30 Jun 2019. <RU> St Petersburg, Russia —

Today we went to Peterhof Palace (Петерго́ф, Petergof) or, more correctly, to its lower gardens. Although the Palace itself is worth visiting, we felt we would be "palaced-out" with our two-day visit to the Winter Palace, aka the Hermitage, in the next couple of days. So we contented ourselves with the very spectacular gardens!

So how to get there? Well, we walked to Chernyshevskaya station, took the Metro to Admiralteyskaya, walked round by the Hermitage, and took a hydrofoil — known here as a Meteor, the Russian model hydrofoil used on the Neva River — for the dash to Peterhof.

Well, that's just about what happened, except that we ran into a bit of a commotion in and around the square in front of the Hermitage. It was the running of the XXX International Marathon White Nights. We hung around for a short while to take in the excitement, and then made our way to the riverbank and the Meteor terminal.

The trip to Peterhof is about 32km, and takes about 45 minutes on the Neva River and out into the Gulf of Finland. The trip is interesting for the first 10 minutes, while still in the Neva River, but the open gulf is basically just open water. The only excitement was when one Meteor passed or overtook another!

We got to Peterhof and wandered in to the gardens, stopping only for a refreshing caffeine hit on the way in. Walked in until we came to the Grand cascade and the Samson fountain. We've never seen anything like this. The sheer magnificence of the gilded statues and fountains below the palace has to be seen to be believed.

The Grand Cascade is modelled on one constructed for Louis XIV at his Château de Marly. There are 64 fountains whose waters flow into a semicircular pool in which the large Sampson fountain was installed in the 1730s. The current fountain is a replica installed in 1947 to replace the one looted by the invading Germans during the Seond World War. It depicts Samson tearing open the jaws of a lion, representing Russia's victory over Sweden in the Great Northern War — the lion features in Swedish coat of arms, and there was a major victory over the Swedes on St Sampson's Day!

The other part of the gardens, although perhaps not a spectacular, are delightful. We wandered the leafy avenues, and as we reached the shoreline of the Gulf of Finland, we came across the Hermitage Pavilion, designed for the relaxation of the Emperor and his guests in 1725, it has a moat an upstairs room replete with paintings. We didn't go in — it wasn't open to the public that day — but we just marvelled at the exterior of this exquisite gem!

Tonight we had tickets to the Mariinsky Theatre, for a performance of the Ballet 'Giselle'. We had originally had tickets to 'Shurale' on the 29th, but unfortunately the performance was cancelled. But the wonderful people at the Mariinsky offered us tickets for tonight's performance — better seats, with a 58% discount! Well, that's what we thought. It turns our that we had tickets in the second row of the second balcony. Sounds good! But the design of the Mariinsky means that the chairs in the second row are not raised sufficiently for people in that row to see over those in the front row. This means that much of the stage is obscured by the heads of those in the front. And if those people in the front have no idea of theatre protocol/etiquette, and lean forwards and/or decide to cuddle, the vision of those behind is obscured even more. This was our situation. We made our displeasure known during the interval and they did behave a lot better, but a tip for anyone going to the Old Mariinsky — don't accept anything but the front row in any of the balconies!

In spite of the difficuties imposed by the seating, the performance was delightful. 'Giselle' is one of the most technically demanding of ballets, and the Mariinsky company was certainly up to the task.

Another trap at the end of the night. The Mariinsky has a contract with the taxi companies, and provide taxis to take the patrons home after the performance — but the fact that our taxi TO the ballet cost 300 roubles (about $6.80), and our taxi home cost 1500 (about $34) may cause you to think. Get a taxi a little further from the theatre!

From our point of view, this is all part of the journey, and it was a bit of a luxury not to have to worry about the trip back home after the performance!

29 Jun 2019. <RU> St Petersburg, Russia —

St Petersburg, arriving at 8:30am. We arrive right at the height of the White Nights Festival, when the skies scarcely darken overnight. Lots of things to do!

After having breakfast on the train, we got into St Petersburg on time, and were met by Vera, who made sure we got safely to our hotel. And there's a problem — arrive at hotel at 9am, room not available until 2pm. What to do? The ever-resourceful Hams decided to take a long exploratory walk. Leaving our luggage behind, we set out.

Walked out north and westwards, went along Kirochnaya ul., stopping only for morning coffee at Tsekh 85, a small bakery, part of a chain we noticed in various parts of the city. Good bakery! We got to the Tavricheskiy Garden, where we relaxed for a while, and orientated ourselves a little to a new city. We sat and watched the locals thoroughly enjoying the summer weather which, let's face it, is so short around here. Then we set off northwards towards the Neva River.

The Neva is a wide, fast-flowing river with a lot of traffic — mainly small tourist craft. Shortly after turning to follow the river downstream, we came across a magnificent statue of a sailing ship. This is the monument to the Poltava, the first Russian naval ship, a 54-gun ship of the line, launched in St Petersburg in 1712.

We noted what seemed to be a rather graceful tall ship moored near the northern bank — well, it used to be a sailing ship, but is now the permanently moored restaurant Fregat Blagodat.

Also permanently moored nearby is an old 1900 cruiser 'Aurora', which is now a floating museum. During the October Revolution of 1917, 'Aurora' apparently fired the first shot, signalling the start of the attack on the Winter Palace. Ironically, she is now moored almost opposite the Winter Palace (now the Hermitage Museum).

At 12 noon EXACTLY, we head a loud report. The noise comes from the Peter and Paul Fortress on the northern bank of the river. The 12 o'clock gun is fired every day, and you can set your clocks by it!

We walked along the river, and passed one entrance of the Summer Garden, another place we will be visiting in the next few days.

We went round to the square (Dvortsovaya Ploschad) in front of the Hermitage and got our bearings there. We would be returning here in a couple of days! The huge Alexander Column in the middle of the square is quite a landmark!

We then went into the Metro at Admiralteyskaya Station and took the train to Chernyevskaya Station. Our first encounter with the St Petersburg Metro was a total pleasure — but I suppose we had already become Moscow Metro regulars. With only a couple of blocks then to walk back to the hotel, we got there at one minute to two. We had been told our room would be ready at two! You can't say the Hams are not punctual.

By this time we felt we had done enough, so we settled in for the day. Warren got some blogging done, and we watched a little TV before we went out to the Montana Steakhouse in Kirochnaya ul., near the Chernyevskaya Station, for a very nice steak meal. Then back home to the hotel and a very welcome bed!

28 Jun 2019. <RU> Moscow, Russia —

Today we leave Moscow for St Petersburg. It's a late-night overnight train (11:30pm to 8:30am), so we still have a fair bit of time to continue exploring Moscow.

First task: pack up and exit the hotel. Well, not quite. Because we have a late train, we're leaving our bags at the hotel until closer to train time!

It was wet out, so we decided on indoor pursuits — although we usually had to walk in the wet to get to them! The first port of call was the Museum of Modern Art, a couple of blocks north of our hotel. Much of the museum was in the process of setting up new exhibitions, but there was a fascinating exhibition there of Alexander Pankin and the Avant Garde. The part of this exhibition that interested us most was those works which involved the realization of mathematical objects (Number series, irrational and transcendental numbers, scientific ideas) in the art space ("meta-abstraction"). Here are just a few...

Diptych: The imaginary nature of the Black Square (the iconic painting by Kazimir Malevich)
(L) Mathematical representation of the Black Square; (R) Structure of the Black Square
The middle frame is the explanatory text from the left hand image (How's your Russian?)


One whole room was devoted to Pankin's investigations of one Malevich work, a small Suprematist drawing. One treatment was a 3-dimensional representation that revealed Malevich's work when viewed from one specific angle, defined by a viewing tube.


Bach's square (2018)

We then left and braved the rain again. We walked the short distance to Chekhovskaya Metro Station, caught a train to Kropotinskaya Station. Went up and called in to Il Patio for a pleasant Italian lunch. From here we went over to the Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts, only to find a huge queue that was not moving at all.

We reconsidered our options, and decided to go back into the Metro, go to the Biblioteka imena Lenina Station, and come up just outside the State Historical Museum at the end of Red Square. Good move! The exhibition there in The Museum of Patriotic War of 1812 gives a wonderful Russian perspective of the Napoleonic War of 1812 to 1814.

In particular, there are about 20 large scale paintings showing Napoleon's advance into Moscow, the torching of Moscow by the patriots, and the subsequent catastrophic retreat by Napoleon and his troops. Napoleon was ultimately defeated by the Russian scorched earth tactics where, as they retreated, the Russians set fire to all the crops and stores left behind them, not allowing the French troops to re-provision themselves from the land! And the burning of Moscow itself was the last straw! During the retreat, the Russian winter killed huge numbers of the French invaders!

They are also showing a collection of gems created by Peter Aksenov's jewelry house for the 2016 BBC series "War and Peace". These are exquisite!

After a couple of hours in the Napoleonic Wars, we left the museum to find the weather little better. We did,however, find the zero kilometre marker just off Red Square, and we also paid another visit to farewell Saint Basil!

We returned to the hotel, took our leave from the friendly staff, and took a taxi to Leningradsky Station for our train to Saint Petersburg. This station is one of a group of three stations — the other two are Kazansky and Yaroslavsky. Leningradsky, aka Moscow Passazhirskaya station, is the oldest station in Moscow, and is dedicated to trains to and through St Petersburg (aka Leningrad during the Soviet era).

We had time to have a gourmet deluxe hamburger at the station before it was time to board our train. This leg we were travelling first class. The accommodaton was rather cramped, especially with our rather large luggage! But we stowed it away, and were comfortably ensconced in our cabin for the trip into Saint Petersburg.