On the calendar, it's April 12, the day of the first human spaceflight, so today I decided to tell you about my stroll through the wonderful Cosmonautics Museum located near the VDNKh complex in Moscow.
How to Get There
The address of the exhibition space is Prospekt Mira, 111, and it's easy to reach from the "VDNKh" metro station, taking no more than five minutes. A landmark for entering the museum can be the monument "To the Conquerors of Space," which is visible from many points in this area.
The ticket price for adult visitors is 350 rubles. Children aged 7 to 18 can enter the exhibition with a discounted ticket, which costs 210 rubles (spring 2023).
A Bit of History
The day of cosmonautics in the USSR began to be celebrated in 1962, and two years later, a huge monument "To the Conquerors of Space" appeared on the territory of VDNKh. The 110-meter composition, glorifying the country's achievements in space exploration, is considered one of the largest memorials in Russia today, surpassed only by the Victory Monument on Poklonnaya Gora in the capital.
The opening of the museum space took place in April 1981. At that time, the museum was significantly different from the exposition we know today: its area was four times smaller. Today's Museum of Cosmonautics consists of eight exhibition halls and 100,000 exhibits related to space themes. The complex includes a cinema hall and a conference room.
The museum exposition is organized in such a way that both adults and children will not be bored here. Visitors can see many originals and models of spacecraft, view cosmonaut suits, learn about what life in space looks like. There are also unusual items, such as Yuri Gagarin's electrocardiogram, dated April 11, 1961.
All exhibits are equipped with informational plaques. At the entrance to the exhibition halls, guests can find a terminal selling tubes of food for astronauts, an excellent gift for those interested in the topic of space.
Museum visitors can peek inside many spacecraft or even walk through large models of aircraft. For example, on the second floor of the exhibition, a replica of the basic block of the no longer existing "Mir" station is presented.
In 2019, the Cosmonautics Museum welcomed more than 750,000 visitors. You can stroll through the exhibition halls independently or go on a guided tour as part of a group.
Here I conclude the story about this exhibition space.
Have a nice trip!
