How Sochi's Olympic precinct was transformed from a cabbage patch to a futuristic sporting playground

AS THE Winter Olympic Games begin, see how Sochi was transformed from a cabbage patch to a futuristic sporting playground.

GAZE out across Sochi's Olympic Park and you may think you've gone to the moon.

Giant spaceships seem to have landed, arriving from a galaxy somewhere in the future.

These are the$1.5 billion collection of stadiums which Russian president Vladimir Putin hopes will help show the world that Russia, in the post-Soviet age, is a modern global force.

The transformation has been on a scale similar to Sydney's Homebush, if slightly more exotic. Only five years ago, refugees from nearby Abkhazia grew cabbages across this scraggly piece of Black Sea coast.

The site of the Sochi Olympic village in 2009.

While the $779 million Fisht Olympic Stadium staged the Opening Ceremony this morning and will host games in the football 2018 World Cup, the most striking structure is the $302.9 million Bolshoi Ice Dome.

It will play host to one of the biggest sports events at the Olympics, the ice-hockey men's final, where Canada and Russia start the tournament as the two top favourites.

Based on the design of a frozen drop, the stadium took the name Bolshoi, which means 'major' in Russian and also evokes an association with Russia's famous Bolshoi Theatre.

Nearby, the Iceberg is a $278 million skating palace, while the Ice Cube is a $14 million investment in that great winter past-time of curling.

Sochi's Iceberg Skating Palace. Picture: Getty Images

Sochi Olympics organisers have faced a constant barrage of criticism, but they've got one thing right that Australia got wrong back in 2000.

The Shayba 7,000-seat multi-purpose arena, which will also host some hockey games, is a moveable venue, making it possible to be dismantled and transported for post-Games use in another Russian city.

Australian sports administrators, including NRL chief executive Dave Smith, would no doubt love to take a venue or two from Homebush and use it more effectively somewhere else.

View of the Olympic rings outside the Fisht Olympic Stadium. Picture: AFP

Like Sydney Olympic Park, the challenge facing the Russians will be making sure the venues don't cost a bomb to operate when the Games caravan moves on.

But, they're not letting the weeds grow under their feet - the Russian Formula One World Championship will be staged on a street circuit in the park this October, 100 years after the last Russian Grand Prix was staged in St Petersberg.

Yes, you spaceship-landing martians, times are changing here on earth.