Kemerovo Oblast (Russian: Ке́меровская о́бласть KYEHM-eer-uhf-skuh-yuh OH-blust') is a region in Western Siberia, which borders Altai Krai to the southwest, Novosibirsk Oblast to the west, Tomsk Oblast to the north, Krasnoyarsk to the northeast, Khakassia to the east, and Altai Republic to the south.
By Siberia standards, Kemerovo Oblast is populous, urban, and industrialized. It lies in the heart of the "Kuzbass" (Kuznets Basin) region, home to the world's largest deposits of coal. Accordingly, most of Kemerovo Oblast's cities developed because of economic opportunities related to the coal industry. As a result, the region's cities are often quite polluted, although the situation has improved since the fall of the USSR. Visitors to the region's cities will find them busy, but not significant tourist attractions in and of themselves. But this is all the more reason to get out into the beautiful and unspoilt (and uninhabited) Siberian countryside!
Russian is the only dish on the menu.
Most visitors will pass through Kemerovo Oblast on the Trans-Siberian Railway, which makes stops at (from west to east) Yurga, Taiga, Anzhero-Sudzhensk, Yaya, and Mariinsk.
There is an airport at Kemerovo (IATA: KEJ), with flights to/from Moscow, Krasnoyarsk, and in the summer: Anapa, Sochi and Khabarovsk.
Novokuznetsk also has an airport serving flights from Moscow (Domodedovo and Vnukovo Airports), Saint Petersburg, Tomsk and in the summer: Sochi, Krasnodar, and Anapa.
Rail is the most important means of transport in this industrialized region on the Trans-Siberian Railway. The most important junction town is Yurga, junction for the branch going south to Kemerovo.
The next major stops on the Trans-Siberian Railway are Novosibirsk to the west and Achinsk and Krasnoyarsk to the east.
Travelers heading to Tomsk should take the branch from the Trans-Siberian Railway junction at Taiga.