Cheap beer, beaches and a secret heart

Stifling quarter-final venue has attractions for fans, Stalin’s bunker and reminders of a dark past

in Samara

When they arrive in Samara, the first place Englishmen (though possibly not the members of Gareth Southgate’s squad) should head to is the Zhiguli Brewery. Here, on the banks of the River Volga, in the giant brick brewing sheds, they have been converting Volga water into Zhigulevskoye lager for generations. And it is here, from a couple of windows to one side of the building, that locals queue up, clutching plastic bottles, to buy the stuff on tap. It costs all of 75 roubles a litre, which works out at about 45p per pint. And, not that it really matters at that price, it tastes like nectar.

Armed with a couple of bottles of liquid refreshment, the England fans arriving in preparation for Saturday’s quarter-final against Sweden can then make their way to the kilometre-long beach which has been constructed just along the river from the brewery. Tons of imported sand have been rolled into place to create a Rio-style landmark. Right now, as the city swelters in temperatures not experienced in more than 50 years, this is where the entire population appears to be encamped, taking dips in the river to escape the heat.

Sitting on the beach, watching teenagers rollerblade along the promenade, seeing the jet skiers swoosh past, observing the tourists on cruise boats toasting the view, it is hard to reconcile the fact that this town used to be closed to the outside world. Then known as Kuybyshev, after the Bolshevik leader Valerian Kuybyshev, in the Sixties and Seventies this was the centre of the Soviet space programme. All the Soyuz rockets were constructed in the warren of factories on the city outskirts. And in the height of the Cold War, so fearful were the authorities of secrets being uncovered, no one was allowed into the place without requisite permission.

This was always a city with a secret heart. It was here that a bunker was constructed some 60metres underground, where Stalin could come if under threat. Now, 27 years after the fall of the Soviet system, in a visual statement of how times have changed, there is an Irish pub a stone’s throw from Stalin’s hideaway, where you can drink a pint of Guinness if you tire of Zhigulevskoye.

Though probably the best place to escape the stifling heat enveloping the town is the bunker, where the temperature is a comfortable 18C all year round. Its secret finally revealed in 1991, this is an astonishing place, complete with a bloke outside who will let you dress up in Stalin-style jackets to have your picture taken for less than £3.

Here, Stalin had an exact copy of his Kremlin study installed. He insisted it should have six doors to keep any visitors guessing through which he would enter the room. Not that he was paranoid or anything. He had ordered the place to be built in 1942 when the Germans were consuming vast tracts of the Soviet Union and preparations were being made for Samara, 1,000 miles to the east of Moscow, on the border with Kazakhstan, to become the nation’s capital. But, in the end, Stalin is reckoned never even to have visited the place and it remained in aspic until opened up to visitors in the last five years.

Samara has put its best face on for this World Cup. A proper industrial town (Lada cars are made just down the road and virtually the entire wartime production of aircraft came from its factories) it was known for being a touch grubby under the fingernails, the lovely old wooden buildings of the centre faded and tumbledown, in need of some of the Russian money that is being invested instead in London property.

But it has been mightily spruced up for the tournament, cars banned from much of the centre, its public buildings washed, litter whisked off the street. The one piece of graffiti I spotted had been sprayed away by the next morning. After Russia beat Spain in their last-16 tie, the temporarily pedestrianised streets were thrumming with all-night celebrations as fans spilt out of bars and clubs, so England followers will have plenty of places to toast success (or drown their sorrows).

That is if they ever make it back from the Samara Arena where the game is being played. The lovely new copper-coloured stadium, designed in homage to Samara’s space heritage, is some nine miles from the city centre, on the edge of this sprawling metropolis. Surrounded by a traffic exclusion zone, once left there by the many free buses that shuttle from the city centre, fans are obliged to walk a