We have had a wonderful visit to St Petersburg visiting most of the key sights in the city.
One highlight is the magnificent St Isaac's Cathredral. We marvelled at its grandeur. The Kazan Cathredral was beautiful and we heard choral singing resonating through the whole place. We walked up next to Catherine's Canal to the Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood where Alexander 11 was assassinated. We were fascinated by the multi coloured onion domes on the roof and its mosaic interior.
St Pete's is a magical place for art lovers. We spent the entire day yesterday at the Hermitage Museum. It incorporates the Winter Palace and is arguably the best art collection in the world. On Monday we visited the State (art ) Museum with its extensive collection.
We have been to many wonderful places but a few were not up to expectation including the Marble Palace with its 36 different coloured marble. Many of the floors are covered over and some of the marble walls are painted.
We visited the famous Summer Gardens. This will close next year for refurbishment. It needs it.
We spent 2 days beyond St P., the first at Peterhof built by Peter the Great. We went by boat around the Gulf of Finland 29 km to the west. This is known as the Russian Versailles. We loved the Grand palace which contrasted with the much more modest Mon Plaisir, his first abode. The gardens and fountains were amazing. The following we visited the palaces around Pushkin. Catherine's Palace and Park were magnificent including one room lined entirely with amber. This contrasted with Alexdander palace, home of the last Tsar and his family. It was a real family home.
We leave in a few hours on the train for Moscow.
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6 comments:
Did the amber have any mozzies in it?
If it did, we might be able to get some dinosaur blood, and create a new race of dinosaurs from the DNA! Then we could hide them all on an island and build a theme park around it!
No mozzies but we did see amber with bees and scorpions!
Hi there! I'm an internet friend of Amanda's. I'm so enjoying reading about your Russian travels. Very interesting.
Got your postcard with the owl on it yesterday. It's gone onto the frig.
You're doing a lot of train rides - I think you should have fitted in a ride on the Trans-Siberian railway on this trip.
And I'm staying away from any theme parks Amanda develops.
The theme park in Moscow is Gorky Park. You may remember it from the movie. We may visit it on the weekend as there is a big market next to it.
I know Gorky Park from a song. Not a clue what movie you're referring to though!
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