, and was able to say that there was at least her salary of two years... Just before the collapse, my father had visitors as culture exchange, the poet Brendojev and his wife. Their first visit in the West. At the train station when I picked them up, a strict lady started questioning me where I was taking them. I answered in even stricter voice asking who she is and why I must answer that. She then got visibly scared, as apparently she thought that I was "more important person than she", as I was later explained. Mrs Brendojeva was shocked when visiting normal Finnish grocery store; she just kept asking "why there are 20 brands on margarin alone..." When old seacaptain Brendojew told me that he had always wanted to have a car, but never got permission to buy one, I decided with my father that he WILL get one from here. My father arranged couple of entry fee happenings where Brendojev read his poems, and with that money he was able to buy almost new used Lada. I have never seen a happier man. I was working at that time at local Caterpillar dealer, and I gave them all kinds of Cat suff, baseball caps, scale models etc. They made good money with those when back home. Russians are kind, romantic, friendly people. I feel sorry for them that they had to endure the Soviet era.

I am a (West) German and travelled by car to the Caucasus in 1987 as a 14 year old. Not with Inturist, though. The company my dad worked for had a project in Ordzhonikidse/Vladikavkaz, and my dad arranged for installer visas for my brother and me, to tag along as he and a colleague drove a VW T3 there for the western workers to use. Since we weren't tourists, we stayed in a regular panel block and were free to move about by ourselves. I still have the visa and my plane ticket from Ordzhonikidse to Moscow, which was 31.50 rubles at the time. We also tried to go on a short trip to Tbilisi, but the police made us turn around due to "road problems". My dad later found out that they did not want foreigners in Georgia due to civil unrest.

A group of Soviet tourists is visiting a capitalist country. One of tourists asks to the group: - Who is the leader of this group? - I am, - someone aswers. - How to say in English: "I need for political asylum."? - Who asked this?!!! - another worried voice asks from the deep of the group. - It's ok, no worries. I just wanted to get to know who is the leader of the group.

I went to the Soviet Union in 1987. Definitely a very monitored trip with the tourist co. One of tourists some how got away and went to a local’s house and spent the night. The tour guide completely freaked out! Enjoyed my time there - so interesting! The next year my family was one of the first to have Soviet visitors stay in our home in New Orleans. We had 2 women who were party members and left their families to travel to avoid defection. I remember their eyes when we took them to a grocery store and the mall! We absolutely loved getting to know them. We continued hosting Russian visitors even after the collapse of the USSR since they came to learn about business.

I went to USSR with a college study tour group in 1990, we had to have our InTourist guide with us at all times. She was very nice but we were always messing with her by asking if she was KGB and she would say no KGB, no KGB. We toured sites associated with famous novelists and took a very long train ride from Moscow to St. Petersburg during which we played drinking games with the conductor, who drank us under the table. The highlight was when a cab driver drove a few of us all over St. Petersburg to sightsee in the middle of the night during one of the White Nights.

I often travelled through the USSR by car with my parents. We had to stick to one route and at every major junction there was a GAI (traffic militia) outpost where our documents were checked and quite often an attempt to extort money was made. Every time we crossed back into Poland, I was smiling from ear to ear.

When my father was in the army in the early 80’s he was stationed in West Germany but could do an army sponsored tour of Berlin. They took a train through Easy Germany to West Berlin and then was able to cross over Checkpoint Charlie and your East Berlin. Obviously all under the watch of the Stazi but still he said it was a pretty cool trip.

Very interesting about the start of Soviet tourism. My grandmother told me that she and my grandfather took a trip to Europe about 1928 to avoid political unrest in Cuba. When they visited Russia, they were paired up with a Spanish count and countess, and traveled from Berlin to Moscow by train. Upon arrival, they were met by a young woman from Intourist, whom my grandmother swore spoke better Spanish than any of them. Though they had handlers, one night my grandfather decided to ditch the handler one night, and they went walking about. They were very impressed upon coming upon a small group of women and children huddled around a fire, and that the only thing they had to eat was black bread. My grandfather gave them what money he had, and they went back to the hotel. That was the only time they saw the real conditions in Russia, as the handlers made sure they saw nothing detrimental to the image the Soviets wished to portray.

My Finnish dad visited the USSR so many times, he once got interrogated at JFK in New York because of the tens of soviet passport stamps, being asked if he was a communist or something. He also went on cruises down the Volga and sold blue jeans in Leningrad. The former he says he liked immensely, and that the scars on Volgograd were still visible decades later. I think he was able to move around kinda freely due to the Militsiya and other bureaucrats being so easy to bribe with foreign cigarettes and other 'luxury' goods.

My Russian coworker (who is in his 60s) said that to travel out of the Soviet Union, his boss had to sign a document saying that his employee knew no "state secrets". He said what this was *really* asking is, "How likely do you think he's going to return to the Soviet Union?" because officially the only reason anyone would want to defect is if they have state secrets to offer enemy nations. Of course he didn't know any state secrets, but his boss refused to sign it since it would put him in hot water if he defected.

David and the team produce some fantastic content, but every video I watch I’m amazed by the comments that place anecdotes and personal family experiences to flesh out the topic. It’s democratic history at its finest and it’s brilliant to see. Thank you all for telling us all your experiences.

My grandfather was one of 3 top people responsible for the construction of Al Jufra air base in Libya. He was a Soviet citizen and brought his family with him for some time. My mother managed to see some American cartoons and movies that were never shown in the USSR. My mother also went to the US as part of the cultural exchange thing you talked about.

I visited the Soviet Union in 1974 as part of a tour sponsored by the Russian Language Club at Syracuse University. I have to differ with much of what you said. We were able to go off on our own away from our Intourist guides, and did so on several occasions. Soviet citizens approached on the streets and were very friendly. They had many questions, especially for us Black tourists. I had a very interesting trip, but I would not want to return there now.

In the 80,s, when I was at school in the UK, our school would offer for those interested, a summer trip to the USSR, for 5th and 6th formers I think. A story that came back from one of these trips was from a high building in Leningrad where a panoramic of the scenic parts of the city could be seen. Unfortunately for some tourists a small part of the military port was just visible through a few buildings from one angle. Anyone caught pointing their camera in this direction would have their camera seized and all their film reel pulled out on the spot before being handed back their camera!

Well Soviet "tours" in here Finland were quite popular, to in and out of Soviet Union, roughly hitting the peak in 1980s. Most of the trips being educational, sort of, but turning more towards relaxation (i.e. getting wasted) as years went on. Naturally, most common import would had been Vodka, often meant actually for tourists. And much cheaper in dollars then in Finnish marks in some cases. And if when you ever you ran out of money? Just sell your passport to some local and claim you "lost" it when you want to return to home by consulate (for free). Although I have read few cases that this return trip was denied on basis that this having happaned too many times.

I'm American. I travelled to Leningrad in 1988 with a mostly swedish tour group. We took the boat to Helsinki and then a bus into USSR. The trip was freaking fascinating, I'll never forget it. I'm glad I had a glimpse of that society before the communist regime collapsed.

I travelled to the USSR in late 1984, flying to Khabarovsk in the Soviet far east from Niigata in Japan. I was with a small group of six Aussies, plus two Kiwis, two American uni students and about 12 Japanese. The In-tourist guide, a bear of a man called Alexei, was only tasked with assisting the Japanese. Our group was too small, so nobody was assigned, but Alexei took us under his wing anyway. In a friendly way, we tormented him about the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan as he tried to defend the Soviet position ("we were invited"). We also teased him about In-tourist being an arm of the KGB, asking him each morning whether he'd finished his nightly report to KGB headquarters. Once he got used to our humour he retaliated in kind and he became very friendly. His often repeated phrase was "It is a pity". We spent two weeks travelling across Siberia, eventually to Moscow, and finally Leningrad. The mainly working-class passengers and staff on the train were incredibly friendly once they saw our Kangaroo badges and realised we were not American. Conscripts got on the train at various stations and sat in the aisles because they were not allocated seats, and drank themselves asleep. One was a sub-mariner was from Vladivostok heading back to Moscow who described his mother-in-law as a "dragon". In Moscow we were constantly approached by people to buy/sell contraband or US dollars. We spent New Years Eve in Red Square with thousands of others. As soon a midnight passed, police moved in to shoo everybody away. We had a great time. Six months later I travelled to East Germany and East Berlin. That was a very different, and sometimes scary experience, and I found myself being watched on several occasions by the Volkspolizei, especially if I approached any East Berliners, such as a group of uniformed school kids in a park. Security personnel at the main railway station looked like Gestapo officers in peaked caps, Jodhpur pants, high leather boots and side-arm. It was a relief to get back to West Berlin.

Fascinating color footage. I don't think I've ever seen color film of Lenin before.

Aged 14, I accompanied my grandmother on an organised weekend trip to Moscow in 1975. I believe it was a quite expensive upmarket/top of the range trip as we were accommodated at a nice but old fashioned looking hotel in central Moscow with lots of coach tours included, including an evening visit to a Bolshoi Ballet performance in a very large theatre. I don't remember our guide very well but I think she was friendly enough. I recall that in the hotel our group was fed in a separate dining room (all meals were included) and therefore have no idea of how what we were fed compared to what other guests may have received. I can't remember anything being wrong with the food or anybody voicing any dissatisfaction although I can remember starters of Russian salad and Borsch. We were allowed out of the hotel unaccompanied and I purchased, I think from the GUM store - it was a large department store anyway, some model aircraft kits of Aeroflot aircraft including the IL18 and Ilyushin 62, something to impress the boys at school when I returned home! Although this was a UK originating tour I recall that there were a number of Americans in our group. One disappointment was the fact that the Soviet visa was issued as a separate document and no USSR entry or exit stamps were put in the passport leaving no record in my passport of my visit to the USSR. I also had the experience of visiting communist Albania, I think in 1976, which was a much less pleasant experience. No, my grandmother wasn't a communist, she just liked visiting unusual places and could afford to indulge herself. In the early 1950's she took herself and my mother, then a teenager, off on a cargo ship for a 2 week holiday in the Canary islands! Returning to the subject of Albania, it was of course an organised tour. We flew on JAT via Belgrade. On arrival at Tirana airport, you didn't go through the usual formalities like at any other airport. Instead, our passports were taken away by a man (presumably a policeman) standing at the foot of the aircraft steps and we were shown into a large room which resembled a sort of old fashioned tea room with tables with white tablecloths. We were probably served tea or something, I don't remember. After a while our guide came to tell me that my hair was too long and I was required to have a haircut. So myself and some other male members of our group were taken off to the airport barber and given a free haircut. Some male passengers (not me though) were informed that their trousers were too flared and were provided at no charge with locally produced cheap looking jeans to wear for the duration of their stay. Our passports were returned to us, stamped at the back with a small R P Shqiperise entry stamp on the back page. Our guide was a plump young lady named Spressa (or something like that) who spoke fluent English. We were fed lots of propaganda. We thought that we would be staying at a hotel on the coast for the duration of our stay with various tours included but that was not to be. We were told that the hotel was not available and instead taken for the first night to a hotel in central Tirana then spent the rest of the time on a coach tour of the country, a different hotel each night. I got the impression that these hotels were being opened up just for our group and were usually cold. I was unimpressed by the food. We visited museums, factories and a state farm. Very educational no doubt but not exactly what we had booked. My grandmother said she didn't really want a coach tour and asked if we could stay at the Tirana hotel for the duration of the holiday but was firmly told no. This doesn't surprise me as obviously they wanted the entire group to remain together with the guide. Having said this though I would say that we were well taken care of and looked after probably to the best of their ability. On the day of our departure we returned to Tirana airport. The incoming JAT flight from Belgrade never arrived. Apparently JAT cancelled it as there were no incoming passengers and just our group on the return sector. Our poor guide was clearly out of her depth at this point and had no idea what should be done with us. The exit stamps in our passports were cancelled with a red X and we were taken back to the hotel in central Tirana. I don't know who should take the credit for the excellent arrangements which were made for us, the Albanians, the tour operator back in the UK or JAT, but the next day we were driven to the frontier at Han i Hotit, crossed by foot into Yugoslavia, where the Yugoslav boarder guards had never encountered such a thing as a group of British tourists before, then by coach to Titograd airport to be flown to Belgrade by JAT then re-routed to London via Munich on JAT and BA. The Han i Hotit exit stamp must be almost unique in our Passports as this route was not normally open to foreigners. The Yugoslav entry stamp is completely illegible due to almost no ink. Participating in this trip to Albania were 2 or 3 single men in their late 20's or 30's who didn't seem to fit in to the mould of typical participants in such a tour. I have often wondered who they were and their reason for being there. Definitely British but not your typical holidaymaker/tourist types.

My father’s aunt visited the USSR in (I think) the 1960’s (sadly they are both deceased so I can not confirm when this happened). While on their tour, Auntie took lots of photos, even when she was told not to. After several stern warnings the guide suddenly stopped saying anything about it. When they got home and had the photos developed, it turns out that their pictures were blank! What they surmise was that one evening when they went out for supper, someone entered their hotel room and “fixed” their camera!

My Grandfather told me that he was outside USSR once, IIRC in early 80's. Getting permission was also one of 2 times he was in KGB "for talk" (Nothing serious, more of a reminder that since he isn't part of communist party, they will be watching him, closely)

Expeditions were really popular in USSR. People would go to the mountains, take long trips on wild rivers, ski, etc. Whole musical genre, tourist songs, songs to sing at camp site was invented / popular.

I first visited Russia in March of 1991, about six months before the collapse of the USSR. On each hotel landing sat a stern faced old lady with a row of medals across her chest. Her job was to observe the comings and goings of tourists. At breakfast the food and the service left much to be desired. When the head waiter's turned his back the waiters would lift the cloth on their trolly to reveal military goods for sale. Great bargains were had by some on that trip.

Toured Soviet Union in 1972. A real eye opener. Great experience, awful food.

I'm not from former Soviet Union. Not even born in Cold War time. But I worked as tourist guide under Myanmar military dictatorship before the opening-up. The system is quite similar to what you had described in this documentary. Even in late 2010s, just before civilian government under Aung San Suu Kyi came into power, we were given strict instructions to not to let our clients go out of proposed itinerary and never raise any topics related to the politics. I can kinda imagine what life of a Soviet tourist guide may look like

My grandfather traveld to Egypt. To fund the trip he sold a lether jacket in Kairo, before returning to Soviet Union he bought a camera for left over money, wich he sold in Moskow. In the end he had more money than before the trip. My aunt had a trip to USA in the end of 80.s and she brought some sweets from there. My parents kept it in a cabinet with a class door. I knew that these sweets were something very special as my parents used the word import - that word ment something expensive and very hard to get.

One of my teachers in middle school took a trip to the Soviet union. Said one of the people in his tour group found a not very well concealed bug under the wallpaper of the hotel room they were assigned so they gathered around it and sang God Bless America the night before they left. No idea if it was true, of course.

I went in USSR in 1989 as part of student exchange cultural visit, I was 12 years old, still have the passport with diplomatic visa in it. Traveled 3hree days in a train called Pushkin. Perestroika was a thing and no one talked positively about it. We exchanged 100 German marks on black market and got about 800 rubles. Average professor salary was about 80 rubles if I remember correctly. We where given 10 rubles a day and my friend tier them in pieces and drop in the middle of a street cause he was mad they are giving us only 10 rubles , I remember old lady coming to pick them up and starts crying as we where going away. I went to arcades in VDHN and for one ruble got so many coins I could not hold them in both hands. We had a dinner at TV tower , restaurant called 7th sky, first time I tried caviar, it was awesome. Crime was starting to rise and we where advise to behave (which we did not) being teenage pricks. Felt very safe and liked Russians a lot. I remember going to sleep and thinking, if nuclear war starts now, I am fucked being in downtown Moscow. I remember metros being so clean that you could lick floor. When ever we went into restaurant and those where crowded all the times, they found place for us because we where foreigners. Went again in Russia in 20214 and could not believe how Moscow changed.

Cool episode! My parents travelled to the USSR in 1980 and went to Moscow and Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). In 2019 I visited the places together with my mother she went to in 1980!

When we lived in the USSR, my brother and his friend discovered old Austrian foot paths going into Romania. The crossed the border illegally, and back just to prove it could be done. He was 14 at the time. Also, a popular destination for Soviet tourists was Yugoslavia which also had visitors from the West. Many Soviet citizens with families in the West would often meet/reunite in neutral though Soviet Bloc Yugoslavia.

Back in 1976 I met a Russian Merchant seaman in Kobe, Japan. We were both waiting for a launch back to our ships. Communication was difficult so I eventually pulled out a bottle of vodka and showed it to him. He smiled and showed approval. The reason I posted is to say there was some interaction without any sort of chaperone from the USSR. The KGB couldn't be everywhere.

My mother wanted to travel from here (czechoslovakia) to yugoslavia for holiday so they had the secret police essentially going around all the neighbors in the housing bloc asking about her family and behavior etc... Our friends emigrated to austria while on holidays in yugoslavia

I remember a line from the novel "The Hunt for Red Ocotber" :" the bastard should work for Intourist"🤣

Individual tourism was actually allowed from Finland already from 60s. Maye even from 58. Basically you had to have planned route and stops. Only some roads were allowed. I have seen some map where those roads were marked.

A very good and fun video. Thanks! Living in Estonia I'll add, that the picture was of course a bit more detailed and complex than it's possible to show in such a short video: from the late 60s onwards it was possible to visit Soviet Union also on individual basis. It was also strictly controlled, the tourists were meant to stay in Intourist hotels and visit Intourist restaurants, but at least in the case of Estonia it just wasn't possible and historians have now published quite hilarious documents where local KGB complains the local party central committee about the 'deluge' of Finnish tourists (in the 70s and 80s at most 1000 tourists per day, up until Covid it was more like 100 000 day-tourists and depending on the time of the year 20 - 50 000 overnight stays) in Tallinn and the impossibility to track all of them individually. A second group who was able to visit Soviet Union sometimes individually were émigrées, people having relatives in Soviet Union. This is also a policy that completely changed after the Great Moutache took a trip to the Eternal Gulag. Until then there was a total NO regardin émigrées, but slowly the policies changed and especially in the case of the Baltic republics KGB thought that allowing them to visit the socialist paradise it would be possible to make at least some of them somewhat friendlier towards the system. And so at least some of the Estonians, Latvians and Lithuanians living in the West started visiting old home again. It was actually a complicated issue also from the point of view of the exile communities and for example there is a case where a renown American-Estonian journalist visited Estonia without telling his friends in the USA where his going to. He just said - to Europe. Only after visiting Estonia and getting back to the States he sort of 'came out' with the fact where he had actually been to and it started a small scandal in the American Estonian community as there were many hardliners who thought that visiting Soviet Union means recognizing the occupation. This was in the 60s. But that's already another story. :D Once more - thank You for an interesting video!

I remember reading the experience of a young man whose burning goal in life was to escape from the USSR. To do this he became a merchant sailor, and he had to wait years till he finally was able to go ashore in New York City. In a closely-guarded group he was taken to Macy's to be able to buy a souvenir. He bought some hair pomade, then "accidentally" left it behind so that just as the group was being led out the door, he could claim he needed to quickly run back for his purchase. Instead, in a blind panic, he just ran as fast as he could to another exit and then continued for as long as he physically could, through the streets. It worked.

It was much more relaxed after the fall of the Soviet Union. I took a two-week Russian Waterways trio from Moscow to St. Petersburg in 1993, and they were just in the process of gearing up for tourism. We stopped at villages that had never seen a foreign tourist, and we wandered around in cities quite freely. We had the advantage of adopting the husband of an official guide as our guide, and he took us to many places that were not accustomed to foreigners. The Russian people loved us, even throwing bunches of wildflowers on the deck of our boat when we were in a lock. It was a trip to a place that no longer exists.

The Intourist hotels were a hotspot for intrepid businessmen with an eye for foreign goods and clothing, as well as sex workers, some of them of course involved with the KGB. As to the business of getting money while on travel, there was this Soviet joke: A Soviet orchestra goes on tour. They hold the final meeting before they leave. The conductor says: "So first we go to England, buy wool. Then we go to Japan, sell the wool and buy gadgets. Then we come home, sell the gadgets and get the cash. Any questions?" "I have a question. Do I need to bring the violin?" As always, great work on the episode!

I have enjoyed this clip, submitted documentation and received the proper signatures to press the bell button. However, I have been advised such a move is a provocation. Feeling such advice is anti-detente, I have gone ahead and pressed the bell button and clicked like. Seriously, well done. I’ve learned so much from this channel.

I can already tell this is going to be a good episode. You guys always pick the most interesting topics.

I knew an Australian couple who actually met while as tourists in the mid 70's in the USSR. They took in some US dollars that they sold for buckets full of Rubbles. There was an amazing department store that only took US dollars not Rubbles where you and party leaders could buy anything very cheap.

I went to Moscow in 1990 and dealing with Intourist was quite a challenge sometimes. We were continually monitored, when we returned to our hotel after a day of going to Gorky Park, eating lunch at the Moscow Hotel and buying tickets from scalpers at the Bolshoi, they knew exactly what we had done, quite scary really, certainly made you wonder what the lives of the citizens were like under that scrutiny.

I visited Leningrad, Moscow and Kiev back in 1979 and I could tell that I was visiting a 2nd world nation when I rode on an Ilyushin - Il62 jet airliner. They cut some corners on interior comfort. The only real disappointment was that St. Basil's cathedral was covered by scaffolding as seen @12:05. Our itinerary was controlled but we did have some free time on our own some evenings. In the Moscow subway I could trade $1 CAN = 3 rubles or $1 USD = 4 rubles. I also traded gum for militaria. I think that Intourist discouraged foreigners from exploring on their own was to prevent them from simply getting lost in a large city like Moscow and also to prevent any sort of robberies which would look bad for the Soviet government. I asked the tour guide about crime and she denied that there was any crime in the USSR. As a 15 year old I had no difficulty in obtaining Cosmos cigarettes and Chamagnski.

This isn’t a story about visiting the USSR itself, but my grandmother worked for the International Atomic Energy Agency during the Cold War and, after Chernobyl, she was sent to the GDR to find out about the effects that the meltdown had in the area. She told me about how she had a Stasi agent to keep an eye on her, and how she was taken to a few places around Berlin, namely the Pergamon Museum. (which I believe was closed to the public at that time) When we went to Berlin a few years back she had wanted to see the Ishtar Gate again, which we were able to. Apparently she got to visit Leningrad in I think 1991, but I’d have to ask her about it to be able to relay that particular story

Two little anecdotes for you. 1) My grandparents were farmers in Western Ukraine, part of the Polish Second Republic before 1939. After the War, they resettled in New York (sponsored by an uncle). In the late 1970s, a relative from the USSR was able to travel to visit. When she returned, she was asked by the KGB for a full and complete report of her trip. During her 'interview', she was presented with photographs of herself visiting various locations in New York. The implication was clear: not only had she been followed, but failure to divulge who she had been in contact with would be regarded as treason, and moreso: the reach of the KGB was strong enough to penetrate the 'free' societies of the West. 2) When I myself had opportunity to visit Ukraine in the 21st century, I saw a number of impressive monuments dating to the Soviet Era. I regarded them with a mixture of respect and ridicule (depending on their provenance). But when I visited the Holodomor Musemum/Memorial in Kyiv, it was too much: both myself and my brother were so overcome with emotion that we had to leave, only to go over to the River Dniper and cry.

The comment about the jeans reminded me. When I went to Germany in 1993 on an exchange even though the Berlin Wall had fallen a few years before, American jeans were still very coveted. If you had a good pair of Levi’s you could sell them for 4-5 times what you paid for them for extra spending money.

My grandfather used to serve in the Baltic sea shipping company and visited many Western countries (West Germany, Belgium, Italy, Canada and some others) throughout 1970s to early 1990s. I still like listening to his stories from these times.

My family was camping in Greece in the late 80s and next to our plot was a family from Poland. They also brought a bunch of stuff with them (binoculars, torches, toys...) to sell in exchange for foreign currency (deutsche marks), they even sold the caravan at the end.

Was there in 1976. Treated very well. Was a guest of a quasi-government organization. But there were hardly any consumer stuff to buy unless you go to a dollar store in a hotel. Internal transportation had a lot to be desired but have never been better served than on an Aeroflot from Moscow to Frankfurt, Germany.

My grandparents went to the USSR in the 70s. No one could work out quite why but I was around 9 or 10 and ended up with a pen friend who was called ‘Svetlana’ from ‘Krasnodar’ who sent me lovely things like Father Frost cards and a Cyrillic alphabet poster and a collection of postcards from the folk tale Ruslan and Ludmilla. I have been fascinated by Soviet and Russian culture and language ever since and was quite shocked to discover that their guide and my pen friend was almost certainly KGB!

A relative of mine travelled to the USSR because of work in the late 1980s. When he came back, all he could say was that "the Soviet Union is collapsing". He was a respected professional of his field, and still his experience led him to this conclusion. It must've been pretty terrible.

One old czechoslovak joke from that period: Two border soldiers having a chat (czechoslovakia had border with the USSR) *Jozef what would you do if czechoslovakia decided to quit its border controls with the USSR? -Well, I would step aside so the huge crowd of people trying to escape from the USSR to the Weat did not run me over *And Jozef what would you do if czechoslovakia decided to quit its border controls with the West? - I would climb up a tree * Why would you climb a tree? - To have a better look on that idiot who would want to escape from the West to the USSR

Recently discovered this channel and thoroughly enjoying it! I'm a 22 year RAF vet, spent a few years in W Germany in the early 80s. I'd love to see a video on Soxmis and Brixmis and I'm sure other viewers would too!

"I have seen the future and it works," Lincoln Steffens (American Tourist in the Soviet Union). Guess he got it wrong.

I remember that the same week revolution in Czechoslovakia started, my mom was on a cruise vacation on Danube. Funny thing, it was on a Soviet ship. I don’t remember much, but she said they were not using real money on the ship, but some sort of coupons, valid only on the ship. Also it was a bit humiliating, because they had almost no Austrian shillings, so they were mostly windowshopping. And some Austrians were laughing at them :”immer kuken” - something like “everytime only looking”.

I went to Moscow in 1988 as an American tourist. When I was outside the Kremlin I saw Gorbachev briefly getting into a limo. I later talked to a bored Soviet soldier who had recently returned from Afghanistan. He showed me a picture of his unit in the mountains. Later I went to see Lenin's tomb but didn't get in because I didn't want to wait on the long line. I stayed at a hotel that had once been an aristocrat's palace before the revolution. There was a big silver plated samovar tea service with a giant hammer and sickle on it. I stole (borrowed on permanent terms) one of the hotel's spoons. It was stamped CCCP on the underside but didn't have any other Soviet markings unfortunately. I talked to an old lady who remembered the days of the empire still. I also saw a big brown bear at a circus push a wheelbarrow.

I've been watching this channel since it was introduced and have never been disappointed.

Was in Russia for 2 weeks in Sept. 1979. Moscow, Kiev, Yalta & Leningrad. The guides were not so tight as you say. We could go places by ourselves and even skip organized outings. Did a black market money change in Red Sq. Skipped a 'folk dance concert' to go to the Soviet Army Museum in Moscow. Stayed at the old Rossiya Hotel in Moscow.We did get taken to all the Lenin statues and Lenin Sqs. available. Couldn't take pics of train stations, power plants etc. We had an American guide for the trip - Harvard grad and we went out with her some evenings. The American company General Tours organized the trip and we had nothing to do directly with Intourist. I enjoyed the trip a lot.

When I was in grade school in the 1960s, I did a school project about travelling to the USSR. It would be interesting to see the project now and how naive I was.

Traveling was Slow. One single customs check outwards the SU took eight hours. Somebody on the bus said something the nacsalnyik did not like, so the busful of people had to stand at the customs banks.

Not long after the collapse of the Soviet Union I was introduced to a man going under the name of Alexander. (It was not considered wise to know his real name.) He had never previously visited the United Kingdom but spoke English with various regional accents. Those Soviet linguistic schools must have been quite something.

My mom was on a "Soviet tour" in the 80's and she sold a bunch of stockings to the locals for some extra cash.

My uncle worked for John Deere tractors in Iowa from the 60s until the 90s. Back in the late 70s he helped host a group of Soviet officials who were doing a tour of the American Midwest learning about various agricultural practices. They brought crates of vodka and Soviet cigarettes among other things that they then traded with people like my uncle for jeans, American cigarettes, perfume and bourbon whiskey to take back home to trade and sell. My uncle said that since that day he developed an affinity for Russian vodka 😂

Then 1939 came along and a year or two later about a million very enthusiastic German tourist crossed the border

Civilians: So when can we travel USSR Government: That’s the best part you don’t

Went there in 1979 for a few weeks. Moscow and Leningrad. Luggage lost for several days on the way in from Finland. Beautiful historic sites. ‘Modern’ buildings falling apart. Approached by people who wanted to buy my blue jeans. Saw long lines outside of food stores.Had to account for all purchases with receipts. When departing for Finland our plane was boarded by armed soldiers and searched. Also had great case of Czars rRevenge. ( my system just not used to the Russian water). Had a good time. Learned a lot. Grateful for what I had back home.l

I would like to see an episode about Soviets who defected while on official foreign trips

My dad had a great tourist trip in Afghanistan from 1985 to 1987.

I was in an economics class and the lecturer said he gave a tour to a Soviet citizen who was studying with him in London. He took him to a supermarket (grocery store) and he was amazed at all of the cheap high quality food and the colorful packaging. The first thing the Soviet said was “is this where the government officials buy their food?”

One other short remark: actually, one could also argue, the reasons for USSRs reluctance to let it's own citizens out could be traced even to the times of Russian Empire. Back then also people needed an exit permit and not anyone got it. Especially known critics of the Tsarist regime rarely would have been allowed out.

i remember a story from my parents who drove a international friendship club in Sweden. Once they had some Czechoslovakian associates visit Sweden and in the evening my parents wanted to take them out on a nice night out in Gothenburg. So they had a three course meal at a restaurant. later my dad payed for the whole evening. (it was a lot of money even for swedes, well they were students in their 20s) (it turns out they just borrowed money from my grandad). when the Czechoslovakians saw the bill they started to cry after working out how much money they had payed for the meal when compared to a meal in Czechoslovakia. well its hard to tell the story in text form but every time my dad brings it up he gets a tear in his eye, i can only imagine how it must have felt for those people behind the iron curtain that got a chance to se the west.

Stories like this is why I always watch your team's content, great stuff!

My dad went to the USSR as a student ambassador for the US in 1991 right before the collapse. He said that all of the stores were only half full and that they only had blocks of ice cream. He also said that everyone looked miserable and they tried to buy their clothes and money.

In my city in India, we had Soviet tourists visiting very often, mostly Ukrainian, Estonian, Russians and occasionally German. Also, I took a Trans Socialist trip from Pyongyang to Berlin. It was 1985 and I went to Pyongyang from Delhi through Beijing in a flight. Visited Pyongyang, then took a train to Vladivostok. Stayed there for few days and started the trans Siberian trip. We stayed for few days at Lake Baikal, went to Ulaanbaatar, Krasnoyarsk, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Dushanbe, Bishkek, Tashkent, Chelyabinsk, Samara, Saratov, Volgograd(Stalingrad), Crimea(and took a two day cruise there), Kiev, Moscow, Petersburg, Minsk, Warsaw, Krakow and to Berlin. We had many Govt agents and in some parts in Siberia were were unmonitored. We were a group of about 50 Indian tourists who were well below 25. We went to West berlin next and then came to Vienna, Budapest, Athens, Istanbul, Baghdad, Damascus, Tel Aviv, Tehran, Lahore, Karachi and then back to delhi. It was 3 months.

I was born after the collapse of the USSR, but my grandma was there on a visit in the late 1980s. She’s told me that there are eyes and ears everywhere. You should be careful of what you say, regardless of the language you say it in, and where you go and what you see is solely dictated by that state. There’s someone with you everywhere you go, even if it’s to the bathroom. They drop you off at the door of everything. She was there for some cultural event, so I don’t think it was meant to be a holiday at all, but I don’t think I would’ve been particularly keen on holidaying there even if I had the opportunity. Sounds more like a place to stress out rather than de-stress

As a college freshman in Washington, D.C., I went on an Intourist tour from late December 1986 to early January 1987, spending New Year’s Eve in Moscow. We traveled to Tblisi, Yerevan and Leningrad as well. I found the guide to be very talented at her job (guide, interpreter, problem solver, monitor, propagandist) and we were not very tightly controlled. We were able to roam freely in all of the four cities during unscheduled hours, and were often approached by young people asking to barter for our jeans or Walkman cassette players. The monitoring, however, was fairly obvious. The same man was often seen randomly and non-chalantly walking nearby during all our tour stops (a different man was apparently assigned the task in each city), and the men in our group would get unsolicited phone calls from women speaking good English in our Intourist hotels asking if we “wanted company”. The infrastructure and the food were much better than I’d expected, and the customer service was always thoughtful and efficient. The Intourist hotels were a study in internal contrasts. In the Russian cities we stayed in very modern, new hotels (Cosmos in Moscow, Pribaltiskaya in Leningrad) which were very much like western European hotels of the mid 80s. But in the other republics, the hotels were charming and well kept but older and less modern. But the one in Tblisi had a discotheque that was quite odd, like the cantina in Star Wars.

That was very informative, thank you.

Comrade David, just to let you know, my approval to click your bell button was personally signed by none other than the Great Leader Papa Stalin himself. And as such, you have no rights to refuse.

In 1972 I was in Villach, Austria. Villach is a small town near the border with Yugoslavia. On the street I encountered a group of tourists from Yakutsk. They were nice people but definitely looked like they were "from the sticks," as we say in the USA. They didn't seem to be surprised that a Russian speaking American had approached them and started a conversation. Looking back I'm surprised at the encounter.

They spent so much money and effort on trying to look like the ideal state to the outside world, while they could have invested that money and effort on actually making their state a better place to live. Actually it sounds like the 20th century's first Instagram influencer........

Hilarious! I was just wondering this the other day! Thanks for the upload!

Relative was a tour guide circa 1971. Last night of their 10 day stay, an East German group was having a banquet in Varna, BUlgaria. One young teacher faked a migraine and slipped out back and met her west German boyfriend. He was waiting for her with his sister’s passport (same last name, also a blonde), and a German rental car. 3 hours later they were in Turkey, and the next day on a ferry to Italy. Stasi Boys lost their s***!

Your videos are packed with so much info, I often watch them a second time! 🤗💛

My mum and late grandmother visited the USSR during mums studies of "Great Dictators of the 20th Century" (Or "Great LEADERS of the 20th Century" as they sold it to the Russians...) My Grandfather is Scottish and so has the fairly common surname Alexander. Which happens to be fairly common in Eastern Europe. So, as they get off the plane they see all the other Western tourists being checked over carefully, and brace themselves for a long wait. Get to the border guard, who they greet in OK Russian. He takes passports from them and looks. "Ah! Alexander! Welcome home!" And waved them through.

My great grandfather toured often before the formation of the Soviet Union. He served in a cossack regiment. We have a photo someplace of him with czar Alexander II, Kiser Wilhelm II, and Arch Duke Franz Ferdinand taken after they finished up a hunting trip for boars.

I’ll be watching this later sadly I work Saturdays, but I wanted to get in early to say I inherited, well more found in a box of my grandmother’s a Soviet cosmonaut pin and from my research it’s a pin you would get to complement a larger medal of the same design. It’s a gold hexagon that says советский исследователь космоса. Soviet investigator of the cosmos. Then she has another pin that’s random af and says Soviet/China Far East tennis club.

I went on a school orchestra exchange with a Moscow school in 1992. While Still in transition looking back on it was close to everything you said, with the exception of pointing out the KGB headquarters and being taken to the first McDonald's in Moscow. We stayed with the family's of the students It was a fascinating experience, and we were all blown away by the hospitality of the families we stayed with despite a very large language barrier. Unforgettable experience

My grandpa was world renown chess problemist then based in Yugoslavia. During one summer(i believe late 70s) they had a chess convention at Malinska,island of Krk,nowdays Croatia. He had a russian friend,also problemist,who came with an "escort" in likes of a female KGB agent following him all the time. After the official stuff he had to go into his room,no chance for deeper fraternizing with anyone else. So my grandpa paid some young beach lifeguards to flirt w her and get her dead drunk so they could have a simple dinner together.

My grandma, then librarian in a small village under Bryansk, had a 3 week (i believe) tour across India in early 60s. Didn't talk about it often, don't think it was something important or lifechanging to her, I think she preferred Black Sea resorts better.

I heard that the German army got a great deal in 1941 and ended up overstaying their welcome.