Jul 22, 2009 - Usupov Palace

Sorry to go out of order, but we just got back from the Usupov Palace and I wanted to write about it today. I think this was my favorite excursion so far on this trip. So far at Peterhoff and the Winter Palace I kept hearing Mel Brooks "it's good to be the king" but now I think it's good to be a Usupov. Everything was so luxurious, but actually rather tasteful. The Usupov family had Tatar roots and made their fortune either trading or manufacturing salt. They had several residences within the city, even, but this was the main residence, and...

Jul 21, 2009 - Stockholm > St Petersburg

Day two of our trip has now come to an end and we have had a fantastic time. It all started yesterday with dad driving Iris and me to the airport (thanks dad). Mum and dad were amazed by the amount of luggage we brought with us that nearly filled the boot of the car. I was quite sad leaving mum and dad after such lovely few weeks in Sweden that were really simply fantastic! The flight to St Petersburg included a stop-over in Helsinki where Iris quickly got acquinted with the Moomin creatures and some Ittala glass pieces. I really like the...

Jul 20, 2009 - Saints Peter and Paul Fortress

On Tuesday (the 14th) we had a history lesson in the morning and went to Saints Peter and Paul Fortress after lunch. Although it is not far to walk, we took the metro from Sennaya Square, which was one of Dostoevsky's haunts. When we got off the metro (I forget at which station) we passed the hockey/basketball and soccer stadiums. Soccer is very popular here, and the local team is called Zenit. They are actually building a new, much bigger stadium further from the city center. We passed it on our way to Peterhoff (another story). The...

Jul 19, 2009 - Some photos from the first week

I will catch up with stories about our days so far, but until then, here are some photo highlights. I have taken 519 photos and 3 short movies so far! I'll end up deleting many of them as duplicates, and currently I can only upload 149 more, so I will pick just the best. -AM

Jul 18, 2009 - Catching up!

After some minor glitches (and a few major ones) our trip journal is finally up for viewing in the correct format! I will post more about specific excursions later, but for now I will just get everything caught up. Unfortunately, Shala has had to leave us so currently our group consists of me, Dr. Smirnova, and Boris (a student at FinEc who has been like my personal guide and entertainer). Hopefully Dmitry, the history lecturer can join us for more outings, but he has a newborn son so I think he will be more behind the scenes than in...

Jul 14, 2009 - Day one by Shala

July 14th It is beginning to sink in that though its called white nights, it rains a lot. One of the first things I am told on my way from the airport is that it rains 300 days of the year. I am hoping this is an exaggeration! I am also told by a friend that in St.Petersburg its 9 months of anticipation and 3 months of disappointment. (Bad joke, no offense). And so there is much to discover in this wonderland. Most memorable today was the tanners on the embankment. Anyone who looks at a postcard of St.Petersburg will instantly realise that...

Jun 21, 2009 - St Petersburg by Boat and Hermitage

We were again up early this morning and met two of our tour companions at breakfast. We went down to where we had arranged to meet and we were all off the ship and through immigration quickly. We were asked for our tour tickets today, unlike yesterday. We have a hard time understanding the system, but at least it did not give us any problems. We had to wait a few minutes for the guide and the van, but we were settled on the van and underway by 7:50am. We visited two cathedrals one of which had a service being conducted. In typical Orthodox...

Jun 20, 2009 - From Russia....

We were up bright and early just as the ship docked at St. Petersburg and went up for breakfast. We met the others in our party and went down to disembark. We joined a line waiting for the gangway to open, which it soon did and we were off the ship. We had heard conflicting stories about the problems of getting into Russia; of getting in when not part of a ship's tour. The eight of us had organized a tour through a local Russian company and we were a little apprehensive as to how it would work. When Christine and I got the tour information...

Nov 14, 2008 - St. Pete Day 3

Today was the day to see the Hermitage. It has over 1000 rooms, so there's no way to see it all in an afternoon. So the tour we did was the Readers' Digest version. It was very beautiful of course, and I think if I had studied more about classical art I would have been more excited about the artwork. They had an exhibit of paintings that were taken from Germany during World War II, and there has been much discussion about what should be done with them. We were not allowed to take pictures in those rooms, but they had stuff from Monet,...

Nov 13, 2008 - St. Pete Day 2

This was our most grueling day yet; we sure packed a lot into one day!! Again with the buffet breakfast. However, I decided this will be my last one. Tomorrow I'll hunt for "blinis," the yummy pancakes that St. Pete is supposedly famous for. This morning we visited Kindergarten #44, which we enjoyed. The kids were cute, and some of them practiced speaking English with us. One little girls could count to 11 in English, and another girl taught me how to say "cow" "pig" and "duck" in Russian. (Korova, cveenya, ootka) We stayed for tea, and one...

Nov 12, 2008 - St. Pete Day 1

Buffet breakfast at the hotel. It's ok...the Marriott really spoiled me, though. The only really good thing I like here is the smoked salmon. The OJ isn't fresh (it was at the Marriott), the bacon and sausage aren't great, I don't like eggs, and they don't make the "blinis" here. This morning we did a sight-seeing tour on the bus, the results of which you see above. So I guess I really didn't have much to journal about, other than catching up with my photos. So if you read about Peterhof already, go ahead and skip to the next journal...

Aug 11, 2008 - St. Petersburg and Peterhof

DAY 28-29: St. Petersburg and Peterhof What a city. There are so many beautiful buildings, inside and out, and so much old wealth. It isn't any wonder that the Revolution happened here ... it is beautiful to be around, but so over the top and excessive! We enjoyed wandering around the Hermitage, and the interior of the building is awesome. Many of the works of arts were similarly amazing. Overall though, we found the Hermitage to be disappointing. Many of the major works by Rembrandt and Monet were under glass, and there was so too much...