SAKI, Crimea — Tamara Tsetlayana stood on a narrow stretch of gray beach, rinsing off a thick layer of the black, ostensibly therapeutic mud that has drawn visitors to the salty lake here for more than a century.

The dreary shoreline with its view of rusted dredging equipment was perhaps less appealing than previous holiday destinations in Turkey and Europe, she said, but patriotism drove her choice this summer.

“With all these sanctions, we decided to support our own,” said Ms. Tsetlayana, expressing a sentiment that the Kremlin hoped would inspire a stampede of Russians eager to vacation in the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea after Russia annexed it from Ukraine last year, prompting Western sanctions.

Yet that tourist tidal wave never quite materialized.

It wasn’t for lack of trying. Workers at state-run companies received subsidized travel packages, for example, while employees of the security services were barred from vacationing abroad. The storied military history of Crimea inspired an advertising effort — one billboard campaign featured a pointing paratrooper demanding to know if you had signed up to be a tourist in Crimea.