Ulyanovsk is defined by its Lenin heritage — the Soviet state invested heavily in turning the birthplace of Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov into a pilgrimage site, and the results are impressive even to visitors with no ideological attachment. The Lenin Memorial Centre and the cluster of preserved Ulyanov family homes occupy a whole neighbourhood on the high Volga bluff. Beyond the Lenin trail, the city has a fine 19th-century merchant town core, a literary museum devoted to the novelist Ivan Goncharov, and wide views over the Volga from Novy Venets Boulevard.