last stop - Saint Petersburg

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Check out the video of Russia which I uploaded. Russia in 30 seconds.
click here for the video. Password is warta

App tip. '1 second everyday'. Take a short video every day, select one second in this all and then stitch weeks months or the whole year together. That's how the attached video was done.. Great fun and it's amazing how much you can see in a second.

Saint Petersburg must be the most visited city in Russia judging by the masses of tourists we saw. What a difference to the first few Russian cities we visited where we got excited when we saw another tourist. We understood why everyone is here once we explored the city.

Given that the Germans shelled the city for over 800 days during the second world war it is surprising that it still stands. Apparently Hitler wanted to raze it to the ground, if the Nazis would have been successful in taking it. Luckily they weren't.
Most of the inner city was rebuild in the original style after the war and it looks fantastic with loads of 18 century architecture around.

The city started of as a fort to protect Russia from the Swedish who originally 'owned' this piece of land but lost it to Russia during one of the many wars the Europeans had back then.

It became a proper city when Peter the Great moved the capital of Russia from Moscow to here. He wanted to create a European city and was inspired amongst others by Amsterdam which explains the amount of canals that criss cross the city. The city definitely has a European feel to it especially compared to Moscow which feels and looks very Russian in comparison.

The original fort still exists in the form of the Peter and Paul fortress which was built next to the Neva river. Very pretty to look at but the real surprise is that it has a very nice beach to rival any ocean beach (minus the palm trees). Didn't dare to go for a swim as I can only imagine how cold it would be.

The highlight of St Petersburg for us was the Winter Palace (yes there is also a summer palace build further out of town) and connecting buildings which house the Hermitage Museum. The Hermitage started out as the private collection of Katherine the Great who had a slight horder problem when it came to art.
She ordered a special house to be build next to the Winter palace to house her collection. She called it her Hermitage and the name stuck. Her obsession continued and was kept up by later Tsars who bought more and more art, paintings, statues and other collectables so that it was necessary to build more and more buildings over the years. Even the Soviets continued the tradition and the collection is now so big that the museum hosts only a fraction of the total collection.
What is displayed is enough though. The floor space is gigantic and spread over at least 5 sizable buildings. It would literally take days to even look a minute at each exhibition item. We had half a day... Talk about visual overload.
There is a room whichis a exact copy of a room in the Vatican. Room after room full of paintings. Rooms full of Greek and Roman statues. A bit of Egyptian stuff, Russian art and whatever else can be collected. That is on top of the impressive palace rooms themselves.
Then there is there is the modern art section. If you ever wondered where most of the picture of Picasso, Monet and any other impressionist painters are, then wonder no more. Other museums would be happy to have one Picasso. The hermitage has two rooms full of them....

One other highlight not to be missed is the KD shop. Shop doesn't describe this opulent part delicatessen and part patissery housed in an incredibly elegant building with an interior to match. Time stood still in this place since about 1920. They have a jazz band playing on the balcony and more importantly (to me at least) cakes which were closer to art than food. Nevertheless these delicate looking cakes were eaten with gusto and tasted as good as they looked. I'd come back to Saint Pete just for them...

Apart from art and buildings we also admired a couple of Russian naval ships and a sub as our last day in Russia coincided with the annual Navy Day, held on the last Sunday in July. Mr Putin would be attending as well so we thought we have a look. We made our way down to the river with intentions of getting on a ferry but all boats had been suspended for the day as Putin is, shall we say, paranoid about security. The embankment was jam packed as seemingly most locals get out to attend and many were adorned in naval clothing and plenty of men in blue and white stripped singlets and navy caps. They are very proud of their navy. Quite a few hammer and sickle flags were to be seen as well. Some people just can't let go of the past and it seems quite a few want the good old Soviet days back.
We popped ourselves on a bridge and waited with the masses for 1,5 Hours but Putin wasn't to be seen (apparently he is always late). We were asked to move off the bridge and went to the other side when we finally lost our patience and continued with sightseeing along the river. We caught a glimpse of Putin when we saw a luxury Cruiser being escorted up the river (the bridge was raised for security reasons rather than size of his boat).

At 10pm that evening we returned to the river, just beside the Hermitage to continue the celebrations with masses of Russians many of whom were very merry. Eventually we were treated to a beautiful display of fireworks to end the day and our memorable, pleasant and educational visit to Russia.

The next day it was off to the fatherland good old Germany. Dillon was very excited to go there and inquired many times if he finally would see his cousin's. He had to wait two more weeks but German bakeries and his grandmother (who was joining us for the Germany part of our trip) were waiting for him. All this week be part of our Germany blog I'm sure.

Until then...

Spasiba and dasvidanya Russia

We spend a total of 109 hours on trains and covered close to 7000km. That's across Australia and half way back. And we didn't even do the longest trip. This country is huge.

Russia has been a bit of a surprise to us. I thought it would be full of grumpy unfriendly Russians that live in soviet towns. How wrong I was. Moscow and Saint Petersburg are easily as interesting as London or Paris
It is a fantastic and interesting country that I would come back to without hesitation. We really enjoyed the train journeys which are transportation, scenic, relaxing, interesting and educational in one. The food is delicious and the people friendly, helpful and understanding that we only knew two words of their language.

We already planned the next trip, this time through the further Soviet countries of the Stan's and Georgia.

Not bad for a trip that we mostly did to fill the time before we go to Germany.

Seriously go to Russia it is with it. Preferably while the Russian economy is on its knees as it brought the Rubel down with it. It currently is as affordable as it will be in a long time.

Thank you to Wendy and Leon (and the two other people which I just forgot to mention) who were the inspiration for this trip we owe you one.

Btw we can still receive emails or WhatsApp messages!

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