Russia/Mongolia/China Trip Day 2: Around St Petersburg

On the morning of Day 2 (technically Day 1 but I guess yesterday sort of counts) we had breakfast at the hotel. I’m always curious as to what constitutes breakfast in a new country and there were some interesting choices in Russia. There was bread/toast, veggies, cheese, sandwich meats, potatoes, bacon, pancakes (which were really really good), porridge, cereal, and, of all things, green beans. That was definitely a first! After breakfast we met with Misha (short for Maria), our guide from Intrepid. After talking through all the schedules and logistical details, she arranged for us to have a walking tour around St Petersburg and we headed off to meet the tourguide, going first via the Church of the Spilt Blood.

This church, with the stereotypical Russian onion domes, was built on the spot where Alexander II was assassinated. In 1881, Alexander was inspecting the troops, like he always did, when a bomb was thrown into his royal carriage. The man who threw the bomb was immediately apprehended and Alexander wasn’t wounded but he got out of the carriage to make sure everyone was ok. When he did, another bomb was thrown at his feet. This one exploded, injuring him. He was rushed to the Winter Palace where he died of his injuries. In his honour, his grandson Nicholas II had the church built for him. During the Stalinist period the church was abandoned, so much so that a bomb landed on the roof of the church during WWII but because it didn’t explode, it wasn’t found until they started doing renovations on the church years later.

The inside walls are absolutely covered with mosaics of the saints and scenes from the life of Jesus. We couldn’t really discern any chronological pattern to the scenes but just about every single story from the Gospels was represented. The central dome had an awe-inspiring, if not slightly creepy, picture of Jesus looking down on you and blessing you. No words, nor pictures, can adequately describe this place!

Well hello there Jesus!

We then walked through Mikhailovsky (St Michael’s) Park, past the Russian Museum, and past the Engineer’s Castle. This castle was built by Tsar Paul, the son of Catherine the Great. Known as Crazy Paul, Paul was massively paranoid was convinced someone was trying to kill him. He built this castle to serve as protection for himself. His fears of assassination were well founded, however, and ironically, he was killed inside this Castle. Because nobody, least of all his son Alexander I who succeeded him to the throne, wanted to live there, they gave it to the Engineers to become a school. It was here that Dostoevsky studied as a mathematics student.

Back of the Russian MuseumEngineer's Castle

We then met up with our tour guide who took us around the sites (both well-known and less well known) of St Petersburg. We started at the apartment building from which hundreds of people “disappeared” during the reign of Stalin. In 1939 this building was cheap to live in and therefore it was full of artists and writers. These people tended to believe ideas contrary to the Stalin regime and they were very unpopular with Stalin. In 1939, the KGB came through and rounded up hundreds of people from that building alone. It is still unknown what happened to all the people taken away; some were shot immediately, some taken to prison, some to camps, some were never heard from again.

We then walked through an area that used to be controlled by the Swedes. This area has a nice church that used to be really gorgeous but was abandoned during the Stalinist timeframe. Like most churches, it was completely abandoned and was even used as stables. The happened to many churches and most of them have yet to be rebuilt or refurbished to their original state.

Next stop was the Winter Palace, which is now the Hermitage Museum. We’re going there on Wednesday so I’ll save any information I have on that until then when we actually go inside. Across the courtyard from the Hermitage is a building designed by the architect Rossi that has the longest façade in the world. In the middle of the square was a giant column that was made of one single stone of granite. Pretty incredible for a column that size, it must weigh a ridiculous amount!

Next stop was St Isaac’s Cathedral, one of the darkest Cathedrals (in terms of the colour of the stone) I’ve ever seen. Commissioned by Peter the Great, it took over 40 years to construct and was finished during the reign of Catherine the Great. There is a statue of Peter the Great in front of the Cathedral. We’re planning on coming back to go up onto the dome to see the view of the city from there.

From St Isaac’s we went to a market in the centre of the city that sold fish, meats, cheeses, fruits, and vegetables. We would have wandered around a bit more if Col France hadn’t gotten us kicked out for taking photographs...

After the market we wandered around the city a bit more, seeing more of modern St Petersburg and being told about the various neighborhoods and apartment complexes. Apparently they’re very segregated by wealth with certain areas being very rich and others are much poorer. We finished our tour pretty close to our hotel and came back to rest a bit before heading off to dinner.

We ate dinner at a Georgian restaurant. We had lots of different salads, veggie dishes, and meat and chicken kebabs. The highlight of the meal was khachapuri which is essentially Georgian pizza. It was a pizza like crust with melted goats cheese baked on top. It was really good. After dinner we tasted “Russian Cola” or Kvass which was really undescribable and not at all similar to any American or British soft drinks.

On our way back to the hotel we went to an area of St Petersburg that was the headquarters of the counter culture movement and the underground social movements. Lots of bands played there and there are lots of tributes to the Beatles (despite the fact that they never actually went to Russia). It was pretty cool to see this area that was known for its counter culture in a place where counter culture really went a long way towards creating lasting social change. We then walked back to our hotel after a long and amazing first full day in Russia!