Central Park — still widely called Gorky Park after the Soviet writer whose name it bore for decades — is the largest recreational area in the city, stretching east along Gogol Street from the main shopping district. The park has boating lakes, funfair rides of questionable vintage, several cafés and shashlik stands, and a small zoo that has been home to Tien Shan bears, Turkestan lynx, and other Central Asian wildlife.
The park is at its best on Sunday afternoons and public holidays, when families take over the paths and the fairground music competes with birdsong. The zoo occupies the northern section; the rides and boating lakes are in the centre; quieter wooded walks are toward the east. Trolleybus lines 1 and 12 run along Gogol to the entrance. There is a small entrance fee for some sections. Best avoided when it is pouring with rain — the fair closes and the park turns muddy quickly.