Follow me 
Recently, I returned to view the construction site of the Olympic University being constructed on Orzhonikidze Ulitsa in Sochi. I last photographed the site about 8 weeks before. As with most construction projects in Sochi, there is rapid progress. From the photos below, you can see the changes:
Martial Simonneau the owner and head chef at Brigantina Cafe and Brasserie, took time this week to talk to me about his restaurant, his service ethos and the arc of his life from Normandy through Nice, Paris and Moscow to Sochi, where the Brigantina is the only French-owned and operated restaurant in the city center. Martial learned about the restaurant business from his parents' restaurant in Normandy. He lived in Nice and and later in Paris, where he worked at the famous De la Paix Cafe for several years. Eventually, Martial was hired to run the kitchen at a casino in Moscow. In 2002, he came to Sochi to manage a restaurant in Krasnaya Polyana, where he worked for several years. After this, he detoured to Yekaterinburg to run a casino. Two years ago, drawn by the promise of Sochi, he moved back and opened Brigantina Cafe and Brasserie next to the seaport. His son, Bastien, a graduate of business school in Paris, has come to Sochi to help. Martial and Bastien have opened a second cafe, Napoleon, a few blocks away on Vorovskovo Ulitsa, where they offer French baked goods. Theirs are the only locations in Sochi where one can buy a genuine French croissant.
The Brigantina, as evidenced by the photo, appeals to celebrities and political leaders visiting Sochi and is noted for offering the best and most consistent cuisine in Sochi. Martial and Bastien are ever present, seeing to the needs of diners and assuring that all runs smoothly. Martiall's ethic of attention to detail and, above all, the customer, is reflected in the well-trained staff. I asked Martial, who was recently profiled in Forbes Russia, about his experiences with restaurant ownership in Sochi. Martial said, with a laugh. that "in Russia everything is difficult, but nothing is impossible." Martial and Bastien are planning to expand their operation to include other kinds of food service, including a bar/ cafe that will be designed to appeal to the underserved professional clientele seeking a place after work and in the evenings.
Specialities at Brigantina include steak frites, mussels, escargot, oysters from France and live crab flow in from Canada. The menu also offers several pasta and pizza selections and the wine list ranges from inexpensive local offerings to several very expensive Bordeaux wines. The Brigantina stays open 24/7 and has both indoor and outdoor dining areas.
Rendition of the Hyatt Regency in Sochi
Today, I looked at hotels in central Sochi. The new Hyatt Regency is being built in the vacant lot between the Park Hotel and the Primorskaya Hotel. The site is great, with a park-like walkway about 50 meters between it and the bluff and then just below the boardwalk. The Hyatt is quickly coming out of the ground and next door the Primorskaya is beginning renovations.
Statue of A.C, Pushkin and the construction site of the new Hyatt Regency, Sochi
The adjacent Park Hotel has been the preferred spot for business travelers because of its quality and location. Just across the street from the Park sits the new Bounty Boutique Hotel.
Park Hotel, Sochi
The Primorskaya has a great location and a beautiful facade. However, the aged Soviet-era rooms are currently very substandard. It will be interesting to see the result. Despite the room quality, Primorskaya has had one of the friendliest and most helpful of the hotel staffs in the city. Of course, the Grand Rodina has the most professional staff in south Russia.
Rendition of the remodelled Primorskaya with the hotel in the background, Sochi
The Park has 447 rooms and the Bounty Boutique Hotel 27 rooms. When the 350 room Primorskaya has been remodelled and the Hyatt Regency (200 rooms) has been built, Sochi will have 4 quality hotels with over 1,000 rooms within 2 blocks in the very center of the city. This is only a small part of the total, with thousands more rooms being constructed in the city center, at Adler (Olympic Village) and Krasnaya Polyana (alpine events).
I like this interactive map of distances to Sochi from other cities in the Black Sea Region. It illustrates distance very well and shows cities such as Yevpatoria, Ukraine are not far from Sochi. There is ferry service to Sochi from Trabzon, Turkey and other cities including Tuapse, Russia and Gagar, Abkhazia. It is assumed that by 2014 there will be more ferry service offered from Black Sea cities to Sochi.
What the map does not show is how overland distances translates into travel time. For instance, the city of Svetlograd is about 195 miles. Svetlograd is some distance past the more well-known southern Russian city (and original home of MIkhail Gorbachev) of Stavropol. Stavropol is about 150 miles directly from Sochi. To a North American, it would seem that a trip to Stavropol would take about 2 hours. However, on the train it is about 10 hours. The bus trip is about 12. A car trip would probably around 10 hours due to circuitous roads and traffic. The map does not show that there is only one road (and one railroad) leading to Sochi from the rest of Russia. The Caucasus Mountains come very close to the sea at Sochi and the road was constructed along the seacoast and so avoided the difficulties and expense of mountain construction.
For this reason, security for the Olympics, Paralympics, World Cup and Formula 1 are not the issues that are assumed by many that are unfamiliar with the region. It could take 24 hours or more to reach Sochi from the restive regions of Russia's North Caucasus. And since there is only one road, the checkpoints and potential checkpoints make infiltration by those with destructive power very difficult. And with a mountain range in between the two, it would very difficult to make an overland journey.
There is no place immune from security risks, but because of Sochi's location it is no more of a risk than any other high profile destination.
I posted Inside Socni Newsletter yesterday with new photos of Sochi's Olympic Village. Please take a few moments to read the newsletter and pass it on. Inside Sochi has on-the-ground photos and information of Russia's new sport capital.
Subscribe to the newsletter here.
Post a Comment