(Source: https://сезоны-года.рф)

Any walk through Samara sooner or later leads to the embankment of the Volga River. The streets next to the embankment descend right to the river, repeating the coastal relief, so you will eventually go out to the embankment.

The neighborhood of the city of Samara with the great Russian river has become strategic: the city is considered the capital of cruise tourism in Russia. Dozens of motor ships and boats depart from the river port of Samara every day. They go to Volgograd and Astrakhan, Kazan and Moscow, and even further - along lakes and canals, to Ladoga Lake.

The Kuibysheva Square in Samara is not just the main city square, but the largest square in Russia and the second largest square in Europe. This is the favorite promenade of the city residents, and for tourists this place is the key point of the historic centre of Samara.

All the main attractions of the Samara centre – Stalin’s Bunker, the Samara Drama Theatre, the Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, etc. – are situated near the square, within a walking distance. Volga is also very close to the square: ten minutes of slow walking.

The presence of a Catholic church in Samara can puzzle only a person who does not know the history of the country. The Volga region is one of the historical centres of Russian Catholicism.

The adherents of the “Roman law” appeared here back in XVII century - the Poles who served in Russian army settled in these places. The only catholic church of Samara currently standing on Frunze Street can be considered one of the masterpieces of Russian Gothic Revival, not only in the Volga region.

The buildings of the old Samara are eclectic and bizarre, but the Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus (or simply the Polish church) neighboring the equally huge Orthodox church with a golden dome stands out even against this background. Steeple roofed towers look both brittle and austere, the white twisted column above the portal emphasizes the upward direction on the style, the complicated decorations of the walls cannot by any means be called frivolous. Everything is subordinated to the main goal: to create a sensation of vertical movement from the earth to the sky.

The “Cosmic Samara” Museum impresses you at first sight - the place it takes among its surroundings is emphasized very successfully. The benchmark for potential visitors looks very different from the proud (and slightly awkward) stele of its Moscow “counterpart”: it is the legendary “Soyuz” R-7 rocket carrier installed on the museum’s building vertically, as if before the launch: this benchmark can be seen from afar. The rocket is real, not simply a model; it had served as a training model at the Plesetsk cosmodrome for 15 years, the rocket had been was built here - in Samara-Kuibyshev, at the “Progress” plant. It’s even strange that the Cosmic Museum has appeared in the capital of Russian rocket production so recently: “Cosmic Samara” was opened in 2007.

The first museum in the country created by fans and for fans is the Samara Football Museum. It opened in October 2007 in the building of the sports lyceum on Volzhsky Avenue, then it moved to 148 Molodogvardeyskaya Street, near the Kuibysheva Square.

The founders of the Museum are the famous poet, cultural specialist and TV presenter Sergei Leibgrad and Sergei Chernyshev, the chairman of the “Volzhsky Bastion” public fans association. The largest part of the exposition is devoted to the history of the “Wings of the Soviets” club formed in Kuibyshev (Samara) in 1942, as well as the history of local teams – “Metallurg”, “Lokomotiv”, “Dynamo”, “Unita”, “Lada” (Togliatti), “Syzran-2003”.

The whole collection of the museum consists of memorable things and football rarities donated by football fans, actual football players and veteran players. The collection is impressive and contains 17 thousand exhibits.