Buffet Mentality

Czar's Palace/Hermitage St. Petersburg

As we’re looking at our last 4 weeks in Russia, we’ve had many intense conversations as to how we can squeeze in as much Russia as we can in such a short amount of time…and show up for work on a regular basis, also.  The main issue hampering our plans is from April 15 to May 15 we are not to travel outside of Moscow while Greg’s company renews our work visas for the year we’re not going to be here.  I wondered why they bother, but apparently a current work visa is required to move out of Russia.  So, we’ve kept our May 25th packing day and can concentrate on cramming in as much fun into our remaining time as possible.  

The array of sights and activities to do here are varied, exotic and endless; willing and fun friends to participate with you are legion and when faced with a limited time window, we’re panicking and stuffing as much into every available moment as we can.  Having said that, we’ve found ourselves with a FREE DAY (Friday — the May Day holiday).   If you’ve seen the crowds in Moscow, you’d know that an international holiday in a large crowded city is probably not going to be something you’re going to experience alone.   I’ve gotten past my American need for personal space and we jostle and get jostled by the best on a daily basis.  Plans for this upcoming weekend are: Friday- who knows?  Saturday: Ismailovo Open Air market to pick up the 2 paintings we bought last week and shop till we drop, and Sunday: take a winding church tour ending up at the Moscow river where we will board a boat and have a picnic on the boat.   I’ve made a batch of Russian refrigerator pickles in anticipation of snacking on the boat Sunday. 

We took a 3-day weekend to visit St. Petersburg a few weeks ago and I’m just now finding time to share the trip with you.  It was only an hour-and-a-half plane trip and we stayed at the Petro Palace hotel, recommended by our friend, Tim “The Oracle” Adams who has lived and traveled in Russia for so long that he always knows the answer to every question you put to him.  The name of the hotel didn’t really inspire anticipation of a really nice hotel, so we were pleasantly surprised by the clean, well decorated, spacious room (complete with mini bar and fridge), king-sized bed and convenient location to all the major sights we wanted to see…all at a really reasonable price.   Once there we visited The Winter Palace, now home of the Hermitage museum, and walked to the banks of the Neva River where we saw one of Rostral Columns of St. Petersburg.  We had to make it a point to visit The Church of the Spilt Blood just so we could tell our Moscow friends which was better…that or St. Basil’s Cathedral because there are feelings of competition between residents of the two cities as to which is more beautiful.  On the way to Stroganoff’s Restaurant we walked past The Admirality and on the way back to the hotel from the restaurant, realized that St. Isaac’s Cathedral was right at the end of our block!  So with good restaurants right within walking distance (and THE BEST Bakery/coffee shop across the street!) and great shopping, the hotel couldn’t have been in a more perfect location.  I wish we could put all the pictures on here, but it looks as if I’m just going to have to break down and set up an account on Picasa and just share all the pictures there.  I’ll let you know when we get that together.   My one regret was that we didn’t spend a week in St. Petersburg and spend the entire week combing The Hermitage.  It was absolutely mind boggling with so many priceless treasures, paintings and antiquities that we just couldn’t do a quick pass, but had to stop and soak up every single thing; which, of course, got us through maybe 1/10 of the entire museum!  We left the buffet of beauty unfulfilled and wanting for more.