Day 13: St. Petersburg in Russia Travel Log

We woke up at 6:30 for a 7:30 tour to visit the Peterhof palace today. That was a price to pay for the early admission. There were very few visitors at the time we got there. It’s billed as the “Versailles of Russia”, but it’s actually quite a bit smaller than Versailles; the palace not as opulent/gawdy, not as big, not as large a collection of art. We had a guided tour for about an hour, and had 2 1/2 hours of free time for the gift shop and the garden. I surreptitiously bought an amber pendant for our wedding anniversary, (La Professeure was too absorbed in her own shopping to notice), so by the time we were done with shops, it was only 10am and we had 2 more hours for the garden. Mother-in-law was tired by this time so we left her in the shop (I think she’d rather shop than walk around the garden). We only got to explore one side of the garden because we were not efficient - we ended up walking past the Triton fountain 5 times for various reasons - to see the main cascade turning on, for ice-cream at the cafe, and for the bathroom. But the guide provided a recommended route, so we got to see the nicer fountains on that side and took lots of pictures.

The bus took us back to the boat for lunch, then back to the city center again for a canal cruise. I was a bit disappointed by the cruise because it was cold and drizzling, but more because it was so short. We started on the Fountanka river, and sailed up to Neva around the summer garden. I thought we would go into the canals around Hermitage, but no, we just turned back in the middle of Neva, and retraced our route. Still we got to see many sights around the route. After the canal cruise, we were bussed to Church of spilled blood, and got to see inside. It was quite impressive, especially considering every picture was mosaic.

We got back to the boat around 6:30, had dinner, and had the last bit of entertainment on the ship: they brought in Mariinsky performers to give an opera concert. The performers were very impressively trained, there was a tenor and a coloratura soprano with a dark voice. I was especially impressed by how tight they are with the piano, and how well the pianist navigated the piano. However, they performed the same Russian folk song we’d already heard 5 times - by this time I was quite sick of it.

Last updated April 27, 2020