Good morning all!!! We are about to board our train for St. Petersburg, Russia. We just had our breakfast and our tour guide has just arrived to accompany us to the train station. Our tour guide reminded us to fix our watches ( 1 hour ahead )... just to make sure we do not get our schedules mixed up.
The train ride to St. Petersburg was 6 hours long. This time we did not have any problem with our suitcases since our tour guide was able to provide us some porters to help us put our suitcases into the train. Luckily we all were seated in one car.... and now for a souvenir shot....
We arrived 1:30 pm in St. Petersburg....
Yeheeyyyy!! St. Petersburg!!!!! Welcome to the land of Matryoshka dolls, Russian Icons, Amber and Faberge Eggs... This was the stop all of us were waiting for....We were met by another tour guide and we proceeded to have our lunch first before we start our city tour.
What do you buy when you are in Russia??????
The famous Matryoskha dolls.. these dolls are also known as the " Babushka dolls or Nested Dolls ".. If you haven't seen one .. they are a set of dolls decreasing in sizes and placed one inside the other. The more dolls you have the higher the price of the doll.. I heard the largest number of pieces in one doll is 60 pieces and costs around $2000. They are individually hand painted. The more intricate the design the higher the cost.
Hand painted ceramics....
Different designs of faberge eggs...
Lacquerware..
Amber jewelry...
Our first stop.... the Nevsky Prospect...
The Church of our Savior on Spilled Blood..
It was built between 1883 and 1907. It was built on the same spot where emperor Alexander II was assassinated in 1881. The church was closed for services in 1930 when the Blosheviks went on an offensive against religion and destroyed churches all over the country. It remained closed and under restoration till 1997 when it opened its doors to the public once more.
St. Issac's Cathedral.... The world's largest Orthodox Cathedral. It was opened to the public in 1885. We even saw a wedding entourage taking souvenir shots by the monument of Peter the Great.
Took a lot of city shots...
Peter Paul Fortress.. We will be seeing this on another day tour here in St. Petersburg.
this is a really good article!
ReplyDelete