We've been to Mother Russia; footloose and Visa free!

St Petersburg was brilliant! I really didn't want to leave, and woke this morning on the ferry hoping that we had miraculously turned around from Helsinki and were back in the Motherland! But alas, Finland it is :-)

Our short visit quickly crushed all steriotypes, preconceptions and expectations we had about what Russia is like.  St Petersburg is, of course, a modern international city.  It has everything Western Europe has (H&M, McDonalds, Citibank... need I go on), and to Andrew's dissapointment it was all priced the same too.  In fact, we had to avoid the big coffee chains because it is obsene to charge €5 for a Cafe Americano.    So much for cheap haircuts and new clothes... we will have to wait until we get further south I think. But I loved that everything is written in cyrillic and that english is not widely spoken because I love the challenge of it; it is so exciting and confusing; especially when that first menu is placed in front of you - it could have been upside down for all we knew!  We get by with lots of pointing and smiles.

Ladas!!

Ok, and I did say ALL steriotypes were crushed, but this is wrong.  The women ARE hot! Seriously, all Russian women are stunning! Well, a large percentage anyway.  And image is everything.  They strut down the street in sky-high heels, dressed to impress and making me feel like an ugly duckling in my t-shirt and flats.  And there are a lot of them too.  Men, if you have money you will have your pick of Russian hotties here! But just as I thought Andrew would dump me in the street and find a prettier wife (or 3!) he pointed out many old Russian women; making the point that "they don't seem to age well'!  Well, you can't have everything :-)   I loved the old women though (they all seem to work in the museums!).  One asked us with a frown if we were American, but when we said 'No No, Australian!' she cracked a massive grin and said "Ah, Kangaroos!" - she was so cute I wanted to adopt her as my Russian grandmother!

Alright, to the deets.  Our 3 day stay was seriously jam-packed.  The ferry (St Peters Line) was ok.  It had a dancing show and cheap Aussie wine in Duty Free so it entertained us for the night.  In the morning we went out on deck to enjoy the view as we steamed through the shipping lane to port.  After arriving morning we cleared customs (orange passport stamps - what a novelty!) and took our 'Tour Bus' to the steps of St Issac's Cathedral. From there it took us about 2 hours to walk to our hotel... partly because it was at the far end of Nevsky Prospekt and also because we kept getting distracted!  Our hotel was basic but nice, and at AU$60 a night it was a bargain.

Russian Bride spotting No. 32!

Despite the rain drizzling down for most of the day we walked for miles, right up Nevsky Prospekt (a 4km street that stretches through heart of the city), past the Kazan Cathedral, the spectacular 'Our Saviour on Spilled Blood' Cathedral and the Winter Palace, over the Blue bridge to the Stock Exchange building and to the Peter and Paul Fortress. We visited the small space and rocket museum (Tasmania rated a mention in a 1956 newspaper about an early spotting of Sputnik!) and walked along the waterfront to the Cruiser 'Aurora'. After swinging by the Summer gardens we went back to the hotel before venturing back out for dinner - although I think our feet were pretty blistered and bruised by that point!

Winter Palace and Hermitage

Feet still aching, the we dedicated the following day to the Hermitage - one of the greatest art collections in the world.  In summer the lines to visit stretch far into the distance and have horrendous waiting times so we were prepared to get up early and wait.... but we soon discovered that this is not the Russian way!  We are generally early starters so when we were told that breakfast at the hotel started serving at 9am (rather than the usual 7.30-ish) we though it was odd... but the opening time for most major sights was 10.30-11am!  So we had a sleep in, relaxed, had a lazy breakfast, and THEN visited the Hermitage! :-)   We didn't need to worry about lines though - out of peak season we were able to walk straight in the door.

Inside the Hermitage

I highly recommend the Hermitage, which stretches through 5 buildings (including the stunning Winter Palace) and contains over 3 million items. It is a tad overwhelming (near the end of our visit I accidently walked through a room filled with priceless Picassos without looking up!), but you can get a 2 day ticket if you need more time.  It was really reasonably priced at 400 Roubles too (about €10).   The audio guide helped orientate us, and I think it is the first time that a museum/gallery has successfully held my attention for more than 3 hours.

Back into daylight (and a beautiful sunny day at that!) we had lunch of coffee and pastries in the park before walking a few kms over to the Blockade Museum, which was..... closed.  A good thing to know about sightseeing in Russia is that, together with late opening times, they also take a day off during the week.   So remember, the Hermitage is closed Mondays, Christ on Spilled Blood and the Naval Museum are closed Tuesday and the Vodka museum/St Isaccs Cathedral shut their doors on Wednesday... we learned these things the hard way!


Not to worry, we filled the afternoon with a visit to the Naval Museum (open Wednesdays!) which Andrew loved for its massive model ships, and then swung past the Bronze Horseman - the symbol of St Petersburg. With time to spare we visited the kitche and little know island of New Holland and then had dinner at a buzzing local place near the Sadovaya train station.    We toasted the day with with dessert at Tepemok; A Russian fast food chain which dominates the city and serves the russian dish of choice, Bliny (thin pancakes containing sweet or savory fillings).   I think it was one of the best days ever!

Dont you dare! :-)

Now being almost permanently crippled from all the walking, we planned out our last day to best utilize the very cheap trolly busses as much as possible - which is easy to do in real-time with google maps.   We went to the market and tasted honey straight off the hive before finally going inside the 'Saviour on Spilled Blood' Cathedral.   The Cathedral intentionally mimics St Basils in Moscow - that classic Russian architecture of elaborately decorated onion domes and bright mosaic patterns.  It is stunning against the sky and the domes look almost fluffy like big colourful marshmallows.  But (and this is because I despise paying to enter ANY church and was a bit miffed to have to do so), at 250 Roubles a ticket I didn't think the interior was great... It was a little to 'gold' for my taste!  I probably just sound like a brat, but we have been to a huge amount of churches - good and bad - and this one didn't hold my attention for long.  But it is basically floor to cieling mosaics depicting the life and times of Christ. 

 

Saviour on Spilled Blood Cathedral

Off to the Blockade Museum, about the 900-day siege of Leningrad (now St Petersburg), we discovered how unintientionally one-sided our view of WW2 was.   Does anyone else think of WW2 and think that the Russians were kind of... forgive me for saying... monsters?   Seeing the 'other side' and trying to grasp the absolute horror that those poor people endured during the blockade from 1941 to '43; well, I can see why they wanted revenge.  I am by no means saying that they were all angels (I watched a doco on Stalin last night - now If we want to talk about monsters....) but no human beings should ever have to suffer the atrocities that they did.  Did you know that you can scrape glue from the back of wallpaper and eat it? Well, lets hope none of us know what it is like to be that desperate. 


To get back in a chirpier mood we headed for the Naval Cathedral of St Nicholas, which was more spectacular outside then in, and then headed up to the Collonade of St Issac's for the best views of the city.  Tossing up whether or not to do the Vodka Museum, we decided to give it a miss because we were sadly short of time and had to head back to the ferry.  We didn't want to leave! St Peterburg is truly a tourist's paradise and has so much to see - we were never going to fit it all in in the time we had, but I think we did a pretty good job of it!  

Russian fast food... Pancakes! Yum.

We met some Russians in the line for customs (it took FOREVER!! We inadvertantly booked our return trip on the 3 day weekend cruise boat which was filled to the brim with Russian tourists doing the Helsinki-Stockholm-Tallin-St P's loop) and ended up chatting for 2 hours.  They had qualified for skilled migrant visas and been in line for 3 years to immigrate to Australia, putting their lives on hold, just to be rejected when the Australian government suddenly changed the immigration policy a few years back.  They were pretty peeved about it, having done advanced english language courses for 3 years (and their english was good!) and learning everything about Australia from politics to culture and history... they even knew the foreign ministers name! (I couldn't remember it! oops!)   It gave a different perspective on the immigration issue to meet people who were directly affected by a decision we personally disagreed with - here were two smart, intellegent and well-spoken individuals that were desperate to come and contribute to Australian society being tied up in beaurocracy; whilst we continue to feed welfare to so many spoilt bludgers that don't know how unbelievably lucky they are to be Australian.... so sad. 

Anyway, back to my story, we cruised back to Helsinki and arrived early this morning.  With delight we managed to skip the horrendous customs queue because there was an 'All Passports' line (meaning Russian) and an 'EU line' - all praise Andrew's EU passport! I think we were the only non-Russians on that boat! So now we are back and hanging out for a few days until our ferry to Tallin on Saturday, with little to do other than laundry and a visit to the sauna... bliss!

So to finish, if you find yourself in St Petersburg here are our recommendations:

• Check your expectations at the door.  Everything your think you know about Russia and its culture is probably wrong and strongly influenced by western media which tends to portray Russia as the 'bad guy' (thanks America!)
• Go out of season.  September is great because the weather is good and the lines are short or non-existent.
• Eat lots of Bliny - they are cheap and yummy! The lunch combo of bliny, soup, salad and tea is my personal recommendation.
• learn how to say Hello (Priviet) and Thankyou (Spassiba) - it makes the world of difference
• Get lost in the backstreets, Nevsky Prospekt might have everything you need but the real charm is when you discover the buzzing local haunts off the beaten track.
• Get the latest Lonely Planet City Guide App on your iphone - it is great for navigation and finding places to eat.

And here is something I learned...
We were told that Russians don't smile because they are always 'thinking about their problems', but if they do crack a smile it is very genuine.  We had been noticing that most people we spoke to seems to be 'going through the motions', they frowned and spoke in monotone. But as soon as we cheerfully thanked them in Russian with our terribly pronounced 'Spassiba' they broke into a huge grin - we even got some giggles.  It made our day.