How and by what means to get to Bakhchisaray

In this article, we tell you everything about how and by what means to get to Bakhchisaray in Crimea. From the guide, you'll learn which road is best to take by car, how to get there from other regions of Russia by train or plane, how to get cheaply from the airport or train station, including schedules and transport costs. And if you have any questions left or just want to chat about holidays in Crimea, join 💬 our useful Crimea chat.

Overview of ways to get to Bakhchisaray

Bakhchisaray is 30 kilometers from the center of Simferopol and 40 kilometers from the airport (Bakhchisaray on the map). Intercity public transport is quite well developed here, and you can get here directly or with convenient transfers by train, commuter trains, and buses from Crimean cities and mainland Russia. Here are brief instructions:

• ✈ By plane to Simferopol airport, and from there by taxi from 1400 rubles or by direct bus from 100 rubles.
• 🚆 By train to Bakhchisaray train station (only from Moscow and St. Petersburg), and then from the train station by taxi from 100 rubles or city bus #2 for 30 rubles.
• 🚆 By train to Simferopol train station (from other Russian cities), and from there by taxi from 1000 rubles, commuter train from 50 rubles, or bus from 70 rubles.
• 🚌 By bus from the airport, Simferopol, Sevastopol, Yevpatoria, Yalta, and almost all major Crimean cities, and then from the bus station by taxi from 100 rubles or city bus #2 for 30 rubles.
• 🚗 By car via the Crimean Bridge and then along the "Tavrida" highway via Simferopol (this is the shortest and optimal route), or along the southern coast of Crimea via Koktebel, Sudak, Alushta, Yalta, and Mount Ai-Petri (this is a scenic route, but much longer and may require an overnight stop along the way).
• 🛌 Buy a ready-made package tour with transfer directly to the hotel without any worries.
• 🛌 Buy a ready-made excursion from Crimean resorts with transport to Bakhchisaray and back.

Before organizing an independent trip to Bakhchisaray, we advise you to check prices for ready-made tours from Russian tour operators. If you buy such a tour in advance or "catch" hot deals, you can vacation with a tour including flights and transfer at a good hotel for the price of a regular flight. You can find and book holidays in Bakhchisaray at prices direct from tour operators without markups on these Russian tour search and booking sites:

• ✈ Tours to Bakhchisaray on Onlinetours.ru
• ✈ Tours to Bakhchisaray on Travelata.ru (🎁 promo codes for discounts here)
• ✈ Tours to Sevastopol/Bakhchisaray on Level.Travel
• ✈ Tours on Sletat.ru

Now we'll tell you more about each way, how and by what means to get to Bakhchisaray with schedules and transport costs:

By plane

By plane, you can get to Bakhchisaray through the only passenger airport in Crimea, Simferopol. Flights operate from Moscow, St. Petersburg, and large regions of Russia, and many additional flights, including charters, are launched in the summer.

For flight searches, we use the Russian Aviasales, which has proven itself to be the most reliable and effective even under sanctions. Here is a search and booking form directly from this search engine:

ЦЕНА	ПЕРЕСАДКИ	АВИАКОМПАНИЯ	ДАТА ВЫЛЕТА	ДАТА ВОЗВРАЩЕНИЯ
Купить от 9054 ₽	Без пересадок		27.05.2026	08.06.2026
Купить от 8815 ₽	Без пересадок		03.06.2026	04.06.2026
Купить от 20776 ₽	Без пересадок		09.07.2026	22.07.2026
Купить от 20305 ₽	1 пересадка		20.08.2026	04.09.2026
Купить от 15764 ₽	Без пересадок		28.09.2026	23.10.2026
Купить от 11648 ₽	Без пересадок		13.10.2026	21.10.2026

How to get to Bakhchisaray from Sochi airport

Getting to Bakhchisaray from Sochi airport is not easy – you'll have to make several transfers and spend almost a day on this route, sometimes more. You can go by taxi, bus, or train. The most comfortable option is the train. If you decide to go by bus, you'll have to go along winding mountain roads, which not everyone can handle. Nevertheless, if you decide to go by bus, bus tickets can be purchased on the websites unitiki.com or bus.tutu.ru.

The train route would look like this:

First, from Sochi airport by taxi, city bus, or commuter train, get to Adler train station. From Adler train station, you need to take a train to Simferopol. There are direct "Tavria" trains on this route (once a day), as well as trains with a transfer via Krasnodar. We buy train tickets here:

• Tickets for "Tavria" trains are bought on Tutu.ru or on the website of the official carrier Grand Service Express.
• Tickets for trains with transfers are conveniently bought on the official Russian Railways website.

Then from Simferopol to Bakhchisaray you can easily get by bus or taxi, which we describe in detail on this page.

How to get to Bakhchisaray from Simferopol airport

From the airport to Bakhchisaray can be reached in about an hour and a half by taxi or direct bus. You can also take buses with a transfer via Simferopol, then the trip will take two to three hours. Also at the airport, you can rent a car and drive directly to the hotel.

Of course, the most convenient way is by taxi. You can find a car at the airport at the counter in the arrivals hall or in the parking lot outside. But keep in mind that in the parking lot you'll have to haggle down to the real price of about 1400 rubles, as drivers sometimes take advantage of tourists' lack of knowledge and quote speculative prices right away.

If you don't want to haggle but want to head off on vacation immediately without delays, you can book a personal tourist transfer through the search form below or a taxi on the website of one of the local taxi companies. In that case, a driver with a sign will be waiting for you at the airport upon arrival. Payment is made online, and Russian-language support is available. Payment is per car, not per person, so a group or family can save money. Transfer is available at least on the website intui.travel.

If you prefer complete freedom of movement, you can rent a car right at the airport, and drive to Bakhchisaray. By the way, a car will be very useful in Bakhchisaray, since the most interesting attractions are located outside the city. Plus, by car, you can get to the nearest beaches in less than an hour, for example, to Orlovka or Kacha.

The daily cost starts from only 800 rubles in low season / from 1500 in high season. You can book a car and pick it up right at the airport or in Simferopol on these trusted sites:

If a taxi or car rental is out of budget, you can leave by direct bus from the airport towards Sevastopol – almost all of them stop in Bakhchisaray. They depart every 15-30 minutes, travel time is an hour and a half, cost from 100 rubles.

Tickets can be bought at the airport bus station ticket office, which is a couple of minutes' walk from the terminal exit. You can also buy them in advance online on bus.tutu.ru. If you still decide to buy tickets on the spot at the bus station ticket office, you can check the full current schedule here – krimavtotrans.info.

If there are no seats on direct buses, or they don't suit your schedule, you can easily get there by bus with a transfer via Simferopol. To do this, from the airport bus station, take city transport to the "Kurortnaya" bus station (frequent, travel time 30-40 minutes, fare from 30 USD). Then at "Kurortnaya" transfer to Bakhchisaray.

More details on how to get from the airport to Bakhchisaray here.

By train

A railway line passes through Bakhchisaray and there is a train station here. You can get here directly on long-distance trains from Moscow and St. Petersburg (these are passing trains to Sevastopol), and on commuter trains from other Crimean cities. If there are no trains to Bakhchisaray from your city, it's not a problem at all, since you can get there with a transfer via Simferopol, which has many trains from Russian cities.

Here is the train schedule to Bakhchisaray:

Everything is simple and clear with direct train flights to Bakhchisaray, and how to get there with a transfer via Simferopol is explained in more detail here.

By bus

Bakhchisaray is located on the main highway connecting Sevastopol and Simferopol, so you can get here on direct buses from many Crimean cities, as well as from neighboring regions of Russia. Interregional flights here depart at least from Moscow, Krasnodar, Novorossiysk, Sochi, Rostov-on-Don, Astrakhan, Volgograd, Grozny, Derbent, Pyatigorsk, Vladikavkaz, and many other cities in the European part of the country. If you need to get from a remote corner of Crimea where there are no direct bus routes to Bakhchisaray, you can get there during the day with a transfer in Simferopol, Sevastopol, Yevpatoria, or other large cities. You can check the schedule and buy tickets to Bakhchisaray on the websites bus.tutu.ru and unitiki.com, and here is the station schedule from the Yandex.Schedule service:

All intercity buses arrive at Bakhchisaray bus station, which is located on the outskirts of the city, about three kilometers from the historical and tourist center (bus station on the map), which contains most of the attractions and accommodation options for tourists. From the station to the hotel or the Khan's Palace, you can take a taxi from 100 rubles or for 30 rubles on city bus #2, which runs every 10-20 minutes.

By personal car to Bakhchisaray

By car from Russian regions to Crimea, you must enter via the new Crimean Bridge, passage is free. You can also now enter Crimea through the territory of the DPR, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, and travelers and tourists already drive along this route calmly.

After entering the peninsula, the route to Bakhchisaray can be planned along one of these options:

• Via Simferopol. This route, 300 kilometers long, runs along the new excellent Tavrida highway, which, with good road conditions, can be covered in 4-5 hours. Along this highway, there are rest stops and new branded gas stations.

• Along the southern coast via Koktebel, Sudak, Alushta, Yalta. This route is 50 kilometers longer, but is considered more scenic as it runs along the seashore via serpentine roads. But to drive it, you'll need almost a full daylight hours, and possibly an overnight stop along the way. Therefore, we recommend it only if you want to travel around the peninsula and visit other resorts and places along the way.

  After Yalta, you can drive to Bakhchisaray in two ways: along the long and good road through the Balaklava district of Sevastopol, or through Mount Ai-Petri.

  The route through Ai-Petri is much more interesting, although the road is worse there. Along the way, you can visit the peak of Mount Ai-Petri itself (there is a tourist market, cafes, extreme attractions, caves, and a cable car), as well as stop for a walk along the tourist trail of the Grand Canyon of Crimea. At the entrance to this road, there are information signs saying there is no passage through Ai-Petri, but that's not true: the road is open there, but some sections are of very poor quality.

Transport in Bakhchisaray, how to get around

The historical center of Bakhchisaray, where accommodation options and attractions are concentrated, is small, and you can walk around it on foot. However, due to the old buildings, it's not comfortable to walk everywhere, and sometimes even dangerous. Unfortunately, in some places the buildings squeeze the roadway so much that you have to walk only on the roadway, as there are simply no sidewalks. Here, for example, is one such section on the main Lenin Street on the way to Chufut-Kale:

At the same time, don't think that due to the small size of the city, you can do without transport altogether. Yes, on foot you can visit Chufut-Kale, the Khan's Palace, the Bakhchisaray Sphinxes, and the Eski-Durbe Tomb. But no less interesting attractions are located outside the city, such as Mangup-Kale, Kachi-Kalyon, Tepe-Kermen, and Eski-Kermen. These places are quite far from Bakhchisaray, you definitely can't walk there. But what's bad is that public transport almost doesn't go there, so you'll have to visit them by taxi, rented or personal transport, or best of all on tours. You can buy tours in Bakhchisaray online on the trusted sites tripster.ru and sputnik8.

Transport may also be needed in the city itself, for example, to get from the train or bus station, or to go to a large store in a residential area, since there are almost no stores in the historical center. For this, you can use local taxis, with a trip costing from 100 rubles.

Several city bus routes also operate in Bakhchisaray. The fare is 35 rubles. Here are useful routes:

• Bus #2 runs every 10-20 minutes. It passes through the entire tourist/historical area along Lenin Street. You can use it to get to the entrance to Chufut-Kale, to the bus station and train station, to the market, and to the PUD supermarket in the city center. See route #2 on the map.
• Bus #3 runs every hour. It passes through part of the tourist/historical area along part of Lenin Street. You can use it to get to the train station, to the market, and to the PUD supermarket in the city center. See route #3 on the map.