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Gelendzhik hotels: why we removed these collections
Editorial Position
Updated:8 min1,640 words

Gelendzhik hotels: why we removed these collections

This page used to contain six articles about Gelendzhik: five roundups of hotels with private beaches, pools, sea views, and all-inclusive packages, plus a transport guide on getting there from a neighboring resort. All six have been removed from every language version of the site.

The beach roundup rests on a silent assumption that the resort functions as a resort. That assumption does not hold here: the local airport remained closed for more than three years, and in spring 2026 a new mass closure of southern airports was expected. This is not restored connectivity, it is an on-and-off regime, and we will not sell vacations against that backdrop.

💡 At a glance:

  • which six articles were removed and what was among them besides hotels
  • what has happened to airports in southern Russia since February 2022
  • why the 2025 reopening does not mean normal connectivity
  • which Black Sea and Mediterranean coastlines remain in our live sections
  • Last updated: 09/2026

Why we deleted these guides

Five hotel articles covered the entire beach demand: private beach, pool, first line, sea view, all-inclusive. The sixth was purely a guide on how to get here from a neighboring resort. We are removing it together with the rest, and we do not retell the route even in the past tense.

Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine began on February 24, 2022. Our articles about the Black Sea coast continued to appear after that, and all that time they described the region as if nothing had happened. All six have been removed, and the old URLs redirect here.

On money, briefly and precisely. The share of oil and gas revenue in the Russian budget fell to roughly 22 percent, while the share of non-oil-and-gas revenue, which includes hotel sector taxes, rose to roughly 78 percent (OSW Centre for Eastern Studies, 12/09/2025). The resort season is domestic consumption, and it has become relatively more important for the budget than before the war.

What happened to the southern airports

Airports show better than anything else what the region has become over four years.

Since the start of the full-scale invasion in February 2022, 11 airports in southern and central Russia have suspended operations. Among them are Krasnodar, Anapa, Rostov-on-Don, Gelendzhik, and the airports of Russian-occupied Crimea (Ukraine). The closure was initially presented as temporary, then repeatedly extended (The Moscow Times, 04/26/2024).

Partial reopenings began only two years later. Elista reopened in May 2024, Gelendzhik in summer 2025, Krasnodar on September 11, 2025, with a limited schedule. In May 2026, according to an NV forecast, more than 13 airports in southern Russia could be closed (The Moscow Times, 09/11/2025; NV, 05/2026).

A reopening after three years of downtime looks like a return to normal only in a headline. A resort whose airport is opened and then closed again along with a dozen neighboring ones is not a place about which you can write a beach roundup with a week-long itinerary.

Separately, on travel from Europe. On February 28, 2022, the European Union banned Russian air carriers from landing, taking off, and overflying its territory through Council Regulation (EU) 2022/334 (EUR-Lex). There has been no direct connection between the EU and Russia since that date, and we do not explain how to replace it.

Why we do not compile such lists at all

Beyond the factual side, there is a legal one, and it applies to the entire section. Council Regulation (EU) 2025/2033 of October 23, 2025 replaced point 2 of Article 5n of Regulation 833/2014 with a direct ban on providing services directly related to tourism activities in Russia (EUR-Lex). The list of covered services includes travel agency and tour operator services, guide services, and related advertising services, and the transition period ended on January 1, 2026 (Skadden, 11/2025).

Even if the airport operated reliably, and even if we very much wanted people on the coast to live peacefully, a publisher based in the European Union cannot publish these lists now.

There is also a third reason, neither legal nor transport-related. Organized tourism to Russia fell by roughly 90 percent back in 2022 (industry statistics review, Fox News, 2022). A hotel roundup for readers who are practically absent from this coast stopped being a reference by 2026: it stayed in the catalog by inertia, because it once brought traffic, and that is the worst possible reason to keep a text on the site.

What this means for you as a reader in the EU and the US

Item

Status 09/2026

Source

Airports in southern Russia

11 closed since 02.2022; Gelendzhik open in summer 2025, Krasnodar on 11.09.2025 with a limited schedule

The Moscow Times, 26.04.2024, The Moscow Times, 11.09.2025

May 2026

NV forecast: possible closure of more than 13 airports in southern Russia

NV

Flights by Russian carriers to the EU

Banned by Regulation 2022/334 since 28.02.2022

EUR-Lex

Services related to tourism in Russia

Banned by Article 5n(2) of Regulation 833/2014 as amended by Regulation 2025/2033

EUR-Lex

Transition period

Ended 01.01.2026

Skadden, 11.2025

Paying with an EU card

Impossible since 10.03.2022

The Moscow Times

German Foreign Office advisory

"Vor Reisen in die Russische Föderation wird gewarnt"

Auswärtiges Amt

We do not report whether an airport is operating on a specific day. We have no verified source with current schedules, and a guess in a text people read before traveling is unacceptable.

Where to go instead

The query was about a warm sea, sand or pebbles, a hotel with a pool, and a straightforward flight. The live sections of the site answer that: Bulgaria, Montenegro, Cyprus, Turkey, as well as Greece and Croatia. Bulgaria's Black Sea coast is closest in format to what readers were looking for in the deleted texts, while Montenegro and Croatia offer the same mountain line right at the water's edge.

The editorial team's overall explanation for the entire section is collected in the section hub. Related text: our position on hotels and beaches in Anapa.

Where we stand

We believe a beach guide promises the reader predictability: they will arrive, check in, and the following week will go according to plan. In our assessment, in a region where airports are closed and reopened in whole groups, that promise is backed by nothing, and making it is irresponsible, even without considering the legal framework.

We also do not restate the deleted transport guide and do not name a single hotel from the previous lists. Neither becomes harmless just because it sits inside an explanatory text.

We write about the state and its policies, not about people based on their passport. In Russia, there are those who spoke out against the war and received prison sentences for it. Our decision not to publish guides to Russia is about money, sanctions, and reader safety, not nationality.

Publication date: September 3, 2026. Last updated: September 3, 2026.

⁉️🤔 Frequently asked questions

The airport has reopened, so why do you write that there is no service?

We are being more precise: the reopening came after a three-year shutdown, and new mass closures were expected in May 2026. There is a difference between a one-off reopening and stable service, and that difference is what makes the beach genre impossible.

Are you exaggerating the safety concerns?

We do not describe any attacks or their consequences at all, and we do not cite any figures on the subject. The entire factual section is built solely on public reports of airport closures and reopenings.

Why was the guide on traveling between resorts deleted?

Because it is practical travel information, and this section does not include that in any form. We do not summarize it or keep it in the archive with a note.

Did all six texts really have to be removed in full?

Removing the recommendation from a hotel roundup means removing the roundup. Adding a warning at the top would have meant leaving the old page to answer the old query, just with a fine-print caveat.

Will you bring these roundups back?

We do not make promises with dates. The decision will be revisited when the grounds for it, listed in the sources block, change.

In short

Six articles about Gelendzhik have been removed in full, including the transport guide, which we do not summarize. Since February 2022, 11 airports in southern and central Russia have suspended operations, and partial reopenings have not restored stable service. There has been no direct air service between the EU and Russia since February 28, 2022, and from January 1, 2026, providing services related to tourism activities in Russia, or advertising them to people in the EU, is prohibited. The Black Sea and Mediterranean coasts we continue to cover are listed above.

How you can help

We do not collect money and receive nothing from the links below. These are the official websites of organizations working with the consequences of the war:

Sources

Link check date: 09/03/2026.

tourism.com.de Editorial Team
tourism.com.de Editorial TeamTravel editorial team: research, fact-checking, updates→ All publications

A small editorial team writing guides for independent travel. We travel ourselves, but we haven’t been everywhere, so we check prices, opening hours and how to get there against official sources.