St Petersburg - Venice of the East

I was so excited to finally experience this particular city. God I was excited and while Moscow wasn't everything I had dreamed I was secretly crossing my fingers it was going to be everything I had hoped.

Now obviously we are up a lot higher here so it was darker a lot longer. It only really started to get light around 10.30am and so the beginning of the day was a lot like the above picture. Dark and moody with this deep blue tinge. 

We got our first glimpse of the Winter Palace across the river .... the frozen river and while dark you could almost hear the ice creaking and cracking as the currents underneath pushed the ice above around.

We also just wandered around the city and the beauty of the details really made this city special for me.

A frozen clock, old lamps in the park, a carving on a wall in a residential suburb, the amazing tile work on the only Mosque in St Petersburg and a dragon holding light on an old building. How totally amazing are the details and this is before you even take into account the actual architecture of the place.  

We visited the museum of political history which was fascinating. The people that showed us around this museum were open and honest about not only their experiences throughout the various political upheavals over the last century but also their various views on everything we asked and then even some things we didn't ask.

Finally a treat for hubby - a visit to the artillery museum where he got to play with Kalashnikov and we got to see not only historical weapons but also current nuclear armament ready for use at any moment in time. Unbelievable ... yes! Wandering around this place you almost giggle at the ludicrousness of the fact your posing next to a weapon that could / has been used in the past or future.

Overall - a brilliant start to our visit to St Petersburg. I am looking forward to learning more about this beautiful city!

OH YES - a lesson hubby also learnt today, when the Russians say something is BIG its possibly a good idea to believe them!

Fun and Goodbyes to Moscow

Well as the title says today we said goodbye to Moscow. But I do have something rather embarrassing / hilarious to admit. It appears that the rooms here are all set to very hot - they are roasting hot and for me it's impossible to sleep without sub arctic temperatures so it seemed ideal to just open the window and hey presto - instant chilled room. This is all well and good until we wake up the next morning to find not only the window sill but also the carpet below the window covered in Snow. Yup - it was snowing into the room ... I found it great, snowing in the room, poor hubby maybe not so much ....

So before we departed Moscow we indulged in a sneaky bit of park skating! Oh yes, did I forget to mention it was snowing ... nope - it was still snowing while we were skating, the skate park practically empty except for us crazy Aussies ..... it was a magical experience ... skating in the park! Hubby was bouncing around and when we had to leave I literally had to drag him away kicking and screaming!

As you know ever so often we indulge in a day of fun - devoid of any seriousness it's all about making us happy - for me today that was us... our day of fun in Moscow!

Then onto the train and onwards and upwards! Tomorrow we start exploring St Petersburg and I can't wait!

The Many Sides of Moscow

People have explained Russia to me as home to the very very rich and the very very poor. Its something  that you hear over and over, the great divide between those with and those without. There is no such thing as the middle class, you either have money or you don't and the divide between is almost unbreachable.

Strolling around the tourist centre we explored the famed department store GUM. This is THE luxury centre of Moscow, marble floors, amazing bathrooms, every designer under the sun, security guards every 15 meters and a food hall that leaves Harrods for dead. You really can't comprehend the money that must be spent in a place like this. Everything is perfect, everything is pretty and everything is expensive. I just cant think of any better descriptive word than expensive!

Now that we have mastered the metro we are able to explore some of the less seen areas of Moscow not normally accessible to tourists. It seems bleak, obviously winter doesn't help the situation however it appears nothing has really been changed or no real construction has occurred since the 60's. For someone like me who is lucky enough to have a beautiful new home and the opportunities given to me to put add my personal stamp, this type of mass produced community makes me sad. 

Where is the individuality? Obviously this type of mass produced cookie cutter apartment complex suited the Soviet ideals but I can't help but think ... when are they going to step out from under the Soviet shadow and stop making houses as start building homes!

Miss V One ..... Moscow Metro Nil

That's right peoples ... I, Miss V, have conquered the Moscow Metro. Oh its scary all right - take a good look at the metro map we brought - you really just have to picture the symbols, in my head I say "its a backwards p and then a k and then something similar to an n!" Ha ha ha, hilarious, also I now can picture what the word exit looks like so I know how to get out. 

Obviously the Moscow Metro is famous, situated deep underground the stations are works of art, they are supposed to show all Russians the might and beauty of the nation. I think they are fascinating, each one is different and full of unusual art, statues and rare stone. The trains themselves on the other hand have not really changed from the 50's. They scream into the station only breaking at the last minute, everyone rushes on while people are trying to get off .... overall its great fun and something everyone should try!

So our first stop yesterday was the Izmailovo Flee Markets. These are mostly for tourists but if you actually look towards the back of the markets you will see a lot more locals and much more interesting items for sale. This is a fair way out of the city and we got here by train. There are lovely cooking smells, people yelling about their items, stray dogs running around, snow and mud cover the floor ... I could have spent hours just wandering around here ... totally brilliant. I must say that at this point the temperature had dropped down to about minus 7 and brave Mr V who is too tough for gloves started losing all feeling in his hands and ears!

After that we went to the Palace of the Romanv Boyars. These are rather unknown in Moscow with even our guide never visiting. You put on little blue bootie covers before you enter and find yourselves crawling through tiny little staircases and ducking into small doorways to explore even smaller rooms. Everything about this building appears to be about conserving heat. At minus 7 today you start to understand just how important heat is.

Finally it was hubby's turn and we explored the space museum, full of old satelites, mock up shuttles and escape pods and stories (All in Russian) of the glory of the space race this place seemed to be more suited to the locals but still worth a visit. 

Our guide left us after this and we got on the Metro to visit a place I was told was not open during our visit ... Gorky Park. Mr V was practically bouncing as we walked over the river towards the park and to be honest even I was blown away. Touted as the biggest outdoor skating rink in the world this thing was amazing. The entire park has been transformed from pathways to ice ... music was playing, fairy lights twinkled in the trees and peoples laughter could be heard from the overhead boardwalks where those "non-skaters" watched. 

Sunday night is apparently the busiest night of the week but we will be back Tuesday morning to have our own turn.

Oh yes, on our way home we came across a space shuttle just sitting by the river .... Only in Moscow.

Moscow - A Beginning

I must admit ... I was slightly nervous about visiting Russia - I didn't know what to expect. Its off the tourist track and whenever I would explain to someone I was going they would give me this ... odd head tilted slightly to the side "are you serious?" look.

No jet lag thank goodness, we slept, we woke, we ate and we were suddenly in the right timezone ... but I digress. First thing in the morning ... 9.30am, we met our guide, Olga. Throughout the day we actually got to know her and let me start by telling you a few things. 

1. She is a horrible walker, she stops randomly in big crowds causing everyone behind us to crash into us a give us dirty looks.
2. She tends to take the most odd routes to get to places, once she walked us through a muddy field when there was a footpath slightly to our right. 
3. She is extremely knowledgeable but I think she struggles slightly with being able to filter and pass information on to us in nice easy bites.

Saying all this Moscow seems to be quite a difficult city to negotiate on our own. There is very little English spoken and even just trying to figure out if a particular building is a restaurant or not is slightly challenging.

Now onto the fun stuff .... my first thoughts. The soul of Moscow appears to be a commercial centre, a business city trying to disguise itself as a tourist destination. Its highly religious, extremely moderate in its personal habits and slightly behind in regards to technology and infrastructure.

Tourist appears to be focused on the Muscovite instead of the foreign tourist. There are no tourist information centres (and if there are, we have not found one yet) and there is a definite soviet slant towards the grandness of Russia in everything we see.

This is all coming across sounding quite negative ... which it really isn't, its a fascinating place where instead of people describing others as we would .... "he is a great guy with a really fantastic sense of humour" our guide described people as "a man of noble character" or "a man of moderate habits". You must bare in mind that Russia only left Communism in the early 90's. Also, it appears they are proud of their Communist ties, there is no real resentment towards a government that stole our guides grandfather, whom they have never seen again. In early 2000 anything foreign became popular. Sushi was a major new fast food fad and department stores like Zara were a hit. However from what we have been told there seems to be a movement back to traditional Russian food / clothing / values. 

As I said this is all extremely fascinating, to us it seems like they have been brainwashed. A perfect example of this is the propaganda campaigns during Lenin's time. There is this fabulous museum called the Gulag museum where it showed how they modified photo's to suit there needs, if a person in the photo was later deemed to be an "enemy of the state" they are simply removed from the photo. If an oration by Lenin did not have enough people in the crowd they would simple modify the photo to add more. 

All this seemed to concern our guide slightly, she seemed confused because they are taught that Lenin was a good man but in her words "how much of his life history is just made up or modified to suit the Communist needs" 

 

So obviously our first thoughts on day one. No doubt these will change as we learn more but I think it truly is a fascinating place full of beautiful architecture, interesting people and ideas totally foreign to us. Is it worth visiting ... Yes, however here are two tips for those of you contemplating visiting Moscow.

• Change your money before you go to either US Dollars or Euro's. It is extremely difficult to find a currency exchange willing to take Australian Dollars.
• Hire a guide, this will give you a change to explore and appreciate the city without having to struggle with all the small things.