Makaryevsky Monastery

Two hours' drive from Nizhny Novgorod, complete with hair-raising overtaking maneouvres and sudden stops for roadside mushrooms, stands the isolated village of Makaryevo, home to a beautiful ancient monastery, a glorious view across the Volga, and a few stray dogs.

We went there for champagne and chocolates as we surveyed the view, before going into the monastery, where we were politely but rather distantly shown round by a young woman, one of the 18 nuns who keep the complex alive.

We saw a cavernous cathedral, where apparently the murals are being miraculously restored, and an upstairs winter cathedral where they had to paint over the ruined walls.

The occasional suspicious onlooker from within the walls only added to the sensation of being deep in the Russian forest.