Transportation

Entering the country: Visa
Entering the country: Travel and Customs
Entering the country: Flights
Entering the country: Flight information
Around Astrakhan: city map and transport

Entering the country: Visa

Most European country's citizens need a Visa to enter Russia and to get a Visa you need an official (standard) invitation letter. For those who have already sent the scan of their passports, the invitation letter will be sent to them by email + the original letter by DHL to the embassy/consulate.

For those who did not send us the information requested, please ask for an official (standard) invitation letter as soon as possible (see section CONTACTS for that).

Depending on the Visa type and invitation availability ordinary process of Visa obtaining could take up to 20 days in an embassy/consulate, but is usually about 10 working days. Though if time is scarce one could use faster preparation option from embassy/consulate which cost extra or if you have less than a week - a special invitation is needed from the ministry of foreign affairs (could be prepared on special occasions, see "CONTACTS"). On exact timings and conditions for Visa application, please, consult with chosen embassy/consulate.

Availability of a visa-free entry to Russia for holders of ordinary passports (diplomatic or official passports are not considered):

Country Using ordinary passport Country Using usual passport
Austria No Iceland No
Albania No Italy No
Algeria No Malaysia No
Belorussia Yes Mexico No
Belgium No Morocco No
Bulgaria No Netherlands No
Bosnia and Herzegovina Yes (for tourists trips less than 30 days) Norway No
Czech Republic No Poland No
Denmark No Romania No
Finland No Serbia Yes (valid for 30 days since entering the country)
France No Spain No
Great Britain No Slovakia No
Germany No Slovenia No
Greece No Switzerland No
Hungary No Sweden No
Irak No Tunisia No
Iran No Ukraine Yes
Ireland No

Entering the country: Travel and Customs

Robots are not usual for luggage that's why organizers will inform airport customs in Moscow and Astrakhan about the Eurobot Final event.

Usually a team traveling with a robot must have an official covering letter in English from the affiliated institution (it is a NOC for each country with a NOC) stamped and signed. The letter should contain such information as: reason of travel, dates of travel (arrival and departure), flights of travel (arrival and departure), full name of a team's representative responsible for a robot (should be one traveling with it, of course), full technical data on the robot, including tools being transported with the robot; also indicate that the robot is not dangerous while in travel, does not have commercial value, is not meant to be sold and will be returned to the country of origin, does not belong to any secret category including military secret.

Though organizers do not provide the teams with such covering letters, you could contact us for help on this matter if you are coming as an independent team (without an affiliated institution).

[ ! ] Be sure to have a covering letter for your robot while in travel.

We also advise you to have printed official invitations (those for the Visa) for all members in a team.

[ ! ] Russian teams coming to Czech Republic for national qualifications this year experienced loss (extracted by authorities) of accumulators during their transit in Germany. We will investigate on this and put updates on the live website of the conditions for better travel experience, but generally we advise you to carefully plan your travels and consider that not all parts of the robot might be allowed in cabin as hand luggage (check with your flight operator for that).

Entering the country: Flights

Astrakhan is 1500 km far from Moscow. It takes about two and a half hours from Moscow by plane which is the fastest and the most convenient way to get to Astrakhan from Moscow and one of the only from abroad. Most of international flights to Astrakhan have transit change in one of the Moscow's airports.

The fastest train going to Astrakhan from Moscow travels about 27 hours and it takes about 17 hours if one travels by car.

[ ! ] In case of severe problems with transporting your robots through airports, please contact: for European airports - will be given on the 24th of June (see main competition web-page) for the Astrakan airport - will be given on the 24th of June (see main competition web-page) for Russian airports - will be given on the 24th of June (see main competition web-page)

Transfer from/to the Astrakhan airport for everyone coming to the competition will be available free of charge according to the program of the events - since 28.06 till 03.07 (see section "Competition: Simple Schedule" for details). In other days transfer is not available. You could use taxi services for that. A usual travel to the airport from the city (and vice versa) will be about 10 Euro.

[ ! ] Transfer by organizers will be scheduled according to the information provided by teams in the questionnaire.

Entering the country: Flight information

There's been a lot said about possibilities to make the travel costs smaller for the teams coming to Eurobot Final in Astrakhan.

Please, mind that this information is still "work in progress". We wish to bring up-to-date information to you as soon as possible as we understand the time is going out quickly. Though the options here are solid there are still some nuances to work out.

We are expecting information update from SkyTeam on Friday (27.05.2011) with more precise information and will then post it here.

Charter option details also depend on the number of interested people.

We tried our best and here are 3 possibilities we offer for those who travel by plane from Europe to Astrakhan.

1. To buy tickets of the SkyTeam alliance.

  • the idea is to use SkyTeam Global Meetings program, which provides discounts for SkyTeam alliance's flights from 5% to 10%.
  • those teams who choose this variant will have to register in SkyTeam, enter the Event ID and book the flight.
  • the event ID won't be published on the web, it will be sent directly to those teams who choose this variant.
  • teams from Africa unfortunately are not covered with this program and we can not provide such an option for them.

Useful links:

http://www.skyteam.com
http://www.aeroflot.ru/cms/en/about/travel_map
http://globalmeetings.skyteam.com

2. Cheap charter flights Moscow-Astrakhan-Moscow.

  • seats are provided at uncomfortable time in case of severe need on preliminary registration basis.
  • seats will be provided with discount but the number is limited.

3. Independent ticket purchase with convenient timing.

  • if no options are suitable for you we leave this up to you.

27.05.2011 UPDATE: dear all, we know some of the teams if not most are interested in the Skyteam discount offer. The organizing team is working hard to achieve quick results on this. For now we are resolving technical questions on how the process of assigning the IDs needed for a discount will be organized with a Skyteam representative in Moscow.

We estimate that at latest this question will be solved on Monday (30.05.2011).

We kindly ask you to be patient as we can not make this process any quicker because it is outside of the organizer's structure.

Around Astrakhan: city map and transport

There are 4 sites of main interest for Eurobot Final's participants: the "Zvezdnyy" Arena (where the competition takes place), Astrakhan State University (accommodation for teams), hotel Azimut (additional accommodation option), the Astrakhan Kremlin (recreation and sightseeing). Exact addresses of the places will be provided below with a map.

During the competition days free buses will be available from organizers to go from the competition site to accommodations and back. The free bus schedule will be supplied to you on arrival. Night buses are also considered for those to stay long at the competition site for the best of their robots.

Public transport of the Astrakhan city includes buses, trolleybuses and fixed-route taxis. Mind that public transport is not available at night, working hours for it are since 06:00 in the morning till 22:00 in the evening. Ticket cost for one travel is about 0.25 - 0.3 Euro.

Public transport (work hours: 06:00 - 22:00, average (wait + travel) time is ~30 minutes)

"Zvezdnyy" Astrakhan State University Azimut Kremlin
"Zvezdnyy" Bus: 25
FRT: 25c, 27c, 80c, 69c
Bus: k2; TRB: 4
FRT: 11c, 22c, 28, 42c
Bus: k2; TRB: 4
FRT: 11c, 22c, 28, 42c
Astrakhan State University TRB: 1, 2, 4
FRT: 32c, 71c, 78c
TRB: 1, 2, 4
FRT: 32c, 71c, 78c
Azimut Travel on foot
Kremlin

* FRT - fixed-route taxi; TRB - trolleybus;

Exact addresses

# Place Address
1 the "Zvezdnyy" Arena 414022, г.Астрахань, ул.Н.Островского, д.147 (http://звёздный-астрахань.рф/feedback.shtml)
2 Astrakhan State University 414056, г.Астрахань, ул. Татищева, д.20а (http://www.aspu.ru/services/5-kontaktnaia-informaciia.html)
3 hotel Azimut 414000, г.Астрахань, ул. Кремлевская, д.4 (http://www.azimuthotels.ru/ru/contacts/)
4 the Astrakhan Kremlin г.Астрахань, площадь Ленина
5 airport "Astrakhan" г.Астрахань, Аэропортовский пр-д, д.1 (http://airport.astrakhan.ru/Kontakt.htm)
Map of Astrahan

Interactive map here: http://maps.yandex.ru/?um=uDWIfh0ftNfXEuZInCCVqc_bwCAgftfK&l=map

Most known Google maps application does not have details on the city of Astrakhan.

The competition

Matches 'n ratings

Яндекс.Метрика