On Tuesday September 6th we took the Allegro, a very nice fast train from Helsinki to Saint Petersburg. It left Helsinki at 11am and arrived in Saint Petersburg at 2:30 pm.
All immigration formalities took place in the comfort of our seats on the train. The Finnish officers quickly stamped us out of the EU and shortly afterwards the Russian authorities boarded the train. We were instructed to remain seated during the whole operation.
First, military police went through the carriage with sniffer dogs, than another officer questioned us about the contents of our bags. Finally, another officer slowly examined our passports and Russian visas. Once satisfied with our paperwork she stamped us in and moved on to people in the next seat we were officially in Russia.
We had a driver pre-arranged to meet us at the station and take us to the Hotel Vera. My first impression of the city was it seemed huge and there seemed to be an incredible number of military personnel everywhere.
We were warmly welcomed at the Hotel Vera and after a little extra paperwork registering with the hotel were ready to head outside and explore the famous city.
We walked all the way down the main Avenue Nevsky Prospekt towards the historic heart of the city. We walked past the massive State Hermitage Museum, The Summer Palace and the Church on Spilled Blood.
The atmosphere felt different than other cities but different in a way that is hard to explain. The crowds were huge especially considering it was rush hour. Nevertheless, looking beyond the crowd the view was incredible as we both experienced that "I can't believe we are really here" feeling.
On our first full day we managed to take the city bus. Once we figured out to pay one of the people in the back and not the driver we were on our way to the heart of the city.
We walked around Hermitage Square again and around the Church on the Spilled blood which got it's name by being built on the exact spot where Alexander II was assassinated in 1881. The church is incredibly beautiful. Although it is somewhat Disney cartoonish in design and actually modeled after St. Basil's in Moscow I couldn't resist referring to it as the Blood Splatter Cathedral.
From there we went to see a famous statue of Peter the Great on a horse. We ate lunch out side and then continued on to find some famous theatres. Finding The Mariinsky theater was a big thrill for those of us who are into Ballet.
The next day, Thursday September 8th we took the bus back down to the Hermitage area again where we got in the line to purchase tickets for the State Museum.
After about three hours in there we managed to see a number of its famous treasures from around the world. Some highlights included walking up the grand staircase trying to tell time from Peter the Great's golden peacock clock, seeing Egyption mummies that looked better than any we had seen in Cairo and and going through a very interesting Korean Exibit. Some paintings we saw included Leonardo Vinci's Madonna and Child and Rembrandt's Prodigal Son.
It is a huge musem, one of the biggest in the world where one could spend days and days and still not see everything. We were satisfied after finding a few key items in the time we had given it.
After that we headed over to Blood Splatter Cathedral and managed to make our way through the inside of it as well.
On Friday September 9th after finishing a nice relaxed breakfast at the hotel we got our stuff together and walked over to the train station.
Our train pulled out of Moskovsky Station in Saint Petersburg at 2:30 pm as we made our way to Moscow.
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