Suzdal 220 kms east of Moscow 25 August 2014

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Suzdal 220 kms east of Moscow 25 August 2014

We decided to see a bit more of Russia as we had a day up out sleeve so we had read about Suzdal, a very historic town which had an impressive Kremlin. Once out of Moscow city limits, on the M7, our speed was averaging 90kph. There was one section of substantial road works which took us down to 10kph for 3.5 kms but other than having to slow down for towns, all went well.

We arrived in Suzdal at about 3.00pm and first stopped at the Monastery...which was closed! We asked an English-speaking Russian where the Kremlin was and once we knew what we were looking for, it was easy to find just by looking along the skyline as it was near the Cathedral of Nativity of the Virgin which had royal blue onion shaped spires with white stars.

Before visiting the old Kremlin, we visited the Cathedral and its museum. Other than religious artefacts, an additional section presented the history of Suzdal which was interesting. They even had a children's museum which included a school room. The desks were like the ones Tom & I sat at in very early primary school (Peterborough for me).

Inside the Cathedral was a typical Russian Orthodox church, with bright frescos on every part of the walls, columns and ceiling. Gold artefacts and religious paraphernalia were abundant. It was impressive.

We then visited the Old Kremlin, which was not a bit like the Kremlin in Moscow. All the buildings (old churches and homes) were of wood. Inside the homes, presented the history of the life of people from the 10th century, but mainly in the 17th & 18th Century.



Although we left Moscow in rain, the whole time we were wandering around Suzdal, it didn't rain. We drove about 70kms west of Suzdale and pulled into a little village and parked in front of an old building. In the morning after we had showered and had breakfast, we got a knock on the door by a man who was renovating the disbanded building that we had parked in front of. Timing was good as we were ready to leave. Our journey back to Moscow was a little wet in places but not too bad.

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