A few hours sleep made us feel much better. I woke up with a terribly sore neck though. I think it's from sleeping on short beds, with hard pillows. Maybe I'm just getting old.
Our hotel is horrible. It's another Soviet era disaster. The sink in the bathroom drains into an open grate on the bathroom floor. The shower is not separated from the rest of the bathroom, so water goes everywhere. The best is the extremely bright neo sign that shines through our window. Awesome. Amazingly enough I seem to sleep perfectly fine. Meredith isn't coping so well though.
We attempted to get the bus into town. It only costs 11 rubles per person. Cheap as chips. We waited in the freezing cold for about an hour before we gave up on our bus and grabbed a cab.
Nizhny Novgorod seems to have a lot going for it. There are some beautiful buildings here. The city is located at where the Oka and the Volga rivers meet. There is a lot of river traffic keeping the city busy. There are many beautiful churches, several statues, lots of bars, and a completely intact Kremlin. There are two main shopping streets that are pedestrian only. It's a great city to walk around. The locals seem more light-hearted than their cousins in Siberia. There seems to be more smiles and laughter around. There are beautiful views of the river at a monument to an explorer(his name escapes me)who in 1938 flew non stop from here to Vancouver over the North Pole.
It is quite cold here. Although there is no snow to enhance the beauty of the city, it is still my favorite place in Russia so far. There doesn't seem to be as much air pollution here. The Russians do have an issue with littering. There seem to be piles of garbage in areas around town. The main shopping areas are spotless, but as soon as you leave these areas the problem becomes easily apparent. Also, I haven't seem a recycling bin in ages. I'm not sure if they bother.
