St Petersburg, 30 th of August-2sept 2008

Saturday the 30th

Pauline, Julien, Bernhard and I wanted to go visiting Peter the Great's Palace, built in 1714-1725 in Peterhof,
but we missed the train for it, so we went to one of the largest English gardens of Europe in Pavlovsk:

In the parc, a building with a pianist, and spectators.
from left to right: Pauline, Julien and Bernhard in Pavlovsk parc
Un ecureuil... Il y  en avait de milliers...
Ha! ha! Just for the joke, the only shining part (so the one that is touched) of this bronze statue is???? I let you guess!!!
One of the lake of the parc...

That's Paul, the son, and successor to the throne of Peter the great. But that one was not great at all....
Recovering from the hang over of the last night...  :)
Playing the tsars, in front of Pavlovsk castle.

As we came back from pavlovsk, I received a phone call from Svetlana, the russian cousin of my sister in law...
Cool !! We met the same evening and she showed me around the city in her very cool car.
Svetlana and I by the baltic sea side. A military submarine in the port.
Svetlana fashion car!
A bridge above the Neva river lightened at night.
Back to the house of Bernhard. That saurday night, we went to a party of some of bernhard friends in an appartment.

Sunday, I went to visit the Hermitage museum. But I stopped on the way in the summer palace Birds coming for pieces of my breakfast... Cookies!!
The Church of the Savior on Blood designed in the Russian revival style commemorated the place where Alexander II of Russia was assassinated in 1881. Alexander II was considered a great tsar, he was a progressist: he abolished serfdom, and was assasinated the day after his plans for an elected parliament, or Duma, were completed. The Information had not been released to the Russian people. The first action Alexander III took after his coronation was to tear up those plans. Alexander II was supposed to sign for a constitutional monarchy!! Too bad for him and the russian people...
Inside the church of the savior on blood... beautiful !

Pevchesky bridge in Saint petersburg city center...
And the famous Hermitage museum.... Unfortunatley , it was beeing restaured... The museum is housed in the winter palace, where the star were living a ruling the country from.
Inside the winter palace...  tha stairs.... magnificent.
The stairs again.
My favorite room, built for Catherine II... Followingare some beautiful arts pieces I really liked...

The next day, monday , the 1st of september, i went to visit the russian museum.
Unlike in the hermitage museum, the russian museum has only russian art pieces. And it is very ,very good as well.

The russian museum, was beeing restaured as well...

The Ninth Wawe, of Ivan Aivazovski.

Barge haulers on the Volga, Ilya Repin


"Nikolay Mirlikijski saves from death innocents convicts". Ilya Repin

Later that same day, I went to the train station ... Taking an overnight train to Moscow... In the 3rd class ones... Cool!


I slept in one of those beds... in russian platskard ... The 3rd class, it is a open space, no cabins...
I could have stayed one more week in st petersburg, and still have not see everything I wanted to... But my visa is only for 20 days, and there is still soo much to go and see... and the mongolian, and chinese visa to get in moscow....

Sometimes, travelling is not such a piece of cake.. A lot of planning has to be done, a lot of reading, to learn about the place, to find accomodation, to find your way and communicate in a foreign language...
Russian people doesnot speak english in general... And that makes it much more difficult... Buying a train ticket becomes a mission... I was writing in cyrilic alphabet the city of departure, the city of arrival, the date I wanted to leave, the approximate time... And if the lady understood, she wouyld give me the right time of deparetue, and a price... Which class ?? What time of arrival in the city? Well, No idea... That 's adventure!!!!!!