Thanks! The picture looks gorgeous...
It looks like the cities have been smartened up a bit....?

The thing about Russia (as well as other Russian speaking countries is that there is sooooooooooooo much to see, so large!) it's hard to even know where to start. Same dilemma, I think, as the USA but even more, since Russia has more historical/cultural sites.

Sergiev Posad sounds great. I had heard of the other three that you mentioned, but not that town!
Had seen the "Ivan Vasilevich film - lol, I thought it was filmed in Moscow....