Cruising out of St. Petersburg

Our route

We left last night on the Neva river to start our trip to Moscow. We're going to travel 5 rivers, 3 lakes, including the 2 largest lakes in Europe, 2 canals and 1 reservoir going through 18 locks.

Our morning lesson was on the Cyrillic alphabet and some simple Russian for our home visit today. Cyrillic is confusing, especially where they use the same letter as we do but pronounce it differently: B is V, H is N, P is R, C is S. Now I understand why USSR, was written in Cyrillic as CCCP (SSSR).And then of course, there are all the Greek, Hebrew, and Cyrillic only characters.
Tea and Pirozhki at Yuri and Vera's

In the afternoon, we visited the small town of Svirstroi, 2000 people, mostly employed by the hydroelectric plant. Our host family was Vera and Yuri who built their home here in 1946 and have lived here ever since. During World War II, this area was occupied by the Finns. Yuri's family escaped elsewhere. Vera's family was put in a German concentration camp where 3 of her 6 siblings died. After the war, her father built their house with wood heat, no running water, but it has electricity and satellite TV. We had tea and pirozhki, a pastry filled with vegetables or fruit. It was our peak in rural life in Russia.

As we travel the rivers, the scenery is similar to Northern Wisconsin with many birch and conifer trees. We can see many dachas, summer homes, for the people who live in the city.

Peter's Places

Peter and Paul Fortress

Our first visit today was at the Peter and Paul Fortress, built in 1703 to start the city. It never was used to protect the city, but was primarily used as a political prison, Dostoevsky and the 1917 provisional government spent time here. Today it is largely museum space. Inside is the Peter and Paul Cathedral which is very different from traditional Russian Orthodox churches. Rather than an onion dome it is crowned by a tall spire with an angel on top. The interior also has battle flags, statues, and a pulpit, very unusual features. All the Czars since Peter the Great are buried here, including the family of Nicholas II, who were interred here on July 17th, 1998, 80 years after they were executed. All the coffins are identical white except for Alexander II and his wife, who freed the serfs.

Interior of Cathedral

In the afternoon, we visited Peterhof, built on a hill over the Gulf of Finland. The grounds are covered with 150 fountains, all gravity fed. The entire complex was built to celebrate Peter's victory over the Swedes. It was all destroyed by the Germans during the 900 day siege of Leningrad (St. Petersburg). The Great Cascade is the highlight of the fountains glittering in gold on our sunny day. There are also many trick fountains throughout the park to the delight of giggling children.

Peterhof's Grand Cascade

We also toured the Catherin block, built by Elizabeth I, but lived in by the future Catherine the Great for 16 "miserable" summers, when she was ostracized by her husband. The rooms today are primarily in Empire style with each room in a single color with gilded chandeliers. This was how Alexander decorated it in celebration of his defeat of Napoleon in 1812.

Yusopov Palace

Yusupov Palace

Our historic visit today was the Yusupov palace, home of the second wealthiest family during the 19th century, next to the Czar's family - Romanov. The palace is known for two reasons. First, it is a very livable palace, much more so than any imperial palace. The palace was lived in by 3 people: mother, father, and son with 200 servants. The personal rooms are small, but ornate, but the highlight is the beautiful theatre that could hold 118 people. Second, this is where Felix Yusupov murdered Rasputin, because they felt that he had too much influence over the Czar, Nicholas II.

Palace Theater

Nicholas had married Alexandria, a grand-daughter of Queen Victoria, and after bearing 4 girls, a son was born. Unfortunately, he had hemophilia, which was kept a closely guarded state secret. Rasputin, a self-taught monk, gained influence because he was able to control the bleeding through prayer, when the doctors couldn't. The family isolated itself from the royal court to keep their little secret and Rasputin was one of the few able to get an audience with the Czar at any time. To the court, he was a womanizer and drunkard, yet they would bribe him to use his influence.

Rasputin was invited to the Yusupov Palace by Felix using Irena, his wife as bait. There they fed him cakes with Cyanide, shot him 3 times and when he still was moving, clubbed him, wrapped him in a carpet, and dumped him in the river. The autopsy showed that he eventually died of hypothermia. These events are recounted with wax figures in the basement room where it all occurred.

In the evening, we did a canal tour seeing the city as Peter the Great meant it to be seen from the water. The historic center of the city sports numerous palaces, now being used for many purposes. The weather was perfect for a cruise, low 70's so everyone was in the open air enjoying the sights.

Catherine's Palace

Catherine Palace Throne Room

A unique day - the 300th anniversary of the founding of the town of Pushkin and we were there. Security is everywhere and roads are closed because the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox church will be here to rededicate a church. The town was renamed on it's 100th anniversary for the poet, Pushkin, because he grew up here. But we're her to visit Catherine's Palace, named after Peter the Greats wife, but primarily used by his daughter, Elizabeth I. The 2nd floor of the palace is where the royalty lived and entertained, thus it is all glitter. Since the town was occupied during World War II by the Germans most of the building was destroyed and thus the palace is completely rebuilt. The first floor which was mostly servant quarters is not reconstructed yet. The main throne room takes up half of the palace's second floor. When it was built, it was the largest unsupported room in the world. We walked through many rooms filled with glittering gold decorations, chandeliers, and parquet floors to the highlight of the palace, the amber room. This room was dismantled by the Nazi's and the original 100,000 pieces of amber have never been found. It took 8 years to rediscover how to tint the colors of amber from it's natural yellow and black to the reds used in this room, and another 22 years to rebuild the room. Amber is used in many different colorful patterns here. After touring the rest of the palace rooms, we visited the gardens, some French style, some English with their many pavilions. With the short summers (last freeze in early June, first freeze in late August), the gardens were filled with flowers to celebrate the warm months.

Panel in Amber Room

In the evening, we attended Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet at the Alexandrinsky Theatre. The girl who played the angle of death stood out as the most interesting of the dancers. Both the music and the dancing climaxed in the death scenes, which were charged with emotion. This 19th century theater was one of 5 royal theaters in Russia. It too was a spectacular setting, recently refurbished. Upon leaving the theatre, the sun was still shining, sunset will be about midnight and sunrise at 4 AM. We're in the period of 'white nights' where the sun is never more than 6 degrees below the horizon.

Russia and Urkaine

Iconostasis of St. Issacs

We had an uneventful trip from Denver to Frankfurt to St. Petersburg yesterday.
Our guide, Misha, joined us this morning for our first day. St. Petersburg was found in 1703 by Peter the Great after he regained this territory from the Swedish. He built the Peter and Paul Fortress to defend the city and personally created the plan for the city. Today, there are 5 million people and 80 rivers or canals separating the city into 42 islands.
We started our tour at St. Issac's Cathedral, the third largest domed cathedral in the world, though it didn't seem that big. Built on former swampland, they pounded tree trunks into the ground and then cut off the tops evenly to provide a solid foundation. It also has one of the first non-masonry domes, it is a triple dome built of cast iron. Originally, the cathedral had many paintings, but due to the high humidity they blackened before the church opened in 1858, so they were replaced with mosaics. Another major restoration was required after World War II since the Cathedral suffered heavy damage. The mosaics had turned black and even the marble was stained. The Mosaics were cleaned, but the marble had to be shaved about 1" in order to recover the colors.

Little Hermitage Pavilion

After a light lunch with vodka, we visited the Hermitage. The Hermitage consists of several buildings, the most historic is the Winter Palace was built in 1762 to serve Catherine the Great. It has 1024 rooms. We saw only a few of the masterpieces in the museum: the Peacock clock, Italian paintings including 2 of DaVinci's 10 known paintings and works by Raphael, the gallery of Canova sculptures and works by Rembrant. As remarkable as its contents are the frescoed ceilings, parquet floors, and ornate doors of the museum itself.

Michangleo's Crouching Boy