Blogs from Saint Petersburg, Northwest, Russia, Europe - page 63

Geo: 59.939, 30.3158 GÜN 5 günlerden çarşamba Bu kuzeyde, azıcık su kenarı ve azıcık tarihi eseri olan her kent "kuzeyin Venediği"olmaya soyunmuştur. Bunların arasında, bu sıfata en yakın olan yerleşim birimi herhalde St Petersburg'tur. Sabah Dome Perignon ve Beluga Havyar bazlı mükellef bir kahvaltı yaptık. Balık çeşitlerini gördükçe, aklım başımdan gidiyor doğrusu. Şekerci dükkanındaki çocuklar gibi dolaştım kahvaltı salonunda. Bugün Hermitage günümüz. Otobüsümüz bizi Hermitage 'a götürdü. Kalabalığı görünce gözlerime inanamadım. Nerede o koca müzeyi tek başıma gezdiğim günler. Nerede şimdiki ana baba günü. Dalga dalga kalabalıklar ve telaşlı, telaşlı sallanan rehber bayrakları ... İşimiz zor ... Böyle kalabalıklardan pek bir sıkılırım... Hermitage deyince 5 dakika duracaksın.(Rusc... read more

I truly needed some time off by the time the last day came around. As fun as it had been, a whole week with a group this size takes its toll after a while. I set out to first change some money for the sights that were yet to be taken in, and then to spend a few more hours at the Hermitage. The money changing was a disaster. The bank had all it’s outside signs in English, but the teller didn’t speak a word and the receipt for the transaction was 100% Russian. Using my Pocket PC, I managed to figure out that the bank was trying to charge me a ‘commission’ per bill changed, not per transaction. I attempted to explain the stupidity of such a system (such as why somebody changing 4 x ... read more

The follow up to our exhausting introduction to the city was a day off of sorts in which we went about on our own seeing more of what intrigued us. We set off in our groups, got our orientation to the major site of the city (The Hermitage: world’s largest museum, former winter palace of the Czars/Tsars?) and then set out to see what we wanted. On the way to the winter palace, 3 out of the 4 travel groups had their first encounters with Gypsy crime. Generally speaking, a group of Gypsy women (they seem to all be around 5ft tall) would converge out of nowhere to start harassing part of the group and go for any personal items. Discretion is not something that these women employed. I would describe it as being more of ... read more

Russia was an interesting place. Saw where Anastacia might have existed, lots of palaces. The midnight sun is incredible, its like the sun shines through the night, it never gets dark. Wasnt much choice for places to eat, not much choice of food either, but the rest was interesting.... read more

Hey Everybody, Here’s a travel update from St. Petersburg. Firstly, Eric and I are alive (that’s the most important part). We crossed into Russia early Saturday morning after taking a 27 hour train ride from Warsaw, Poland which crossed through Belarus, Lithuania and Latvia before entering Russia. The border crossings were all quite easy actually and I was glad all of our paperwork was in order. Poland was surprisingly beautiful by the way. If any of you have any inclinations to travel consider Poland (Krakow is one of the most beautiful and fun cities I’ve ever been in). So, now we’re in St. Petersburg. This city is absolutely gigantic. We’ve spent 5 days here already and I’m sure we haven’t even seen half of it. The architectural style of all of the buildings is very different ... read more