Day 9 St. Petersburg (day 2)
Another early wake-up as we needed to meet Elanna at 7:45. She is so good at getting us to the front of lines, taking us to places where she knows there will be less people at certain times, as well as having a vast knowledge of St. Petersburg history and art history. Our same group from yesterday met up even before Elanna arrived, so as soon as the bus pulled up, we were ready to go. Our first stop was to go to the tour company and pay for the tour. This is the catch, she said we would be stopping first to pay for the trip and then we'd have one hour to shop. Well, shopping consisted of shopping around the tour company's gift shop. You know how they always make you exit the museum through the gift shop? You get the idea. So that kinda stunk, but our day was so packed with sight-seeing, really you had no option but to get all your goodies there (or at the port shops). Not that the selection wasn't good, it was, but still...prices were certainly not cheaper than the port shops.
After shopping, we headed for the Hermitage museum. The building itself was a sight to behold, let alone all the artwork inside. I'm forgetting now who the Hermitage was built for...but I am thinking Peter the Great built if for Elizabeth, but she died before it was completed. Catherine (the big spender daughter from yesterday) didn't like staying there because it was too big and lonely, hence the name Hermitage. (my history may be off there). But what I do know for sure is that Elanna said if you spent only a few minutes looking at every piece of art in the museum, it would take you 15 years to see it all. (we were there two hours). She took us to see works by the biggies... Picasso, Kandinsky, Monet, Rembrandt, etc., and knew details about their lives, how and what they painted with and why. We all had our headsets on, so we could easily hear what she was saying from quite a distance away from her. At the Hermitage there are ladies sitting in a chair in each room to keep an eye out on the people. Years ago there was a guy who threw acid on a painting and started cutting it with a knife. (he is probably still in a damp dark Russian prison) It took them 20 years to restore the painting. Now all the pieces are under glass. Anyway, several of these older ladies (guards) were sleeping. Can you imagine sitting in warm room all day long with nothing to do but make sure no weirdos try to touch the paintings? Well we got such a kick out of it I tried to get a picture of a few of them sleeping, but when my camera focuses it beeps. That snapped them out of it immediately. I asked Elanna if they were volunteers, but she said most were retired ladies and got paid some for doing it. But they also got a free lunch in the cafeteria and other social type benefits. Once a month the Hermitage has free entry for everyone. Yesterday was that day. So today it wasn't very crowded because any locals would have been there yesterday. She commented several times how lucky we were. I got several shots with no one in them.
Next we stopped for lunch at a local restaurant. We had no menu, they brought us all the same thing. First was a cucumber, red pepper and tomato salad, then came the cabbage soup, the entree of chicken and mystery stuff, then finally locally made ice cream. I took a few shots of the food so I could show you the mystery stuff, which was my favorite part. I asked Elanna what it was and she said it as a local grain (we compared to barley - kinda) and was very good for you. She said when it is ready to be harvested, it turns brown and then you boil it. It was dry and fluffy like rice only more dry. I liked it. She said it is often eaten for breakfast instead of something like oatmeal. The other portion of the main entree was some kind of chicken in a creamy sauce. I picked around most of the chicken *insert flashback from yesterday's lunch here*, but scooped the sauce up with the mystery stuff. That was good (and probably safe).
After lunch we went church hopping. First the Church of the Blood. It looked very "Moscow-ish" and I didn't have a lens wide enough to take in the entire thing. :( But inside, everything that looked like a painting was actually a mosaic. It was just breath taking...wow. I took lots and lots of pics from inside and outside. They do have an active church there now, which they didn't for nearly 80 years of course when it was Communist. Churches were used for storage, museums and other misc. things, and were obviously not well taken care of. Plus during the war lots of things were damaged, destroyed or stolen. St.Petersburg has just had an unimaginable amount of reconstruction done in the past 20 years.
Next was Saint Isaac Cathedral. The only pics I have of the outside of it were from the bus (which you may have seen in yesterday's shots) because you would have to be way across the street for any kind of full shot and we couldn't leave the group. The top of this church is the one with the big gold "onions" on top. Ok, that is probably not a good way to describe it, but I think you know what I mean. Inside this church was beautiful. In the center of the church, way up in the tallest "onion" was a big sliver dove. It looked tiny, but in reality it had a wingspan of 9 feet. I have some pictures. But the paintings in this church were amazing. There were 4 versions of this church throughout the years and the third church was pretty good size, but had some architectural problems. So when designing a 4th version, they opened it up as a contest (sort of) and the final plan, which stands today, was designed by a Frenchman. They only have special services in this church (Easter, Christmas, etc.) and there are no pews. Elanna said in Russian Orthodox churches you stand for the entire service which could go as long as 2 hours on a special occasion. Each church we have visited has had some kind of gift shop. This one had a good one and the prices were great! Guy didn't know you could actually buy a shot glass in a church, but apparently you can. I did pick up a few items, but no shot glass (ha ha).
After leaving this church we stopped for a photo-op of our next stop from across the river, and of the two kinda ugly lighthouses. At this stop we saw the police with machine guns - FINALLY!! But Elanna said Putin was in town and going to be doing something tonight that required the city to have security everywhere. I went over to take a quick picture of them. Elanna said it was ok to do that, just don't make it obvious. We hopped back in the bus and made a tinkle stop that happened to have shopping. It was about the same stuff as the tour company's gift shop, but we managed to find a few more things. It's not a good idea to compare the prices of the exact stuff you just bought somewhere else...it can become quite unpleasant. :) When everyone was finished, we headed for our last stop which was the St. Peter and Paul Fortress. Built in 1703, this was the spot Peter the Great chose to build his new city (today's St. Petersburg). It is the burial place of all the Russian Czars - being all the generations of Peter the Great's family, all the way down to the last Romanov (sp?) family that as murdered, even the children, to end the rule of this family. (When Lenin took over and Communism began). Again, I need to now watch the movie Anastasia, which legend has it may have not died during the massacre. Anyhoo, there are tombs all inside the church, but the actual bodies are buried deep under the basement.
Back on the bus we headed back for the ship. Everyone is exhausted and ready for a good meal. ;) We got inside the port when Guy realized we never got any Rubles, so I ran back out and Elanna gave me some. The ship doesn't exchange rubles, because most Russian shops take everything, (Credit cards, US dollars and Euros). So she was kind enough to give me some bills and coins. On the ship we got a quick snack and headed for the room. We couldn't decide if to go to dinner or have dinner brought to us. They will bring up room service from the main dining room - anything on the menu. But chose to go down for dinner. I had a coconut chicken and Guy had scampi. Tonight just gets a B rating. :) We weren't that hungry anyway.
Tomorrow is an early day but we get to set our clocks back one hour tonight! Woot! We are in Estonia from only 7am to 3pm. So if we want to see it, we gotta get up early again. But really only a half day and the next day we are at sea all day, so that will be plenty of time to relax then. We don't have a guided tour planned. We are just going to take a bus into the city and walk around a bit. That is what we did in Helsinki and it was kinda nice. We are about to have tour burnout after these past two days.
Horrible Internet tonight. Will work on pictures tomorrow at maybe an Internet cafe.... xoxoxox
