Blogs from Saint Petersburg, Northwest, Russia, Europe - page 6

Periodically, I am asked by some of you for my "best" trip, meal, experience, drive, train ride, or hotel. So, without making the list too big, here is a snapshot of the best. And best probably means favorite! Best Hotel Rasa Sayang in Penang, Malaysia Casa Palmero at Pebble Beach, CA Old Course Hotel, St. Andrews, Scotland The Peninsula Hotel, Bangkok, Thailand The Datai, Langkawi, Malaysia Best Train Ride The Trans Siberian Railway, Russia Anywhere on the Shinkansen in Japan The California Zephyr from Chicago to San Francisco The Sunset Limited from LA to Nawlins for the Super Bowl The Coast Starlight from Seattle to San Francisco ... read more

After what seemed like a long day - especially finishing with the 2-hour night walk - we did have a good night's sleep. Our tour of the Hermitage was schedule for a 10.30am pick-up. We woke to darkness outside - so automatically thought it was still very early. We had forgotten that we are close to the north pole - so the sun rises later in the morning. On checking our clock - we found out it was 08.30am - and still pitch black. We never did see the light of day until around 10.00am!!! After the usual "prep" time we made our way down to the breakfast room. What seems like a massive spread - closer inspection told us that about half was the usual "northern" country dishes of various pickled vegetables, fish and meats. ... read more

San Pietroburgo, poi Pietrogrado, Leningrado ed infine ancora San Pietroburgo: inutile dire che la storia e' passata spesso da queste parti... Proprio quest'anno ricorre il centenario della rivoluzione d'Ottobre che ha posto fine al dominio secolare degli zar e ha dato avvio alla costruzione della grande utopia sovietica; la citta' di certo non manca di offrire spunti per la celebrazione di quegli eventi: il palazzo d'inverno viene ancora preso d'assalto da una folla oceanica, questa volta non piu' alla caccia dei membri del governo provvisorio ma alla spasmodica contesa di uno dei preziosi biglietti gratuiti distribuiti dal museo dell'Hermitage ogni primo giovedi' del mese; l'incrociatore Aurora fermo all'ancora sembra sempre pronto a lanciare il colpo d'avvio di una nuova rivolta, musei e teatri festeggiano l'anniversario con mostre celebrative ed esibizioni straordinarie. O forse t... read more

An easy start to the day today, as we wanted to do some souvenir and gift shopping. We spent most of the morning walking along Nevsky Prospekt looking in the shops, purchasing some souvenirs, and ended up in a modern multi storey shopping centre with glass lifts. We had hoped to find some unique Russian clothing merchandise, however, all of the shops in the centre were western culture brand names that you would find in upmarket Sydney or Melbourne. It seems Russians, at least in the wealthy city of St Petersburg, are trying desperately to acquire western lifestyle status. After completing our shopping, we headed back to our hotel to drop off the purchases, then walked to the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood. The church is prominently situated along the Griboedov Canal. On 13th ... read more

Yesterday our alarm went off at 4.30am, in time for us to have a quick shower, and grab our suitcases to take the Hotel Shuttle to Berlin’s Tegel Airport. We chose to fly with Air Brussels, as there were limited available flight options to Saint Petersburg. This meant though, that we first had to catch a plane to Brussels, then change to a flight to Saint Petersburg. Air Brussels didn’t allow hardly any time between landing and departure at Brussels Airport, and to compound the problem, our flight from Berlin was delayed and the check in at Brussels Airport was literally at the other end of the very large Brussels terminal. We ended up running along several travellators in order to make the flight to Saint Petersburg. The flight with Air Brussels was uneventful, although we ... read more