Things to Do in Red Square

St Basil's technicolor climb

Inside the onion domes you enter a dim maze of narrow brick corridors. Incense and old wax linger. Duck under low arches painted with fading vines. Emerge onto a tiny wooden balcony. Wind snaps. The whole square tilts below like a Soviet postcard.

Lenin's Maquisoleum at dawn

The queue inches in near silence. Boots scrape polished black stone. Inside it is refrigerator-cold. Guards hiss "no hands in pockets." The only color is marble's amber glow reflecting off Lenin's waxy forehead. You smell floor polish and something medicinal. Daylight hits you again.

GUM rooftop shopping arcade

Light drips through a Victorian glass roof. Marble floors stripe gold. Fountain water splashes under Soviet-era music. Caramelised almonds drift up from the lower level. Window-shop haute boutiques inside the former state department store. Oddly relaxing.

State Historical Museum night tour

After 6 p.m. guides unlock side doors. You slip past mammoth tusks that smell of dust and river ice. Gold-leaf icons flicker under torch-light. You hear your own footsteps in the Viking hall. No echoing school groups. Just the creak of parquet under wool socks.

Ice-skating rink at VDNKh

From December the square's far end floods and freezes. Skate blades hiss. Coloured bulbs buzz overhead. You taste snowflakes and metal while you wobble past kids in fur hats. The Kremlin walls glow rose beyond the ice fog.

Teatralnaya: pre-war apartments turned hostels. Five minutes' walk. Opera rehearsals drift from the Bolshoi.

Tverskaya: boutique hotels in converted 19th-century mansions. Balconies overlook neon sushi signs.

Kitay-Gorod: quiet monastery courtyards by night. Raucous bars lie two streets south.

Zaryadye: brand-new mid-range towers above the river. Walk to Red Square over a footbridge lined with love-locks.

Arbatskaya: budget Soviet-era hotels where reception ladies still use ledgers. The Metro is downstairs.

Krasniye Vorota: former factory lofts turned edgy studios. Breakfast served in a canteen with original 1930s tiles.