Friday
Traffic today in St Petersburg s seems as bad as Moscow. We head off to the Hermitage museum. Jana is very curious about Australian spiders. We tell her about the huntsman spider that walks around the house, but we just consider it to be a pet. She is horrified at the thought of a spider in the house. I tell Jana that Victor’s favourite beer in Australia (Redback) is named after a spider. Victor confirms, much to Jana’s disbelief.
See two paintings by Leonardo da Vinci. Unlike the Louvre in Paris, we are able to stand as close as we like(just don’t touch).The building is quite amazing. Just the doors and the parquetry flooring would make the visit worthwhile. There are rooms full of paintings by Rembrandt, Rubens, Matisse, Picasso, Raphael, Gauguin etc and our guide is excellent and so well informed and keeps us thoroughly entertained for four hours. It is obvious that we have only touched the surface of what is a wonderfully rich art gallery but towards the end we are passing through rooms of Picassos with just a cursory glance which makes you realize that we must leave the rest for a return visit in the future perhaps?
On our return Ken went to the local supermarket and is cooking up a delightful meal despite the instructions on the packets being in Russian. It all goes down well with the french wine he has bought.
The mini Hotel the Austrian Yard is great but up four flights of steps with no lift so we will have plenty of exercise
Saturday
Today we went out to Pushkin and Pavlovsk. On the way out, Jana wants to check up on the spelling of some new words we have taught her (no not ones you think). Yesterday, there was an angry motorist on the road. We said he was “not a happy little vegemite”. We have had to explain all about vegemite. Victor has tasted vegemite and tells Jana it is unusual and he will bring some back next time he goes to Perth. Jana also checks on the spelling of “marron”. She is trying to remember the difference between marron, crayfish and lobster. She almost understands when I tell her about yabbies and gilgies. We tell Victor to ask his son-in-law about them. He says this will be too difficult for him to remember and the only reason he can remember about squid is because it squirted him with ink.(yesterday there were squid and octopus stories, but these are too complicated to relate) The two Russians are learning more about Aust than we are learning about Russia
We arrive at Pushkin and are greeted be two musicians playing Waltzing matilda. Jana wants to know about the story behind the song. Australia is sounding very confusing to her.
We arrive at Pushkin (formely known as Tsarskoe Selo – the village of the Tsar). Here there are over 600 hectares of parks as well as Catherine palace. Designed by the great Russian architect Rastrelli (he seems to have designed most of Russia) The palace was used by the German army during the war. They looted all the treasures and then set it on fire when they had to retreat. There are photos showing the degree of destruction to the palace. Any German guide would need to give a very diplomatic description of its history . However the restoration is amazing aand complete. The amber room was the highlight as the entire room is lined with panels of carved amber. The original amber panels were looted by the Germans and have never been recovered. (hope there aren’t any Germans reading this blog) the new panels have been reconstructed from detailed drawings and has been financed by a German company
After Tsarskoe Selo we head off to Pavlovsk. Catherine the Great give this palace to her son Paul. Wonderful gardens as well as an impressive palace
Sunday
Final day of touring and we head out ot Peterhof. Another magnificent palace to tour. However the highlight is undoubltly the gardens with its fountains. Some of the fountains send water nearly 20 metres into the air. This is all done without the use of any pumps- water rushes down a series of pipes for a spring some 22kms away and this water feeds the many fountains in the property.
Time to say goodbye to Jana. Victor will drive us to the airport at 5am next morning. We give them a tip because they have made the experience so enjoyable. But we tell Victor he still has to turn up at 5am. He says”may be” More Russian Humour. We hope so.
