Back to Moscow

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For the last day in St Petersburg i decided to go off on a wander on my own. I went to see the fortress of St Peter and Paul. It was more of a wall than a fortress. As i approached i noticed that outside the fortress there was a small beach. Brilliant! We'd arrived thinking it would be freezing and here was a beach. It was sunny all day but still only about 15 degrees. Incredibly, there were a few people sunbathing in just their swimsuits. It was a strange sight, people sunbathing whilst others walking past them in coats and scarves. Still, i bought an ice cream and joined them. Although i stayed fully clothed. I spent the rest of the day exploring, re-visitng some of the sights from the day before and getting some new photos. Just killing time really. St Petersburg is nice but we haven't really got the budget to stay in a city like this for too long and i just want to get back to travelling again. I fear i'll feel the same in Moscow. After grabbing dinner we went back to the station to get our train. The travel agents had cocked up though and we wern't all in the same cabin. I got the short straw and was on my own. I didn't mind at first as luckily i was with a guy who spoke good english and once we got chatting i found out that he once live in Bangkok. So he spent ages telling me about all the places we should visit there. I've forgotten most of it now of course. He did also warn us that travel from Shanghai to Bangkok would be tricky, so thats something we need to start looking into. Just before the train left two other guys joined us. They were friendly enough, although didn't speak english. Although, 4 guys in one small cabin should be illegal as there was not much space and it was uncomfortably hot in there. And then we went to sleep. Well one of us did and he was the loudest snorer ever. So i hardly slept and arrived in Moscow at 6am extremely tired.

Day 23 (Tuesday 23/09/08). Things started well back at Moscow as our transfer was already waiting and we were whisked straight to our hotel. We had a tour at 10am so i wanted to get a couple of hours sleep. Unfortuantely, the hotel receptionists (evil, evil women) decided that they couldn't find our reservation. They said we needed our vouchers so we had to find an internet cafe. This still wasn't enough for them and it wasn't until we called our travel agents that they suddenly found our rooms. No apology though. All this took 2 hours, so for the second time in a few days i'd go on a tour not really in the mood for it! Still, as before once we were out, all was fine and i enjoyed it. We met our guide at 10am. She warned me it was really cold out. I said i'd be fine in just my jacket. I was really cold. Bitter winds first thing in the morning. Straight away she showed us the underground and how to use it. The underground stations here are like museums themselves. In fact, you could do a guided tour of them if you wanted. We were then shown around a few sites of Moscow. We saw the theatres, the Red Square, the Kremlin and all the usual cathedrals etc. At the same time we were given an extensive history lesson (from a very pro-russian point of view). At the same time i was still freezing cold. Still, it was all very interesting. After the tour i went to bed until 5pm. Needed to recover. Then that eve, after more useless advice from our friends at reception (different lady this time but they are all incompetent in their own way) we found an extremely cheap bar next to the hotel and had a few vodkas.

Day 24 - Got up for breakfast. Had to find the 2nd floor (hotel is a tower block, we are on the top floor (28th). There was an option in the lift but it wouldn't take us there. In the end we went to ground floor and took the stairs. Annoying guy played the piano throughout breakfast. Aaaaahh!!! I'm becoming a holidaymaker. Want to be a traveller again. Can't wait to leave for the next part of the trip and get away from these fancy hotels that arn't even that fancy.

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Photos

Moscow
View of Moscow from our hotel