Russia - Week 11 | Travel Blog

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July 22nd 2013

Published: July 22nd 2013

Day 70 – St Petersburg

Officially on the downhill slide now. I’m past the half way point of my trip. Sad face. It’s gone fast and slow. Quite bizarre. Anyway… HUGE day in St Petersburg today. TopDeck planned it all so no extra money needed either. Bonus! We started off on a bus tour with our Russian guide - Svetlana. We saw amazing churches, rivers, boats etc. We got to hop off a lot for photo opportunities too which was good. We were then given some free time for lunch and a bit of shopping. We’re having a hat party tomorrow so I was on the hunt for something fabulous. Later in the arvo we headed to a fortress which had a lovely church inside. Lots of gold everywhere. We got to listen to a men’s acapella group inside the church. They were amazing and soooo loud considering there was only five of them. We then got to have a look at some jail cells in the fortress and walk into the punishment room.

TopDeck took us out to dinner then and we had chicken kiev. Who knew that was Russian? It was a great meal which was followed up with a traditional dance show. We all thought the show might be one of those dodgy ones. Our leaders weren’t talking it up or anything so we weren’t expecting much. But it was FABULOUS!!! Best thing on the trip so far. I was glued to it from beginning to end. The cast was huge and so talented. All the female dancers had to have white blond hair and they looked identical in their amazing costumes. They could glide across the stage without moving the top half of their body. It was kinda freaky looking. The men could do all kinds of crazy tricks, turns, jumps, you name it. The music was great and the show had humour and contrast. Just so, so cool. Look out school kids when I get back. You’re gonna be doing some traditional Russian stuff now. I cannot wait for the Russian ballet later in the week.

Day 71 – St Petersburg

We started today off at the Hermitage where Svetlana walked us around for about two hours. We got to see paintings by Da Vinci, Raphael and Rembrandt. They had crazy mosaic tables. The pieces of mosaic where so tiny and it would have taken forever to create the pictures on them. Every room inside the Hermitage had beautiful ceilings, chandeliers and all the trimmings. Definitely worth a look if you’re ever in St Petersburg. For lunch I went traditional to make up for my club sandwich yesterday. I tried something that has been constantly recommended to us – Borsch (which is a soup). Very nice.

And then it was Origin time. Our leaders had found us an English Pub that would put the game on for us. We headed over and found most of the TopDeck crew there already (the ones from QLD and NSW anyway). We had our own section of the pub and I managed to score the one and only couch so I was comfortable. I’m sure I don’t have to give particulars of the game or the result but god it felt good sticking it to the New South Welshmen in the group. QUEENSLANDER!!!

For dinner we had some Thai food (my traditional thing didn’t last long) and some shots. Yes, shots! Not what I thought I’d ordered but when shots come out you gotta have them. So I had three with my meal. As you do. After dinner we had a whole group boat cruise with a hat theme. I’d bought a headpiece that the traditional dancers were wearing in the show. Lots of sequins and beading of course. Most people went for fur hats and there were a few paper ones for the lazy people. The boat cruise only went for one and a half hours and it finished just as it was getting good. We were dancing and waving to the other boats. A few loud choruses of songs were also belted out. Songs by Bon Jovi, Men at Work and the like. We probably freaked Svetlana out a bit by finishing the night with You’re the Voice and not a very good version of it either. Most of the group kept the party going elsewhere but Kel and I walked back to our hotel. It took over an hour but it was a nice walk. It was still quite light at midnight and I got some nice photos from a bridge. When we reached the hotel the TopDeck bus was parked in the carpark so we used the opportunity to get a few pictures with that as well. The end of two awesome days in St Petersburg. Good start Russia. What’s next?

Day 72 – Novgorod

A few sore heads on our bus today. Hehehe. We had a new local tour guide too – Tatiana. She’s older than we expected but has a good sense of humour. She was going to be a ballerina until she got sick when she was 18 and couldn’t continue. I think she’s just the guide I want on the bus to give me all the info about the ballets and other shows. We headed to Novgorod today which is a smallish town. It’s more like a stopover day on the way to Moscow. We did have a look around Novgorod though with a local guide.

Day 73 – Moscow

World’s longest day ever. 11 hour trip to get to Moscow today and although I was tired I could not get to sleep on the bus. It rained a fair bit today too but at least we didn’t have to be out in it. Our hotel in Moscow is the old Olympic village. It’s in a pretty awesome location with markets, a vodka museum and other attractions nearby. Not that we even get to explore them. We have some busy days ahead that are already fully booked with activities.

Day 74 – Moscow

It’s raining. Bummer. We took a bus tour of Moscow this morning and we got to go up to a lookout to see the view. We passed the old Olympic stadium, a War memorial, Moscow University, many many Churches and more. After some crazy traffic because of diversions we made it to Red Square. It was still raining so we took shelter and had some lunch hoping it would clear. It did. Hooray! We headed to St Basil’s Cathedral for some photos and it turned into many jump shots and photo bombing with some of the TopDeck crew.

We then got to have a tour of the Kremlin. It was pretty much a tour of the many churches inside the walls. Not really my thing but I did enjoy bride spotting. Lots of bridal parties around trying to get nice photos. We had a group dinner next and then some of us headed to the circus. It was a variety show really. There was ice skating, trapeze, dancing fountains, a clown, strong men, aerialists and my favourite… cats and dogs. There was an aerial performer up the rope and the dog kept running onto the stage and grabbing the end of it for tug of war. He swung around the stage for a bit too. So cute.



Day 75 – Moscow

We started today at the Armoury Museum which is part of the Kremlin. Our Russian guide Tatiana showed us around and she was hilarious. She says everything with a straight, sour looking face which just makes it funnier. Tatiana walked into the museum where we were gathered and says “Stop smiling, this is a serious place, act Russian”. Nobody smiles at strangers in Russia. If you smile they think you’re simple. There were many tourist groups in the museum with us and a group had started to follow us up the stairs. Tatiana comes out with “Oh no, the Germans are coming”. Made us all giggle. The Armoury was awesome. They had clothing, royal jewels, carriages, weapons, faberge eggs and much more. I quite enjoyed it but that was probably due to Tatiana’s knowledge of all the items.

Next up we lined up for Lenin’s Mausoleum. The line was massive and we lined up for an hour before being told it was closed because of the G20 which was in town. Complete waste of time standing out in the cold. To cheer us up we went shopping. We found an underground shopping centre right near the Kremlin and spent five hours in there. Not excessive at all. We then got fancied up for the BALLET! I have been looking forward to this for days. We were seeing the Nutcracker. I have to say though I was a little disappointed. They weren’t the actual Moscow Ballet Company as they’re off touring so this was a semi-professional group. The prima ballerina was stunning but everyone else was just average. There were timing errors, a fall, set problems and more. I could hear them counting while dancing and dancers were blatantly watching others to follow the steps. They also cut chunks out of the storyline and nobody was able to follow the story. Bit of a dud. Luckily I had seen the traditional dancing earlier in the week which was fantastic.

After the ballet we had a late dinner and headed home via the metro. The Moscow metro stations look really cool. Very grand. Nothing like our stations back home. It was pouring at this stage so we got back to our hotel room quite soggy.

Day 76 – Velikiye Luki

We were moving on today and the roads were shithouse. Lots of bumps and dirt roads. A truck had rolled over in the mud and caused a huge delay. We were four hours late for lunch and ended up eating cereal on the bus to get us through. Lunch eventually came at 6pm. We had two movies today to try and keep us occupied. Our trip leader has been writing a book about his travels over the last three years so he read us a few chapters of that too. Not looking forward to another bus day tomorrow. 11 hours on a bus is quite enough for a little while I think.

Russia - Week 11

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