Our group of nine with our guide, Julia and driver, Vladimir, drove all over St. Petersburg. Many palaces were covered in scaffolding as the clean-up of decades of neglect continues. We had good weather- amazing when you consider that there are about 220 days of rain/year.
I saw "Giselle" at the Hermitage theater the first night, riding the trolley with no one speaking English (I ended up walking the last 1/2 mile as it was the wrong trolley- who knew?). The next night I talked the group into joining me and we had a wonderful evening of "Swan Lake" at the Conservatory. Dear Vladimer picked us up afterward so I avoided another trolley adventure.
Peterhof Palace was just as glorious as when it was built beginning in 1714 by Peter the Great. It was badly damaged in the war and has been completely restored, so the fabrics and parquet floors with their beautiful mosaics ,and the gilded domes are pristine. For more information on the bomb damage to St. Petersburg (Leningrad) you might wish to look at some of the Nuremberg trial testimony at
http://www.nizkor.org/hweb/imt/tgmwc/tgmwc-07/tgmwc-07-65-04.shtmlThe siege of Leningrad lasted 900 days from September 1941 to 1944. By the end of the siege, some 632,000 people are thought to have died with nearly 4,000 people from Leningrad starving to death on Christmas Day, 1941. The first German artillery shell fell on Leningrad on September 1st, 1941. Our guide's Mother was taken by HER mother across the frozen Baltic to Siberia. Many froze to death on that route of escape.
The Church of the Spilt Blood (dedicated to Resurrection) was built in 1883-1907, near the Griboïedov canal, at the place even where on March 1, 1881, the emperor Alexander II was mortally wounded by a terrorist
Palaces along the Neva
Small market near Peterhof
Peterhof Palace
On July 17, 1998 the last Russian Emperor Nicholas II and his family were buried in St. Catherine Chapel (Ekaterininsky Predel) of Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg. This was 80 years after Nicholas II, his wife Alexandra, their children and several close servants were murdered by local Bolsheviks in the town of Yekaterinburg, on July 17, 1918.
The Hermitage Theater built by Catherine the Great
Our favorite cafeteria
Not a soul spoke English........we pointed to what we wanted and smiled.....a lot.
Fabulous Folk Dancers for our last night performed in one of the palaces, now turned into a theater with a resident CAT who slept on the grand staircase......
My Uncle Dave has a new house. 
I even learned to climb the stairs !!
This is a gorilla nest.....(who knew????)
Lots of stuff for little kids like me....
I sure had a busy day!
A little therapy session with Dad and cousin Jessie.
I guess I am a very special little boy.........
I sure had a busy day!
A little therapy session with Dad and cousin Jessie.
I guess I am a very special little boy.........
