St. Petersburg (2)

11th of September
We had breakfast (the same dry breakfast buffet) and then took the metro in to town. St. Petersburg’s metro is said to be the worlds deepest. We don’t know if that is true but it definitely feels like it. We timed going down the escalator and it took almost 3 minutes to get from ground level to the train level. We got of at "Mayakovskaya" Station and wanted to check out some travel agencies to see what city tours or events they could offer. The agencies turned out to be of no help at all so that was just a waste of time. We carried on to "Nevsky Prospekt" metro station and walked to the Winter Palace where, as I mentioned in the earlier report (St. Petersburg (1)), the Hermitage (art museum) is located. We have read that if you were to stand for one minute in front of each piece of art in the museum it would take you nearly five years before you could leave. The director of the museum also said once that - "I can’t say that the Hermitage is the number one museum in the world, but it’s certainly not the second". Well, we had to see it and wanted to be able to dedicate as much time as possible so we decided to come back early the next day. Since it was already late in the afternoon we decided to do something else, but only after we had bought tickets to the ballet "Giselle" at the Hermitage theatre for the following evening. Then we walked over to the St. Isaacs Cathedral, one of the worlds largest, where we climbed up to the top of the dome and enjoyed the views of the city. After that we went for an hour at an internet cafe and then dinner at an Indonesian restaurant called "Sukawaki".

12th of September
After breakfast we went for another session at the internet cafe. Then quick lunch and on to the Hermitage museum, finally! It is grand and we can definitely recommend it to anyone who visits St. Petersburg. The building itself is fantastic and filled with interesting sculptures, artefacts from Ancient Egypt, Babylonia, Greece and all corners of the world. If you are still not impressed it houses a large collection of western art which include for example Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Rubens, Rembrandt, Monet, Pissarro, Renoir, Cézanne, van Gogh, Gauguin, Picasso, and Matisse. There is much, much more to see however, including for example the Russian imperial regalia, an assortment of Fabergé jewellery, and the largest existing collection of ancient gold from Eastern Europe and Western Asia.

Quick dinner consisting of sushi at the "Banzai" restaurant. Still no local food, but at least we got some Russian caviar in the makis :-) Then we went to see the ballet Giselle at the cosy hermitage theatre. Two very enjoyable hours for about as much as a Russian state pension (2500 rubles, but i think the average pension is actually even lower than that). We took a taxi back to the hotel and the negotiation about the prize was hilarious. We tried to get it for 400 until we realized we were 10 rubles short and tried to get it for 390. After a long discussion the taxi driver said, "-Ok, 350 then!". DONE DEAL!!!

13th of September
The last day in St. Petersburg we spent packing and checking out and then on to an internet cafe for a longer session to burn our photos to CDs and to upload some photos for you guys. At the hotel they told us they could not help us send anything other than printed material (!) so unfortunately we haven’t managed to mail them home yet. We went for a quick lunch at a cafe and then we went back to the hotel to get our bags and get to the station. We found the train and got on all right without any problems.

More about the ride later!!

Lots of hugs!!!!

Fredrik and Sabrina