Yaroslavl is the biggest city of Golden Ring, easily reachable from Moscow. I came there after reading other, not very enthusiastic, reviews on this site and again it seems that during last couple of years Russia changed a lot. This time I did not focus on ticking inscribed churches, but instead took a couple of hours to walk in the beautiful streets of Yaroslav's Old Town. Although some works are still going on, almost all city center is already rebuilt/renovated and the result is very impressive. For me Yaroslavl is a wonderful city, comparable to top classicism-style towns in Western Europe – in my personal ranking even better than, say, Bordeaux. It was only a bit awkward that this beautiful old town in warm summer evening was almost empty.

Although Russian Golden Ring is full of interesting places, some of them inscribed as WHS, I found Yaroslavl the nicest and definitely worth a visit