Aug 17th and 19th–St. Petersburg

This blog covers the two days we visited St. Petersburg, Wednesday and Friday.  On the 18th we had a day trip to Moscow, which will be covered in the next blog.

On the 17th, we docked at St. Petersburg at 10:45am, and immediately headed off on a nine hour tour.   It took about 45 minutes for us to clear through immigration. To get off the ship you have to have your passport, an immigration card, the ship ID Card, and either a tour voucher or a Russian Visa.  They were very thorough, and even at the end of the day you had to show your passport and the immigration card to be allowed back to the ship.

Our first stop was to have a view of the city, and to see light houses, one of which is pictured.  In the old days ships bows were highly decorated, and war ships would cut off the bow of ships they captured or conquered.   They built these light houses with ships bows sticking out of them to symbolize the power and success of the Russian Navy,   There was a circular stair in the tower, and someone would climb up to the top to light the lamp.    At the same location we saw this gentleman with his bear, welcome to Russia!!!

 

Our next stop was the Peter and Paul fortress, to see the Peter and Paul Cathedral. The Cathedral was built between 1712 and 1733, on the site of an earlier wooden church.  Starting with Peter the Great, it became the burial place for the tsars.  The entrance of the Cathedral is under repair.  The walls are decorated with gold covered icons, and there is gold and gold leaf everywhere.

The tomb at the top of the first photo below belongs to Peter the Great. The single tomb is that of the family of the last czar, the Nicholas II and his family, including Anastasia, who were shot to death in 1918.   Their burned remains were rediscovered and interned here in 1998.

Driving around, we saw other sights, including St. Isaacs, the third largest domed Cathedral in the world, built by Alexander I from 1818 –1858, to celebrate his victory over Napoleon.  We also saw the Church of the Spilled Blood, which was built between 1883 and 1907 on the site of the assassination of Alexander II.  Most of the churches in the city are Russian Orthodox, and they have five onion dooms on the top, a large central one and four equal size smaller ones.  They are normally covered in gold leaf, as are two domes of the Church of the Spilled Blood at the sides of this photo.   But besides, its size, one of the things that makes this Cathedral unique is the number of domes, their unique placement, and their decoration.

We then drove out into the country side to the town of Pushkin to see one of the dozens of palaces, in our case one of the largest and prettiest, St. Catherine's’ Palace, where construction began in 1711 by Peter the Great’s wife Catherine.  You go through the gates past this modest little fence (left below), and are immediately struck by how large it is.   The second photo shows part of the main building in the palace. No photo I have seen can show you the scale of the main building.  It is 2,280 feet long.  (All Palaces had a chapel, and in this photo you can see the chapel in the corner with the more typical golden onion domes.)

Inside, many of the formal rooms are covered in gold leaf, with beautiful hardwood floors a chandeliers.  The main ballroom (photo above, left) is 8,460 Square feet, with a painting the covers the entire ceiling.    In on of the adjacent rooms the walls, are covered in individual paintings.   The immense porcelain tile tower in the middle of the wall is one of four stoves, the source of heat for this room.  I wish we could describe the palace, but mere words don’t do it justice.   We have seen the mansions in Newport and Biltmore, and they are dwarfed in size and opulence.    While this is one of the largest palaces, the area is covered with them.  It was amazing!!!!

On Friday we went to the Hermitage, which is in the former Winter Palace of Peter the Great.   As a former palace, you again are first amazed by the opulence and unbelievable size of the building.

 

Next you are amazed by the size of the art museum, it consists of four major interconnected three story buildings,with over three million items on display.  Major works include two Di Vinci paintings (first photo), a room of Rembrandt, Gaughans, Monets, Pissaros, Caravaggio, Picasso etc.  We did not even get into the sculpture area or to see the Greek and Roman art.  It would take seven years to see everything in the collection, even with just a brief look.

The front entrance to the museum is next to the Neva River, and the back of the complex is the Palace Square.

We had a wonderful time in St. Petersburg!!!

Aug 16th–Tallinn Estonia

 

We arrived at Tallinnn at shortly after 1:30pm.   There were already four cruise ships in port (Mike and Gina – one of them was the Emerald Princess –photo) and three cruise ship size ferries.   We took a bus a short distance to the old town (photo above the port), arriving at about 2:15pm.

 

We walked in past the double towered Viru Gate; and were immediately in the midst of throngs of tourists from all the the ships and land tours.    This is another walled town that dates back to the medieval period, with lots of historic buildings and churches.  The walls are topped with a structure of wood on the inside and stone on the outside, where archers could stand to defend the city.  They really looked neat.

  Unfortunately it also has the trappings of a modern city, with people handing out flyers for you to see this or that, costumed people encouraging you to go to the torture museum, and strip clubs.    It added some tarnish to what otherwise could be as wonderful a city as Riga was.  

Our first stop was in Raekoia Plats, the cities 14th century town square.   There we went into the old town hall, which is capped by Old Thomas.  The story is told that Thomas was a poor peasant boy, but a sharpshooter with a crossbow. He won the springtime parrot shooting contest, but because he was a peasant he could not win the prize, so he was rewarded with the job of town guard for life. The original Old Thomas is in the City Hall Museum (photo) with a replica on top of the town hall.  The Town Hall also had two of these cute dragons sticking from the wall.

After the town hall, we walked up to the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, a Russian Orthodox Church built in 1885, during a period of Russian domination.

We were not able to take any pictures on the inside, but it was wonderful.  Across the street is the pink Domberg Castle which is now used for government offices.

We found a little café in a courtyard, and had a cappuccino and diet coke while we launched yesterday’s blog.

We then walked back to the bus for an early trip back to the ship.

Again, it was a nice place, but it clearly has started to go over to the tourist dark side.

Aug 15th–Riga Latvia

 

We arrived at Riga Latvia at 10:30am this morning after cruising up the Daugava River and docking right next to the old town.  Riga was founded in 1201, and is now considered the Paris of the Baltic.   The old part has cobblestone streets, that convey a real sense of history, and is filled with sidewalk cafes.   We had our first very warm, sunny day of the trip, and it was a perfect location.  

Our first stop was Riga Castle, the residence of the President of Latvia.  We did not go inside but walked past the building.

 

Next we visited the Dome Cathedral which has one of the largest pipe organs in the world, with  more than 6,000 pipes.   Unfortunately it was undergoing its fourth renovation so we were not really able to see the organ.  We did see a lot of the materials that will be restored to the cathedral stored along a walkway and saw the beautiful stained glass windows inside the church.

We continued to walk through the streets and plazas of the picturesque old town.

We stopped for a drink at Double Coffee, Riga’s version of Starbucks, and used their WiFi. Nancy liked her Cappaccino with cream and chocolate.  The second picture is the top of the house of cats a curious building that has a couple of restaurants on the ground level but nothing else related to cats that we could see.

We stumbled upon the Maza Guild, which was a cultural and craft center from 1888, with the big hall (photo) and then to the Powder Tower, the only Tower from the old fortification system still standing.

We also saw an interesting nightclub, but as are ship was leaving at 4:00 pm, we did not get to check it out.  Overall, it was a great stroll through this delightful town.

We are sending this update from Tallinn, Estonia.  It may be the last update for a few days.  Our next stop is St. Petersburg, Russia, where we will be spending three days.  Unless you have a Russian Visa, which we don’t, you must stay on the ship except for the Guided Tours.  We are taking three excursions, and are not optimistic about finding a WiFi site.  The first day we are taking a 9 hour classical St. Petersburg tour, second day a 16 hour trip to Moscow, and the third day a 4 hour Hermitage (a museum) tour.  After tomorrow the next opportunity to check email and send the blog will be in Helsinki on Saturday.

Aug 14th Visby, Sweden

Visby is a medieval seaport on the island of Gotland, the largest island in the Baltic Sea.   It is a holiday island for Sweden and Visby is a UNESCO world heritage site.  It is a 13th century walled city (Photo) called the city of ruins and roses.  There is evidence that Visby was a Viking settlement as early as 900 A.D.  Today was the final day of their annual week long Medieval festival that attracts visitors from around the world.

 

The port is small enough that we had to tender in, and Nancy and I arrived about 11:45am.  We walked along narrow cobbled streets through the quaint old town and saw many people in medieval dress (photos).

Throughout the city are the soaring ruins of at least a half dozen churches from the 13th century that were abandoned after the Reformation.  Subsequently the buildings were used to house cattle; stones were removed to build other structures in the city.

 

We took a 3:00 pm tender back to the ship, and had a quiet afternoon.

For dinner we ate at the Polo Restaurant, one of the two specialty restaurants on the ship. We have not said a lot a bout the food on the cruise, but the food is one of the best features of the Oceania Cruise Line.  The menu’s have been designed by Jacques Pepin, and they really have the best food of any cruise line we have used.  This evening Nancy had a crab cake appetizer and I had the colossal shrimp.  We both had the iceberg lettuce wedge with blue cheese.   For dinner Nancy had the Filet Mignon and I had the Queen Cut of Prime Rib (16oz, compared to the 32oz, bone in King cut).

We took a quick walk around the deck a couple of times to burn off some of the calories  before stopping in to another food spot for ice cream for dessert.  Tomorrow, Riga, Latvia.