Suzdal, by the see

It appears that a number of pieces we uploaded from Lystavanka have disappeared into cyberspace and appear neither on blogspot nor on our iPad. Sorry about that ... They were mostly about St P but also included our meeting up with our TransSiberian Express group when we moved hotels.

It has turned out a very good group -- the Australians are mostly teachers, one Canadian principal, a couple of students and their parents from the UK via Germany. Our leader Andrew hails from NZ, and has done the trip a few times but mostly works in Borneo.

First part of the trip was overnight train ... our first go in the 2nd class coupes (two sets of bunks) that we'll use for the rest of the trip. Began the acclimatization process and development of the routines that will serve us so well in the months of small group travel to come (ie always interrupt the group leader, need to be told things three times, quote Lonely Planet guides to resolve misunderstanding, develop great tolerance for others' travel anecdotes etc).

Early arrival at Suzdal.




Suzdal is one of a number of early Russian capitals, preceding Moscow and St Petersburg, and is now pretty small but with lots of churches and cathedrals. Mediaeval Russian cities were based around the central fortified kremlin, including cathedral, dwelling for metropolitan etc, and Suzdal was apparently also further defended by a ring of outlying fortified and guarded monasteries.




So from the Kremlin museum buildings you can see onion domes in all directions ... quite a lot of which seem to have been cathedrals at one time or another




We had breakfast in a local home after checking into our hotel and some initial exploration. Then a guided tour around the main parts of the old town, including museums etc.










We visited an historical display of Siberian peasant housing -- and of course churches, but everything in wood -- then back to Elena's for dinner and impromptu dancing...








- Posted from China. How far behind we are!

Croydon by night

A late night/white night river cruise also gave us an example of tourist-funded hooning on the water.

Each midnight in the summer the canal cruise boats take out to the River Neva to watch the various bridges across being raised to allow the large ships to navigate the river.

As there are several bridges being raised in turn, this generates much macho if relatively pointless jockeying for position to obtain the best views of this rather modest spectacle for the enthralled thousands of tourists.

See evidence below. Another one of those quite fun things you wouldn't get around to doing in your own town.










- Posted when wifi permits

St Petersburg: a fortress and a Russian retrospective

The final places visited in St Petersburg were the Fortress of St Peter and St Paul, essentially the fortified island on the mouth of the River Neva where Tsar Peter I first settled; and the Russian Museum.

The Fortress is the kremlin of St P, and as such contains a mix of military buildings, official residences and cathedrals, including one that contains the tombs of the Romanovs, including those killed in 1917 and at least one pretender (these put in place quite recently).


















Hot day, waiting for the bus in whatever shade there is ...

The Russian museum -- in another palace -- contains works of Russian artists from early icons on, together with some crafts.








Our search for a new jigsaw was finally over ...





Sent some postcards yesterday, and very relieved to have uploaded a few missives at last.


- Posted when wifi permits

Why do Tsars get to be saints?

Arrived by plane, caught a bus to the main station, and the underground to a stop near our hotel. Of course near and far are relative terms, when lugging luggage over cobblestones or temporary boardwalks around building works with temperature and sunshine up a notch here.

Nice little hotel with free wifi; hence the catchup in weblog. Breakfasts a little more basic; sausages more like hotdogs, supermarket bread etc. No luck with soy milk coffees let alone decaf. Made an immediate friend.



Naturally Russia is a little less English-compliant; the masses of tourists in St P are more likely from other parts of Russia. And there are masses, making it all a little more breathless, even though the tourist sites are more Disneyland than Luna Park, their scale imperial rather than royal.




Our local church, of which more later. We spent two days at the Hermitage, Winter Palace etc. The need for bolshevism is suddenly urgent, as subsequent updates will tell.


- Posted just before we catch our first real train.

Location:St Petersburg

Suddenly Sweden

Caught a fast train over the bridge to Sweden and on to Stockholm for a couple of days. The train was quiet, as well as fairly spacious, clean, comfortable.




Stockholm is just that bit bigger than Copenhagen, and the city appears more modernized, although still few tall buildings by Melbourne standards, with some interesting architecture and public art.




Also has more museums per square inch than anywhere else in the entire world, apparently. Visited the architecture museum, full of model buildings (no Lego) and tales of urban reclamation. Boat trip around harbour, castles, scenery, churches etc.





Nice to hear tourist operators bragging about Sweden's welfare state ... We might have high taxes but everyone gets looked after, maternity leave, child care etc etc.

Arlanda airport and off to Russia, where pools of photos already await.

-- Catching up using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:пер. Крылова,St Petersburg,Russian Federation

So many Danish, so little time

Yes, pastries in Denmark are better than Danish pastries in Melbourne. Not that we sought them out. Some were always just a little out of reach ...



National Gallery -- quite taken with installation of transparent hanging spheres, some with plant life inside or outside.








Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, a privately endowed museum set up by the beer baron to provide uplifting and improving access to art and antiquities. Includes original Rodins 'the thinker' and 'the kiss', and lots of other marbles.




However viewing the 'watermother' Sue realized that a class of preppies was nothing really ...




Posted from my iPad when Sue is not playing games

Location:пл. Островского,St Petersburg,Russian Federation

A few more things ...

Hmmm. Wifi is not quite as ever-present in Scandanavia as we had begun to expect. So getting photos up took rather longer than I expected.

More tourism in Copenhagen. Hopping on and off buses. Took advantage of current royal connections with Tasmania to visit Rosenborg palace/art collection/royal regalia. Think Tower of London meets Launceston. Lots of old gaudy, although in some way this indicated a certain lack of interest in royalty, as portraits were all crammed together in a way which probably made sense in 18th century but looks quite claustrophobic today. Possible factoid: Danes did away with need for a coronation, and just announce the new monarch from balcony of parliament building. So crown jewels can be enjoyed for their history-artistic merit alone ...




NB While portraits of royalty on the walls were slightly boring, once you got past tracing the family nose, you could always gaze upwards to the ceilings in search of ecstatic alternatives ...







Botanical gardens.




Very large glasshouses. Very unsafe vertigo-inducing metal steps to a narrow walkway in palm canopy. Very pleasant restorative ale (Carlsberg).




Today' prize, by the way, goes to anyone aged 31 or under who can translate the sign.




Abandoned our principles and shelled out kroner for the Tivoli Gardens, built in late C19 to provide activity for young men who would otherwise tend to join riots, so we were told. Seem to have discovered independently the SSPS fete formula of constant activity for children, often involving mass near death experiences, with unending food and drink options for adults.




By the way, tHis is as close as we got Legoland ...




Posted using BlogPress which works best with less photos...

Location:St Petersberg

Copenhagen photos

Here are a selection. More to come ... Too many photos and Blogpress has a little spasm ...
















Stroget. Long-established and famous pedestrian walkway and shopping area, with equally long-established pan piping street performer.









Garden courtyard of the hotel.




















The 'black diamond' national library



- Posted from Stockholm airport

Being tourists in the first town

Modest hotel --we scored the only room with a balcony, although I expect that it will be our task to lower the flag to half mast if occasion demands -- but wifi works. Although that ain't saying much since the trains have carriages marked Fri Internet. Weather warm -- almost got sunburnt on Monday because I forgot to take a hat (laugh, Anna, Liz, laugh) -- although the main thing is the long period of daylight. Seems to get light at about 3.30 in the morning, but that might be because the clock on the giant TV in our room hasn't caught up with summer time. Gosh, CNN is so good too ... Still, there may be soccer tonight on Eurosport.

Most of our time here has been looking round the central parts of the town and the odd museum. We've taken a canal tour -- see where TLM would be if she wasn't in fact in Beijing -- and hopped on and off buses to see the quite bizarre royal art collection, crown jewels, etc; the botanical gardens, with very large glasshouses; the famed famed famed Tivoli Gardens, a sort of a cross between Luna Park, a nineteenth century Disneyland, the Show and the Spensley St fête ... Including a slightly posh nouveau Japanese restaurant where we ate. It will be very large pilsner infused with caraway for me please!

More time on buses and foot today to the national gallery and the Ny Carlsberg Glyptotekt, a privately endowed collection of sculptures and antiquities. Lots of fabulous marble to set Kiera Knightly's pulse a-racing, including Rodin's 'Thinker' and 'The Kiss'.

Selected photos follow.

Today's challenge is: on what days of the week can you use wifi on Copenhagen trains? Answer by email before we break exciting news from Sweden and you could win a chance to receive a personalized 100 word commentary on continuity in Danish architecture from the seventeenth to the twenty-first century.

In the event of a tie, please also advise exactly what the Queen said at the Un that so moved the delegates of Trinidad and Tobago.


- Posted after a large Pakistani meal.

Location:Copenhagen